3706 days ago
As ever, I arrived at Paddington at 10.31 PM. It does not matter what time I leave Real Man in Clerkenwell my taxi always arrives just as the penultimate train of the day pulls out for Bristol Temple Meads. Then there is the dilemma.
I can hang around until 11.30 and catch the last train to Temple Meads. It will be full of English drunks and will stink of fast food. Gradually drunks get off the train but – especially on a Friday – drunks also pile on at Swindon and Bath heading to the bright lights of Bristol to get even more drunk. Does everyone born in Swindon have the intelligence of a 12 year old Orang Utan? The taxi fare from Temple Meads home is less than a tenner. But Paddington is a ghastly place to spend 45 minutes and the Mrs is not that impressed if I pitch up at 1.45 AM.
And so there is the 10.45 to Bristol Parkway. I get home just before 1 AM, the taxi fare at the other end is c£20 but there is less time to kill at Paddington. The real downside risk is that I fall asleep and this train carries on all the way to Swansea. I have more than once woken up to find myself heading into Newport, a truly dreadful place, and facing a £45 cab ride home. On this train there is also the stench of fast food but most of the drunks are Welsh. As such, while buying a coffee at the bar, I have just listened to three sheep shaggers discussing in a most animated fashion how to say “The toilet is broken” in Welsh.
I guess you learn something new every day.
4054 days ago
I thought I was clever catching the 10.45 to Bristol Parkway rather than the 11.30 Drunks Express to Temple Meads. I was wrong. It was a disaster. Newport at 1 AM was my punishment.
The Temple Meads trains stops in Bristol. And so however dog tired you are – and I was shattered – you will get some burly guard waking you up and you know that you will get home. The Parkway train heads off to Wales after visiting Bristol and last night I awoke to find it doing just that with me on board.
Newport at 1 AM is not a very nice place. I peered outside the train station to see two Police vans parked and waiting to deal with the local “nightlife.” Fat girls with short skirts and long heels tottered around wondering where they were heading next. Lagered up lads were hunting for a kebab shop still open. To quote Oscar Wilde out of context “the unspeakable in the pursuit of the inedible.” I refer to the kebabs here not the fat girls but I suppose that is equally applicable.
To be fair to Newport that is pretty much par for the course for any British town on a Friday night but I swiftly concluded that I did not fancy hanging around for four hours and sixteen minutes to catch the first train back to Bristol.
As such I struck a deal
