44025 – 18:03 Wednesday 11th February

44025

44025 was the Carriage A on the 18:03 to Penzance.

I got to Reading and then spent the next 90 minutes just hanging around the station.

Here’s what I wrote to the lovely folk at FGW tonight.

I was travelling from Paddington to Thatcham on 11-02-15 when I was left stranded at Reading due to signal failures in the Reading West area.

I arrived at Reading at 18:30 and was eventually put in a taxi to Newbury at 20:10. I arrived in Thatcham at 20:40

During the 100 minutes of delay at Reading station I was staggered by the sheer incompetence of the station staff who didn’t seem to be able to organise any sort of consistent message to the hundreds of passengers in similar positions as myself. At one stage we were all directed to the help desk only to find a single member of staff, with a frightened caught in the headlights look in her eyes, who didn’t even know there was a signal failure never mind what was happening.

When the Station Duty Manager turned up 15 minutes later he whispered some garbled message about buses that could only be heard by the first row of the number 200 or 300 hundred people surrounding the desk. The only way to have a chance of finding our what was happening was to trail a member of staff around and listen in to the whispered conversations they were having between themselves.

Eventually we were then directed to the steps down to the short stay car park where I waited on the steps for about 40 minutes with not one shred of communication. When I eventually reached the front of the taxi queue I was amazed to see it being organised by G4S staff and local police with not one member of FGW staff visible.

You are no doubt in the process of claiming your own compensation from Network Rail for the signal failures because in your eyes you will believe this delay was not your fault (although one could accuse you that your inability to work in any sort of a functional way with your partners makes this just as much your fault) but what cannot shrug your shoulder of, is why your staff simply cannot deal with any sort of a crisis situation. All that was needed tonight was someone with a level of confidence to raise their voice so all could hear (maybe stand on the help desk so all could see) and loudly announce what was happening. No-one is expecting magic taxis and buses to be produced from thin air but I do expect to be kept informed of what was happening and a competent level of organisation.

I am an annual gold season ticket holder and would like to know what compensation I am due for the almost 2 hour delay not to mention the atrocious discomfort suffered.

42034 & 42062 – 18:03 & 18:37 Tuesday 10th February

42034 & 42062

Well back in the saddle after a weekend away and a Monday that saw me travel home a la taxi.
42034 was the chosen Carriage F on the 18:03 Penzance service and what was also chosen was the seat next to me by the wazzock in the head to toe orange day-glo.

This strange fellow gradually smelt more and more like fish the nearer we got to Reading so by the time we were pulling into Platform 7 I could have been working the past 6 months aboard a Grimsby trawler.

42062, Carriage C on the 18:37 to Frome was less smelly but more noisy thanks to the little lad in front who was driving his model space shuttle with accompanying spit bubbles.

Good to be back.

44086, 42167 & 42021 – 07:15, 18:03 & 18:37 Monday 2nd February

44086, 42167 & 42021

A three carriage capture today and an insight into what goes on aboard the slightly later than my regular morning train.

A sleepless night, even more disturbed by the annual running of the World Handegg championships saw me awaken slightly later than normal and only make it to the station in time for the 07:15 instead of the 06:57.

But every cloud has its silver lining and it allowed me to capture 44086, Carriage A on this particular service.

As I was settling down on a rather uncomfortable table seat, I noticed a Thatcham regular about to take a spare seat towards to the back of the carriage. Just as she was sitting down, the chap in the window seat leapt up, quite loudly announced “I’m not sitting by you!”, picked up his suitcase and flounced to another spare seat further down the carriage.

Which just goes to show that there’s a much lower class of commuter aboard this service than my usual one.

The evening’s journeys home were aboard 42167, the Carriage F on the 18:03 Penzance service and 42021, the Carriage C on the 18:37 to Frome.

And the lesson today was, don’t tweet pictures of strangers to other strangers as the tweet might be seen by other strangers who are known a bit to the second stranger and they might call the original tweeter (a complete stranger) intolerant. Or, on the other hand, carry on regardless.

42209 & 42224 – 18:03 & 18:37 Tuesday 27th January

 

42209 & 42224

Well I know I made the offer for someone to jog my memory by mentioning “Leopard Print” or “French Nails” but I didn’t expect Mr (or is it Mrs? (Miss?)) @cr_rail (oooo they are cross) to be on my back morning, noon and night.

“Blah, blah, blah BGC, where’s the Leopard Print update? I can’t live my life without it. It’s so boring on the train without a blog update to read…..” and on and on and on and on.
So before he/she/it has a hernia, let me get today’s carriages out of the way and then we can get onto all things animal and keratin.

It was 42209, Carriage B on the 18:03 to Penzance and Carriage C, 42224 on the 18:37 to Frome. Highlight of the journey was sitting next to a chap reading what would have been called in my day, “Dungeon Master’s Guide” and looking at the pictures of the scantily clad elfish women.

