The Snail Rail Network - Live update of a train hopping fool....

There’s never a dull moment in the Life of I,

This week has involved my old nemesis ‘the snail rail network’ and I’m sat in first class (it was £1.50 more expensive than standard for a 5 hour journey and I get free food and drink!), stranded in the fens somewhere, no apology, no flutter of an excuse in sight. I’m fine though, it’s nice in first class.

What’s interesting is that I know if I was sat in standard class I’d be hearing moans and groans from the ever grumbling and much overcharged passengers. In here they’re all drinking wine, chatting about trips to Thailand, and seem oblivious to the fact we left Norwich half an hour after the scheduled 5pm departure. I wonder if there’s anything significant in this.

I’ve been pretty repetitive in my belief that we create our own luck, our own reality. Looking at the general vibe in here, it would appear that the more happy people are sitting in the more expensive seats. Did they create their reality by not getting bogged down complaining about the state of the national railway service and having a glass of Sancerre instead? Or, have they got far bigger things to worry about, including their massive overheads from the Richmond pile and the private schooling that Tarquin and Sebastian are attending, so a 30 min delay on the train is just 30 mins deferment from the awful stress in their real lives?

And why do we exaggerate our class wars by naming the posh seats ‘First Class’? Why not just call the 2 fares ‘Overpriced’ and ‘Ridiculous’ and see if it helps people feel more at one with each other?

What I do know is that I’ve been on the road for 3 days, my foot (the bad one) is crippling me, I miss my family and I want to be home on the 21:44, in my lovely reserved seat (carriage H, seat 07b), not the later train where I’ll have to jostle for position, possibly even facing backwards, which would be a terrible tragedy.

So, late again, working silly hours and constantly fighting to free up time, cash flow and brain space to take a deep breath and relax. It’s a rather 2013 style week so far, which isn’t really how I’d  planned 2014 to look. Needs must I guess, but it’d be good to be able to have some consistency in my working life rather than this total carnage.

Oh.. the news is that I got on the 5:30 train at 4:50pm and now I’m in danger of missing my connection at Paddington because I’m a dork! Ha, so the reason the people in first class are happy is because their train is on time. I’m the only fool who is running late.  Nice ticket man let me off mind, but he think I’ll miss the connection. With this in mind I’m going to keep this entry until I’m on the train, whichever one it is, just so you know what happened. How exciting…

This does say a lot about my frazzled little brain. I did a 14 hour day, solid yesterday, no lunch, no break and only one visit to the loo. Total and utter brain frazzler. It also shows that making assumptions about other people and their behaviour is pointless. I need to focus on me and my behaviour, how I can make the step to focus on improving myself, be it reading the platform number, or being the best dad and support I can be to my family. How odd that I should start to write and this episode of randomness unravel in real-time (this is completely true by the way, not some premeditated yarn). Everything has a meaning; this one is obviously to help me remember that my own improvement is critical.

Balls, this train has been delayed by signalling problems, which is really not helping my attempt to get home in my plush seat without delay. I live in hope..!

Good times! A Hammersmith and City train was just pulling in to the Liverpool St platform and I made it with at least 2 minutes to spare. Luxury is mine, allllll mine!!! Now where's the free stuff?

One love

Jez

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