Strange Thoughts of a Strange Man

Number 1: If you have a rucksack remember to keep it on your back. Not only is it more convenient for pickpockets but your fellow travellers love the extra room it takes up and the way it bashes into them every time you move. Don't feel it at all necessary to, oh, I don't know, take it off.
Number 2: Do remember to hold your Oyster card on the reader for as long as you can. You don't need to, of course, a simple short touch as instructed is enough but why waste an opportunity to make the reader have an error just as the person following tries to use their card? There's nothing commuters like better than being held up at the gate, looking a complete tit while a million people stand angrily behind them cursing their stupidity while you swan off in the knowledge of a job well done. Really, they'll thank you!

Labels: London, london underground, Oyster, stupid, tfl, Tube

It snowed in Orpington yesterday and today. It took me two and a half hours to get home last night on a train that was, at first, overfull and then, once emptier, slow as it was forced to stop at every signal between Lewisham and Orpington.

When I got to Orpington there were no buses so I had to walk home along with many other people picking their way gingerly across the frozen impacted snow. There were more people walking than normal all in a spread out line, like a walking bus for adults.

There were a lot of abandoned vehicles on the way home. I would expect that on country roads further out from the city but I can’t remember seeing that around here before. It was a bit of a surprise.

There were still abandoned cars and vans this morning as well as the odd dropped glove.

The thing that really surprised me was the pair of underpants I noticed on the pavement.

Labels: London, London Borough of Bromley, Orpington, Snow

Regular readers will know that I work in London. Today and tomorrow we host the G20 summit where leaders of twenty countries will meet to discuss the world’s ills and try to find solutions. Or at least that’s the plan.

I think if solutions are to be found to the world’s economic problems, and that is a big IF it has to be said, then I don’t think they will be found in one or even two days. It will take a lot more than that.

My own opinion, for what it’s worth, is that any solution will involve great and very drastic change and it won’t be pretty. It will probably be quite violent as well.

There are hoards of protestors mostly congregating in Docklands at the moment and there is a rally supposed to be wending its way through town as I am typing this.

For the rest of London, however, it appears to be a nice relaxed day. The tourists are still here, enjoying the sunshine and those of us that are here enjoyed a rather journey into work than normal.

Labels: G20, London, Protestors, Quiet

My sister paid me a visit over the last weekend. Mainly it was for her to go to the Last Night of the Proms on Saturday night (my sixth! David was on top form as usual) but we had plenty of time to do a few other things like some work on our family history and a hefty bit of gardening.

On Friday we played tourist and took a Duck Tour. This is a drive around London on a bright yellow converted amphibious truck with a tour guide. Towards the end of the tour, the truck drives down a ramp into the Thames and becomes, for all intents and purposes, a boat.

It's great fun and made all the better by the witty patter of our guide, Neil. We even learned one or two things about London that we didn't know.

Well worth a try on your next visit to town.

Labels: Duck tour, London

...who lived in a shoe. She had so many children she didn't know what to do.

Oh, hang on! Yes, she did. I remember now.

She took them for a trip to London on my bloody train.

Honestly, children and commuters do not mix. If you must take the kids to London do it after the trains are less busy.

Or better yet, become a lesbian. It's cheaper.

Labels: Children, London, Train

I prefer to walk if I need to get anywhere in London, especially this time of year. I generally find tubes and buses overbearingly hot and filled with very unpleasant and overbearingly hot people. And I don't mean hot in a good way.

I normally use the Transport for London journey planner to navigate but it can be difficult to coerce into giving me a walking route if it thinks the route too long. So I was pleased to find WalkIt.com which quite plots routes across large parts of London and doesn't try to suggest the tube if the walk takes longer than 10 minutes.

Labels: London, Route, Walking