My Train Journey This Morning

[Mich the Tester]

Train packed beyond capacity, only 10 minutes late into Utrecht. No smells, too many OAPs, no urine.

Dutch railways in complete chaos at the weekend due to fire in signals office in Utrecht; apparently there are no back-up or fail-over systems if a signal room is closed down, which is not very reassuring.

[Mich the Tester]

UPDATE; there IS a back-up signalling room and system, but it's in the same building as the operational system so was also damaged by fire.

Permission to use the word 'cretins'?

[2BIT]

think?

Take a decision, man! I know I hate them.

it's a feeling I only really tend to get whilst traveling or driving or shopping or.... actually pretty much any activity where I encounter them

I've been thinking that the quiet carriage makes things worse - you always get some numpty disturbing the peace of everyone else but it annoys me a whole lot more when it's meant to be a quiet carriage, its a shame that first class tickets are so ludicrously over-inflated

[norrahe]

it's a feeling I only really tend to get whilst traveling or driving or shopping or.... actually pretty much any activity where I encounter them

I've been thinking that the quiet carriage makes things worse - you always get some numpty disturbing the peace of everyone else but it annoys me a whole lot more when it's meant to be a quiet carriage, its a shame that first class tickets are so ludicrously over-inflated

But when said idiot disturbs people in the quiet carriage, no one says anything to them and sit there casting dirty looks and tutting.

[2BIT]

But when said idiot disturbs people in the quiet carriage, no one says anything to them and sit there casting dirty looks and tutting.

that's true, I can never be bothered with the drama and it seems that neither the conductors or the trolley staff can be bothered with it too

[norrahe]

that's true, I can never be bothered with the drama and it seems that neither the conductors or the trolley staff can be bothered with it too

If you ask nicely it always seems to work.

[gricerboy]

But when said idiot disturbs people in the quiet carriage, no one says anything to them and sit there casting dirty looks and tutting.

I refer you to the very first post in this thread, and I quote:

Boarded the train this morning only to realise that it had a reverse carriage configuration so found myself in coach D, the quiet carriage, instead of coach A. Well, I didn't realise this at the time and I had just put my Walkman on & was privately rocking out to ELO when I had a tap on the shoulder and was informed by my neighbour (who was wearing spandex pants, hi vis jacket and STILL had his bike helmet on) that this was the quiet carriage and could I kindly turn my appliance off as they are not permitted. Well, I have never been surrounded by such a bunch of intolerant smug little Nazis in all my life. Even the bloody clatter of my laptop keyboard elicited a reaction from one of them! I swear they were all trying to kneecap me with their bloody fold up bikes as we filed off the carriage at Swindon .

[Mich the Tester]

Later train this morning due to visit to physio. Intercity train, only 3 carriages, 0.5 first class carriages, packed so full half the passengers were left waiting behind at the station (including me). Railway staff ran away to avoid a lynching.

Bloody OAPs on their special reduced discount cards making the off-peak trains overfilled.

[Pondlife]

A bit if "it's cold outside and my bed is warm" tardiness this morning meant I caught a slightly later train which was of course on time. No time allowed for coffee and croissant though.


Still, it's Thursday so in the words of the Proclaimers "I'm on my way from misery to happiness today, ah-ha, ah-ha"

(probably warrants a or I should think)

[Mich the Tester]

No train this morning. Stayed in hotel nextdoor to clientco for a bit of a rest. Ended up boozing in the pub till 1 o'clock this morning. Fried breakfast in hotel was most welcome.

Chaos at the rail network operator is now being discussed in parliament; it seems there may be a majority in favour of dissolving the network operator and bringing network directly under ministerial responsibility. Governing parties have had enough of tulipe railway services.