I was in London yesterday for a 1 pm business meeting and had allocated four hours from Wells, Somerset to central London. We left at ten to nine in the morning and soon discovered congestion on the M4 - ('lengthy delays after Swindon').
We diverted to Swindon train station where I abandoned Clare and the car. At 10.30 I was on the platform waiting for the 10.40 to London Paddington, still in plenty of time for my meeting. The tannoy spoke: the train was subject to 15 minutes delay due to 'animals on the line'. Really!
Like nuclear fusion, it turned out that the delay in arrival was time-invariant. At 11 o'clock I caught another train which landed me in London seven minutes late (on a one hour journey) due to 'a slow train at Slough'. So in total, the rail network had delayed me by nearly half an hour on a one hour journey while the road network had basically given up.
I rather resent the fact that I have to build in something like 50% overhead just to travel up to London during a quiet Friday in the holiday season. And yes, I was on time - call me a pessimist.
Rant over. The cat has recently become voracious. Sachet after sachet is gulped down and he's relentless - he must have more. Clare speculated that he may have worms (this must be some kind of folk wisdom she has) but there is no real evidence of parasitization. Another explanation is that we have changed the sourcing of his food.
His surge in appetite coincided with the opening of ... Waitrose :-).
