A nice warm Bath

I went with my parents today, to the lovely city of Bath.

We drove up past Stonehenge to Warminster. Then a packed First Great Western train there, and a South West Trains service (as packed & very late running) on the way back.

Saracens beat Bath 12 points to 11 (away) at The Rec. Not the most flowing game of rugby I have ever seen. However a win is a win, and we are still at the top of the table, unbeaten in the Premiership this season.

It was also a very mild afternoon. Bath is a very nice city...

Laziness has a cost

Like many modern households I have an automatic washing machine. It needs feeding with some form of detergent and perhaps also fabric softener.

When I moved a couple of years ago, the kitchen also had a dishwasher already built in - that too requires feeding with tablets and occasionally other concoctions.

All this feeding takes money. What I tend to do is, every few months, go out to a supermarket and buy all my cleaning consumables in one go. This usually results in my shopping basket of non-food costs me far more than the usual basket of edible consumables. The cost of laziness.

This morning I was however somewhat astounded to see how much more some mental laziness could potentially cost...

I visited Sainsburys in Beaconsfield who charge £2.45 for a 250ml bottle of Finish Rinse stuff. Adjacent to the same bottles were some special offer flashed packs suggesting that two 250ml bottles of the identical liquid be bought for £5.85. Sorry, but I am not paying 95 pence extra for the privilege of two bottles being bound together in even more packaging. Even I am not that stupid. I suspect however that many of the well heeled residents of Beaconsfield (I am neither well heeled or a resident of that town) will unnecessarily take advantage of this rubbish offer!

Many supermarkets clearly mark their shelves with an indication as to how much a product costs per item or per 100ml. If more people took note of those labels they could safe plenty of money. A sign of convenience shopping?

Beaconsfield is a strange place on a Sunday morning as half the world seems to go out for breakfast. At 10.05 am the cafe in the supermarket was nearly full, the Costa Coffee had a massive queue inside and the small independent Italian style cafe was bustling. Maybe it's not laziness, but it appears to me to be a sign of plenty of money!

If you want nature, not shopping, The Chilterns Conservation Board publishes a series of handy walking leaflets that offer walks of various lengths to and from train stations with services offered by Chiltern Railways. Whether you live in the Chilterns, want to escape from London, or are a visitor to these parts, they are to be recommended. Included in the series is a walk between Beaconsfield Station and nearby Seer Green & Jordans Station. A word of warning - most of the time, trains only stop at Seer Green once an hour in each direction so you are advised to start the walk from there.

The clocks have gone back

Across the UK everybody has had an hour extra overnight. That is because at 2.00 am British Summer Time the UK moved its clocks back an hour to 1.00 am Greenwich Mean Time.

I thank it means that the entire population will have either (a) had extra time in bed or (b) got up earlier than they needed to or (c) had to work an extra hour, because the world does not stop spinning.

For me it was (b).

There could be a fourth option in that some could have forgotten (or didn't know) about the change. If that is the case, the individuals concerned will find out soon enough and then presumably suffer a weird feeling of instant jet-lag.

There have been debates, as there always are, about whether the clocks should continue to go forward in the early hours of the last Sunday March, and back again in the early hours of the last Sunday in October. One such debate is the ongoing argument for Scotland to move to its own 'Tundra Time' with the rest of the UK moving to European Time.

Personally, I like getting up for a little while with some daylight - the evenings don't mean much to me at this time of year. My vote (not that we have one) is for keeping things as they are and to keep the existing programme of twice yearly clock changes.

Just a little point of further confusion - 'Daylight Saving Time' does not finish in the the USA and Canada until next weekend.

Hopefully the debate is now over, at least until the clocks go forward again on 29 March 2010.

Make the most of your day - it's light out there! Rural Buckinghamshire beckons to me- by the time I get back home late this afternoon, it will be pitch black, so I am going to make the most of it.

Behaving with decorum

Look.. I know this is the first off-peak train of the day, so you probably don't travel to London every day.

You look well into middle age and are possibly a married couple.

So why the heck are you sitting on opposite sides of the carriage?

Ah. I get it. You are entering the national Dom Joly impersonation competition and don't want to drown out each others' shouting.

Note: Mobile telephones have sensitive microphones. There is really no need to be quite so inconsiderate.

Quick turn-around

My train into Marylebone just now arrived about 30 seconds before it was scheduled to leave for Birmingham.

Don't worry folks, you've got time to get on. The driver needs to get to the front. Please let us off!

You know it's Autumn when...

