Another Train Journey, Another Hotel
Tomorrow lunchtime I will make the familiar journey on foot to the local railway station, head first towards Kings Cross in central London, and then on to the north of England. The better part of another week spent living from a hotel room far from home, sitting among strangers in a foreign office, and pretending to fit in.
I will survive throughout the week on pre-packaged salad bought from nearby convenience stores, cartons of orange juice, instant coffee, and bars of chocolate. I could opt to sit alone in restaurants and watch the world go by, but there’s something terrifically lonely about watching first dates and fat businessmen while eating your “pizza for one”.
I could sit in the hotel lobby with a free drink, and pour my head into a succession of inane blog posts, but that would mean ignoring the loud, obnoxious salesmen that tend to frequent hotel bars, or the sanctimonious cretins complaining to hotel check-in staff about less than stellar free WiFi.
Therefore I will in all likelihood sit in my room with my laptop for company. I will pay for a half-decent connection to the internet, and jump down the infinite rabbit hole each evening, in search of myself as much as anybody else.
Expect navel gazing. Lots of navel gazing.