Travelling North Again
It's Tuesday night, and I'm sitting in a hotel in the north of England once again, 300 miles from home. I've already bought “dinner” from the local supermarket, already eaten most of it, and am now sitting with the laptop and a cheap bottle of wine that should last at least a couple of nights, but most likely won't.
I arrived here ridiculously late last night after something of a tortuous journey. Let's just remind ourselves that yesterday was supposed to be my “day off” (har har). A day off where I spent the morning taking our eldest daughter to the doctors, and the afternoon dicking around with a fish tank (our fish now have a better home than we do). At 4:55pm exactly I left the house.
At 5:25pm I arrived at the first train change of the journeywhich would normally be straightforwardand discovered the notice “train cancelled” on the information screens.
I walked into the street and looked at bus times. While doing so I noticed I was the only person being anything like pro-active, which sort of interested me, in that way you wonder why the hell nobody else seems to be in the hurry you're in. I needed to get to Euston in London by 7:30pm, otherwise I would lose my seat reservation for the long journey north.
The next bus would be in two hours. Crap. I looked on my phone, and found a taxi company. They could reach me in twenty minutesnot worth it, because the replacement train would arrive by then. I looked again, and discovered a taxi office perhaps a quarter of a mile walk into town, so set off in it's direction, bags slung over my shoulder.
I discovered a sign for a taxi office, but evidently no taxi office. Obviously the owners had invented it in order to appear on Google Maps. I rang them. I could have a taxi in twenty minutes. No good.
I wandered back to the station and started figuring out worst-case scenarios. The last train north out of Euston would be at 8:30pmtwo and a bit hours away. Surely that was doable? I called home, and waited on the platform in the cold. Finally a train arrived.
Oh. My. God. I think Captain Slow was trying to break all snail records on his way towards Paddingtoncrawling through each station at a little above walking pace. The normal 30 minute journey to Paddington took a little over an hour. I still had time though. All I had to do was get from Paddington to Euston on the Underground.
Circle Line. Off we go. Headed to Edgware Road, where we would have to change trains. Only we didn't, because the driver announced we were carrying on. I stayed put while other passengers jumped off the train and back on, looking bewildered. Baker Street next, and we sit in the station for an age. Finally the PA system crackles into life.“Apologies for the delay this evening Ladies and Gentlemenwe are just waiting for a change of driver, and then we'll be on our way”I was watching the hands on my wristwatch by nowfiguring out how far away we were, and if I could just walk to Euston in time. Thankfully I didn't have to.
I arrived in Euston station with just enough time to buy food and a drinkthe first since mid-morningbefore running down the platform to bag a half-decent seat on the train.
While being put through the ringer over those couple of hours, I started wondering how my life always ends up like thisalways running from A to Balways trying to be somewhere for somebody, on their rules, to their schedule. I thought about writing a horrible email to work, but didn't.
After leaving Euston, and storing all my stuff away, I stretched out with the Kindle tablet, plugged the headphones in, and became lost in “The Great Gatsby”the movie from a couple of years ago with Leonardo DeCaprio and whats his name in. I didn't finish watching itI got bored by the entire thing and looked up the synopsis on Wikipedia (I haven't read the book). I'm wishing I had read the book instead, because it sounds like it has a great statement to make about capitalism and greed, but the movie really does none of that. Oh well.
I still have the entire season of The Walking Dead on the Kindle to watch, but don't know if I will get around to itI'm attempting NaNoWriMo, and would like to at least get a few thousand words ahead this evening if I can.
I'll be posting excerpts over the coming dayswatch out for them.