The Light Side

My flight to Manchester was delayed by 1 hour 40 minutes this morning due to a broken down plane. Fortunately I was still able to get to the office in time for my meetings but would have preferred a lie in, had I known it was going to be late!

Just hope my flight home isn't delayed - I'm getting home late as it is

Saw mum and dad last night (as I had to stay overnight for an early London start this morning).

They looked well travelled with their tanned skin. When I initially turned up I thought they'd really got into the travelling part as mum had her hair in "pig tails", but it turned out that my nieces had put them in that afternoon.

They've had a great time and experienced some great things - you'll just have to wait to see Dad's blog I guess for all the photos and stories

Phew! A mad couple of days travel. Yesterday: home to London (Russell Square) to Finchley to Tilehurst. Today: Tilehurst to London (Pimlico) to Southend to home. "Gluten for punishment" the train ticket guy said to me yesterday.

Travelled back from Macclesfield early yesterday so didn't have a book seat (but did mean I could get a direct train and home about 4 hours earlier than expected). The downside was that the seat displays weren't working properly and what I thought was an unreserved seat wasn't.

At Birmingham I had to vacate my seat for someone who had booked it to Oxford and the train was packed. So packed you couldn't move between carriages and was a general nightmare with people wanting to get passed to get to the shop or toilet. It also meant I couldn't get a seat and had to stand, and whenever people got off at a station there was a frenzy to get their seats plus more passengers trying to get on Not fun at all!

By Leamington Spa I'd had enough standing and what with looking like I was going to have to stand till Bournemouth (about 2 hours away), I complained to the train manager about the seat displays. He was a nice chap and put me in first class for the remainder of my journey, which was nice

So all was good in the end. Got home earlier than expected and travelled in comfort.

I stoppped off at Mortimer (between Reading and Basingstoke) train station last night, and it's such a hive of activity that even the ticket office shuts at 13:00 on a weekday!