Last Christmas I was given an Ancestry DNA kit. The DNA companies (there are a number) send you a little bottle with a plastic funnel that you have to dribble in. Register online, seal the sample and send it away to Ireland where boffins run it through their algorithms and send you (by email, how else!) the results.

When you register your DNA test you’re given the option of putting your results out into cyberspace or keeping stum, probably a wise choice if you’ve populated the planet with illegitimate offspring.

The results were quite quick, about three weeks and although most of my DNA was derived from a Blighty source, disappointingly as much had derived from Sarf of The River, in fact Kent and Surrey.

Now this is where it gets annoying, even if you discount the Old Testament’s assertion that we’re all derived from the same progenitors, our DNA stretches back through countless permutations of couplings.

The results throw up literally thousands of potential relatives from a cousin once removed to an 8th cousin 4 times removed, and it would seem that a distant uncle of mind was on the Mayflower, as I have dozens of distant relatives in the New World. As a result, I’m getting weekly updates of people I don’t know or care to know.

According to recently released data from Transport for London, the number of licensed taxis in the capital plummeted by 119 vehicles in the week ending 15th October 2023, while private hire licences continued to show an upward trend.

This left a total of 14,907 black cabs available to ply-for-hire in the capital covering 24 hours a day 7 days a week. during the same week.

On the plus side, 55 new electric cabs hit London’s streets.

In contrast, the private hire sector showed continued growth, with the number of private hire vehicles licensed climbing by a huge 206 compared to the previous week, reaching a total of 90,765.

These figures highlight the ongoing challenges faced by the traditional taxi industry, with some attributing the decrease in licensed taxis to high vehicle costs making it more difficult for part-time drivers to work.

The closure of TfL’s Lost Property Office on Pelham Street has resulted in taxi drivers being advised to take lost items to the nearest London police station. However, many drivers have encountered difficulties as the police often refuse to accept the lost property. This refusal contradicts the legal obligation for taxi drivers to hand over lost items. With the new lost property office located far away from central London, taxi drivers are likely to rely more on police stations to return lost belongings, particularly for drivers who operate on the other side of the city. These drivers face hours navigating through London traffic to drop off lost property in West Ham, resulting in what could be four-hour round trips.

In my corner of London, there are fields as far as you can see. So having Ulez cameras purporting to improve air quality isn’t supported by many, in fact, I haven’t spoken to any. This camera first had whitewash applied to the lens, this was swiftly removed by TfL. Someone then decided to use a more permanent method

For reasons now lost in the mists of time, I started uploading daily trivia. First I used what’s now called a burner phone to what was then called Twitter, although not realising at the time that social media is a two-way street. Then with my first iPhone, I discovered that multiple tweets could be scheduled, and more importantly that the snippets could appear here on CabbieBlog. Over time the posting services that I used have each fallen by the wayside or have imposed cost restrictions on the number of postings: Twuffer, Twittimer, TweetLater which morphed into SocialOomph. I then went to Buffer which allows, using a free account, 10 postings at a time. But now X doesn’t allow API keys from these third-party sources unless a large premium is paid. Now I’ve had to turn to Google Calendar to bring you the ‘Daily London Trivia’, tediously uploading the data, and using WordPress’ Upcoming Events widget. Now this new widget developed for their Gutenberg platform sometimes gives ‘No upcoming events’ instead of today’s trivia, their Happiness Engineers (an oxymoron) are trying to find a solution.