I think the universe realised that the London public transport infrastructure had given me far too easy a ride for the last few months, and spun the bottle this morningmy final day commuting to Victoria.
It all began sitting opposite Miss Piggy on the train towards PaddingtonI have now learned to play loud music to drown out her inane smug babble. I filled my ears with “Black Dog Barking” by Airborne, turned up to eleven. Thankfully a good friend then appeared inside my phone by the magic of the internet, and the journey whistled by.
Suddenly we were pulling into Platform 14 in the distant reaches of Paddington Station, and I became a part of the jostling sea of very important impatient idiots. Yet again my train ticket didn’t work in the automated turnstiles, and yet again I had to fight my way towards the sole member of staff dealing with 300 people who’s tickets didn’t work.
After trying to avoid pretty much anybody and everybody for the next few hundred yards, I descended the steps into the subterranean world of the London Underground, and discovered that the circle line was helpfully shut. Wonderful. Time to follow the brown(ish) signs (I’m colourblind) for the Bakerloo line, and go via Oxford Circus.
Eventually I made it onto a train, and switched on the BBC Radio 4 News Quiz podcast. The News Quiz podcast has a habit of being incredibly funnywhich I realised (yet again) while grinning like a lunatic in the middle of the underground train. I also noticed somebody was staring at meno doubt wondering why this guy was peering at the floor with a massive toothy grin on his face.
On approach to Green Park, the stop before Victoria, the train driver helpfully volunteered “We will not be stopping at Victoria Stationthe station is shut to all incoming trains. We have no further information at this time”.
Wonderful.
After something of a mad scramble into the daylight at Green Park, several hundred people pulled phones from their pockets and began frowning at Google Maps (I’m guessing the ones using Apple Maps were the ones walking into the river). I spotted a sign for “Hyde Park Corner” and set off in it’s general directionI’ve spent long enough working in London now to have a vague idea what is where.
Along the way I stopped several times to take photographs of things I had never seen beforelike the RAF war memorial, with quite possibly the best (read:only) sculptures of airmen I have ever seen. I spent a few minutes marvelling at it before trudging off through the rain once more.
I hadn’t looked at my phone since arriving at Paddington, and had some vague idea in my head that I was going to be massively late. Turned out I arrived only a few minutes later than usual. Go figure.