You get up and go outside, it is your normal time but the sky is still pitch black, except for the moon and the stars.

The only sound is that of a neighbour scraping the first frost of the season off their car windscreen.

Brrrr... It's a bit chilly out there.

Making up the numbers?

Two weeks ago, Saracens beat Gloucester at home 19 - 16. The official match attendance was 7,777.

Today, Saracens were again at home. This time they won 36-12 against Rovigo. There were 5,678 people at the match.

Hmmm.

Can you imagine?

In the future, you might well be taking to a friend who lives thousands of miles away.

They say to you "So, what's the name of your President?"

"President?", you say. "We don't have a president - we have a Queen and a Prime Minister."

"Oh", they say. "I thought your President was Tony Bl...."

OMG is that what we are about to have dumped on us?

Pickled? Us? Stewed and well and truly skewered more like.

A Busy Day

Today, I have been to Newcastle Upon Tyne for the day.

Two reasons - lunch with relatives, and to watch Saracens beat Newcastle Falcons away, 22 - 15.

I am not sure which was better, but it was a good day.

Departure from Chateau Centraluser in Rural Buckinghamshire was at 8.05 am this morning, arrival back was at 10.00pm just now. Not bad really seeing as we only landed at Heathrow at 9.09 pm and got off the plane at 9.21pm.


Can't rabbit on all night as I have to catch a train at stupid o'clock in the morning as it is to be, I think, my busiest day of the year at work.

Ho hum - well at least the rugby team I support are at the top of the table again.

Island Life

When I referred to A Better Place, I didn't actually mean that it was better.

What I meant was that; There were hardly any people, the people that were there were friendly, the scenery was fantastic and varied, I didn't need my passport but it was like going abroad, and there is so little pollution in the air that on a clear night you can see many times more stars than you can in the crowded South-East corner of England.

OK, on many levels I did mean that it was better!

I have just returned from a few days on the beautiful Isle of Arran in Scotland. Now obviously the means of getting there and back will provide plenty of blogging fodder, but for now, all I can say is STUNNING!

Yes, we were lucky with the weather. My experiences of holidaying in Scotland tell me to take the waterproofs, and to count it as a bonus if you don't need to use them.

Anyhow, here is a very small selection of the photographs that I took while on the island. Hopefully they will give you a feel of the place:

A Highland Coo in Glen Rosa
According to my Ordnance Survey map, this is called Glenrosa Water or Garbh Allt. I call it picturesque.
Afternoon sun on the beach at Blackwaterfoot.
A still day at Lochranza

And finally, just to add a modicum of topicality, this is the CalMac ferry that took us to and from the island. The "Caledonian Isles" travels several times a day between Adrossan Harbour and Brodick, the largest settlement on Arran.

PS: At some stage I might jig the layout of this post around a bit. For now it will do as I have to head off to Watford for the rugby.

Simple Rules

I try to live my life by some simple rules. You know the ones; "Though shalt not steal", "Though shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife / oxen" and similar.

Two more:

-Eat chilli with rice, and
-Eat bolognese sauce with pasta

Unfortunately, having just put the rice on to boil, I have just discovered that the tub of chilli I have defrosted is actually a very tasty tub of home-made bolognese sauce.

Given that it is a Saturday evening, I suspect that there will many worse examples of rule breaking around our towns and cities tonight...

A better place

A fair bit of public transport over the last week or so - the best part being when it was taking me away from the South East of England.

Having taken loads of photographs, it will quickly become apparent where I have been - this picture is just to whet your appetites.

Regrettably I got more and more depressed this morning as I joined the hundreds of office drones walking between Marylebone and Baker Street. Still, work means I can pay for holidays.

Now, where was I? Oh yes....

Grumpy People

On a Saturday afternoon, Chiltern Railways usually run a Northbound 1727 service from High Wycombe, which calls next at Saunderton, then Princes Risborough and then Haddenham & Thame Parkway.

As I mentioned at the time, there was a rugby match last Saturday at Wembley Stadium, so Chiltern were running a tweaked timetable to cope with the extra passengers, of whom there were plenty.

The trouble was, the Northbound 1727 service last Saturday was a different train to usual, so it didn't actually stop between High Wycombe and Haddenham & Thame Parkway.

Cue lots of people who had an unexpectedly long ride courtesy of Chiltern Railways. You can't really blame them. Many were grumpy.

Usual timetable:





Last Saturday's stopping pattern:

Forty Four Thousand Eight Hundred and Thirty Two

Yes - That's 44,832 people at Wembley Stadium for a club Rugby Union match. The top tier at the stadium was empty, but it was still pretty impressive and there was a great atmosphere.

