44060 – 06:57 Tuesday 22nd April

The Easter Weekend has to be the best weekend of the whole year without a shadow of a doubt and I would gladly bare-chested wrestle anyone to the death who claims to the contrary, but that being said one thing I did miss over the four days of enforced chocolate eating was the constant stream of shared commuting hell that my virtual cohorts experience. It’s definitely one of those situations where you start to count your blessings as the only thing that was untoward with my journey into town today was the reverse formation of the 06:57 whereas everyone else seemed to be battling with tidal waves, rabid dogs and people talking too loudly in their phones.

That’s not to diminish the unsettling effects of a reverse formation of course. Apart from the fact I have to slog my way to the opposite end of the platform it also means that other more fair weather travellers are now encroaching into my space and my favourite Carriage A gets much fuller as a result.

Carriage A on this particular service was carriage number 44060 and I managed to get a seat next to a regular chap who scores about 7 out of 10 on the scale of good travelling neighbours. He never hogs any of the armrest and never makes any unnecessary noise apart from the constant keypad tapping on his Blackberry. He must have been catching up on Easter break emails as the device never left his hand for the whole journey and there were so many to catch up on by the time we were pulling into Platform 9 he was all of a flap scrabbling to put away his glasses, files and all manner of accoutrements. Usually after each email he zips the phone back into various jackets and compartments only to go through the reverse un-zipping procedure 10 minutes later when the reply drops in so at least on this occupation we were both spared any zip induced RSI damage.

Arrival at Paddington was punctual if not slightly early and my disembarkation was only marred by the fact that in reverse formation my chances of trying to surreptitiously get a photo of the carriage number was foiled by the stampede of suits making a charge for the tube. So instead you’ll have to make do with a screenshot of three very fine tweets from the Uptight Commuter (@uptightcommuter) which very succinctly sums up today’s commuting joys.

Hope the poo was most enjoyable....

So, that’s 3 down, 444 to go.