So “Leopard Print” and “French Nails” – I boarded the morning train last Thursday and treated my rear end to one of my favourite seats, the isle seat next to Mr Williams. Mr Williams is a very dapper gent who boards at Reading. For those still trying to place him, he’s the chap who comes into Carriage A and usually yells out “Not that one!” as some Reading wazzock tries to steal his reserved seat. And just so everyone knows I’m not quite the stalker this post is making me out to be, how do I know he’s called Mr Williams? Well it says so on his reservation.

Anyway grabbing this seat means you’re almost certainly guaranteed a double-berth to yourself at least until Reading and as Mr Williams hasn’t been around for a while, if you’re really lucky, you get both seats to yourself all the way to London. Alas on this particular Thursday, two seats to myself was not to be, as I was surprised to be disturbed by Mr Williams himself and there was nothing else to do but to leap up like a startled gazelle and let him in.

But then the next day, Friday, I was fortunate enough to get the same seat again but somehow didn’t notice until I was sat sitting down that Mr Williams’s very own seat was occupied by a lady of certain years who was draped head to toe in Leopard Print. And yes, you’ve guessed it, she also had French Nails.

Now before I get accused of anything anti-sexual (or even sexual) this lady was perfect fine, she didn’t hog the armrest, she didn’t sniff or snort and she didn’t pick her nose with those perfect nails, but the journey wasn’t all sweetness and relaxation for me as I was worried what would happen at Reading when Mr Williams was sure to board.

Obviously I’d have to get up to let him in, and presumably she would too, but then what happens to that single vacant seat? Do I take it again as that’s where I was sitting and after all, it was Mrs Tigeress who’d made the original mistake? Or would she somehow expect to be able to do a sort of reverse “First Come First Served” and expect me to slink off and try to find another free place?
At the end of the day it was panic over as Mrs Tigress got off at Reading and Mr Williams was presumably having a long weekend as I ended up sitting next to some sweating day-glo clad cyclist, which was less than perfect.

So, it’s over to you, the jury…….if Mrs Tigress had stayed on, and if Mr Williams had come nipping down the isle with full expectation of his usual window seat, what would you have done?

42348 – 18:37 Monday 26th January

42348

Another week and another Carriage Capture, although only a single this time on the 18:37 to Frome where Carriage C, 42348 allowed me to sit in relative comfort even though a whole host of bag sitters and sideways long leg sitters were trying their hardest to block all the spare seats.

Still no-one has yet reminded me with the magic words of “Leopard Print” or “French Nails” so that story is going to have to wait.

In the meantime amuse yourselves with these pictures of 150001 who we welcome back to Reading tonight and this bloke who obviously didn’t think through the colour of his footwear when he bought his Brompton.

Queen of the 150's

King of the Dipshits

44036, 42206 & 42361 – 06:57, 18:03 & 18:37 Thursday 22th January

44036, 42206 & 42361

What’s this BGC, 4 carriages tonight?

Well, no, sadly only 3 but I did visit it 4 carriages in total, but alas 42129 was a duplicate although by my records it had changed from a Carriage E to a Carriage D since the last time I sat in it back in October.

But enough about that sort of boring stuff, let’s get down to the meat and 2 veg of today’s Carriage Capture.

Firstly there was 44036 on the morning train and it was a joy to capture a morning Carriage A and find it was one for the few A’s that I still haven’t got. There was a reason for capturing this one but I can’t go into details today. That said, lest I forget, one of my faithful readers needs to whisper the words “leopard print” & “French nails” and that will jog my memory to let rip with this particular episode.

This evening I first boarded the previously mentioned 42129 which was due off to Bristol but with 2 minutes to departure time the TM announced a train fault which led to me and several hundreds of my fellow travellers scampering across from Platform 2 to Platform 3 to board the Penzance service. Alas this last minute swap-a-roo left me without a seat and stood in the vestibule of 42206.

It was her rucksack as well.

Also stood with me was the owner of this fold up bike, it wasn’t even a proper Brompton, who not only dumped her monstrosity of right in the centre of the door into Carriage C but then proceeded to have a length, loud and quite profane conversation with someone on the end of a phone about how her bike had got damaged in the car park today.

Well to be honest love, taking into account the amount of consideration you showed the rest of us tonight, I’m actually quite joyful your shambolic effort of a cycle got knackered. Hope you had to push it all the way home.

The 18:37 to Frome saw me in Carriage B, 42361.

Remember – Leopard Print and French Nails.

42213 & 42250 – 18:03 & 18:37 Wednesday 20th January

42213 & 42250

Well no such excitement on tonight’s trains as it was Babs in charge.

42213 was my carriage of choice on the 18:03 to Penzance, this being a Carriage F.

And on the 18:37 it was Carriage B, 42250, which allowed my rear end to park itself.

Well there it is, if I could make it more riveting I certainly would…..but I can’t.