Yesterday's match finished 19 - 16 to Saracens, though it has to be said that Northampton Saints put up a great fight and it was nail biting right until the final whistle.

I have to say, I was impressed with the effort that Saracens, as a club, put into making the afternoon a fun event. They had 'Diversity' doing some dancing, a rock band, the Royal Marines and an abseiling camel.

The first time I went to the stadium it was to see a concert , so it was good to see it in use for a sporting event. Despite my qualms about degraded public transport all went well, though Chiltern Railways' staff did seem to be letting too few people onto the platform for each train - I missed mine by about twenty people and the next one had a nearly empty carriage when it left the station. Still at least it offers me a virtually door-to-door service.

Apologies for the poor picture and video quality - I've come to the conclusion that my mobile phone is a rubbish camera.

Saracens are currently second in the Guinness Premiership - hopefully that will last a while, but only time will tell.

Diversity
Sarrie the Camel

The Royal Marines

Wemberleey!

For a reason that I haven't really been able to fathom out, Saracens are playing this afternoon's rugby match against Northampton Saints at Wembley Stadium. Somewhere around 35,000 / 40,000 rugby fans are expected on what could be a Bluebird Day (if it had snowed last night, which obviously, it didn't).

It suits me fine as it save a drive to Watford and the dreaded Match Day Parking CPZ around Vicarage Road - Today I can let the train take the strain, and possible have a sherbert or two, something I cannot normally do.

Chiltern Railways have extra trains stopping at Wembley Stadium - great for me, but with engineering works on the Amersham branch, and no Metropolitan Line from Northwood to Wembley Park and the Jubilee Line also out for engineering works, I suspect that London Midland services (serving both Northampton and Watford) at Wembley Central will be a bit busy.

Hopefully the rugby will not play second fiddle and it should be a great afternoon.

It's not too late to go - tickets are £10 on the door, £5 for children. Shades and shorts required.

So, what's my problem?

I have nothing against university, or of the concept of clever people studying hard to earn degrees that will help them push this country forward and far.

Many of the brightest graduates, or simply those clever enough to pass through an attribute based assessment centre process, are taken onto Graduate Training Programmes by large organisations. Mine included.

In my experience, some of the programme participants are rubbish. Most are good. A few are brilliant.

A brilliant colleague has just moved on, as have one from each of the other two categories.

Their replacements from this year's intake are to to arrive shortly.

My boss is teflon coated. My fear this morning was that I was about to be asked to line manage the newbies. I would really dislike doing that.

Fortunately, when my boss and I eventually spoke, he had other things on his mind.. Hopefully he was never going to ask me anyway.

The lovely ridge of high pressure currently sat over the UK means that it is now a truly glorious evening in Rural Buckinghamshire.

Seventeen Words

It's a beautiful sunny, morning. Not a cloud in the sky. I am walking from Marylebone to Baker Street.

My voicemail bleeps. Should I pick it up? I do.

Sigh. It's the boss.

"Hi xxx, it's xxx. Please could you give me a call? It's about the new grads. Thanks."

I have a sinking feeling.....

More later, and an explanation.

Ouch!

There are currently severe delays on the Central Line.

The next train from Northolt to West Ruislip is currently 23 minutes away and is at Queensway.

Ouch indeed.

Imagine if you will that..

... You have a full time job that involves working mixed shifts. The job is safety critical, with potentially dire consequences if you make a mistake.

The company you work for says that it will pay you double time if you volunteer to work exrra hours on Sundays.

After a period of time, the company decides that it no longer wants to pay you as much in return for you volunteering to work on Sundays.

You decide that you would rather spend the time with you family and friends.

Now imagine that you are a driver working for London Midland.

--
Sent from my mobile device

It appears that some people couldn't run a bath

I am sure that many people will find this quite incredible.

London Midland is a train operating company with a fairly extensive network of services.

Today (Sunday 6th September 2009) nearly all of London Midland's train services have been cancelled, due to many staff not volunteering to work today.

According to Bob Crow, the failure to volunteer "was not organised action by workers but a case of the contractual right not to work being exercised".

I find this a little strange. I don't know how many people have failed to volunteer to work today, but it strikes me that if London Midland have had to cancel most of their trains, the number must be statistically significantly different to the norm. In my experience, such a significant variation in the behaviour of people is rarely un-coordinated, or without cause.

Which ever way you look at it, this appears to be a case of management incompetence at London Midland.