And I ask myself "How did you get here?"

A while back I mentioned that I had installed statistical tools on this blog (and my website) that enable me to see what criteria people use to find me - Are they Googling for ‘Driving lessons in Nairn’? Have they seen my car and searched for ‘Farle Driving School’? Or are they bored at work and coming to this blog to feed the fish? Most people visiting these sites are searching for ‘Driving school Elgin’, or ‘Driving lessons in Ullapool’, or ‘The best instructor in Culloden, probably’ for example. But I also get lots of views from people who have searched for ‘Gairloch Harbour’ and get a link to here simply because I put a pretty picture of the harbour on these pages several months back. Other unlikely search terms include ‘John Otway’, ‘Peer pressure’, ‘What’s the worst road to turn out of?’ and (worryingly) ‘Paedophile Boat of Garten’. I must hastily explain that this search directed them to my post, last Christmas, where I described a Santa’s train journey through Boat of Garten (a place in the Cairngorms) and pondered on the social acceptability of including Gary Glitter’s Rock and Roll Christmas on our party playlist. However, I can’t help but wonder what they were actually looking for.


Perhaps I should try to capitalise on this and slip words into this blog which may attract millions of hits on search engines. So don’t be Lady Gaga confused if, while you are reading about the X Factors which cause skidding, or you want to know when to Justin Bieber your horn, or what I think about the complete Wagners who tailgate my pupils, you notice the odd pop culture reference slipped in.

One topic that does seem to be on the increase is ‘BSM’. recent search terms have included ‘Is BSM a good company to work for?’ (You don’t work FOR BSM - their instructors are self-employed driving instructors with a BSM franchise) And ‘AA or BSM?’ (I can’t say, I have little knowledge of an AA franchise). Obviously, if you are looking for driving lessons you should come to me, rather than BSM, but, if you are thinking of becoming a Driving Instructor, I would gladly recommend BSM. Personally, if I was still with BSM I would be disappointed at their recent decision to switch back to Corsas from the Fiat 500 (the Vauxhall is a lesser car in my opinion), but I know many instructors will be happy with the decision. BSM’s is certainly not the cheapest franchise, but I found their training very thorough. I recently had a blitz on old paperwork and was amazed at the amount of training material I accumulated.

Another reason to recommend BSM to new instructors is the level of support they provide; at least, the support was certainly good in Inverness. The office would do everything they could to keep my diary booked up weeks, even months, ahead. Since I left BSM I sometimes miss that planning. At the moment I have more pupils than I have ever had before, but my diary has large gaps after the next three weeks. Nothing for me to worry about (I hope), as many of my pupils work shifts, or have other reasons for not being able to plan too far ahead and I know they will book lessons nearer the time. Even so, not having the office to plan ahead for me keeps me on my toes and I have to keep looking ahead to where the next pupils are coming from, especially with ten pupils taking their tests during the next month.

Facebook, The Inbetweeners, Call of Duty, Cheryl Cole, Ipad, Obama, The Wanted, Wii, Free games, One Direction, Twitter, Football, Amazon, Take That, Hurricane, Top Gear, Zac Efron, Twilight saga, Playstation, Robert Pattinson, Free porn….. There, that should boost the number of people reaching my site via search engines.