Northern Line Blues
It’s great living a couple of minutes from a Tube station. But it’s not so great when that Tube station is on the Northern Line, the so-called ‘Misery Line’ of the network.Yep, you guessed it – like Paris Hilton at a keg party, it’s gone down again.
Personally, I don’t rely on the Tube to get to work, so the only difference it’s made to my life is making the overland train that I take to Clapham Junction more crowded and uncomfortable.
For most of my friends however, who work in the city, it’s a different story. I suspect a couple haven’t even bothered today.
Come on, Northern Line. Pull your socks up. All the other lines are laughing at you.
posted by Cheezy at
11:49 AM
13 Comments:
Isn't Clapham Junction only a 15min walk from Balham?
By
Stef, at 1:39 PM
Not the way I walk! I tend to 'saunter'...
Actually, I think, even for most people, it's a good 30 or 40 minute walk.
By
Cheezy, at 1:52 PM
Furry muff.
Actually I was thinking of Clapham South rather than Balham which is quite a bit closer innit?
By
Stef, at 8:30 AM
Yep, Clapham South is only a 10-15 walk from Balham.
By
Cheezy, at 10:40 AM
i had one look at the madness outside Balham this morning and went home for a bacon sandwich and a coffee.
By
TBV., at 11:14 AM
Good plan, mate.
Working from home is the way forward!
By
Stef, at 11:27 AM
Yes, it was like Beatlemania outside Balham this morning, wasn't it Dave?
Either that or a Half Price Sale at Ikea in North London... only with less stabbings...
OK... if you people promise to keep this a secret, I'll tell you how I got to work (from Balham to Redhill, Surrey) this morning... seriously... but sssshhhhhh, it's embarrassing...
I turned up at Balham, and sure enough, that was a non-starter. So (along with my girlfriend, who's going to Victoria) I walked to Clapham Junction (yep, that did take about 35 minutes - although there are possibly a couple of short-cuts that I don't really know about).
I arrive there just as one of my usual trains (the 0812 to Bognor Regis) is leaving. In fact, I'd have made it if my useless bloody ticket didn't get stuck in the machine and I had to get one of the guys at the station to unlock and remove it.
Fuck.
The next train wasn't for half an hour or so, so I had a ciggie and a coffee and read my paper. Then I got on the train and... and this is the important bit of the story... the big mistake... the fuck-up akin to Hitler deciding to invade Russia... I forgot that, on this train, I had to change at East Croydon.
So, just as we're pulling out of East Croydon station, I look up at the sign saying "The next station is Brighton".
Double fuck.
Anyway, I get to Brighton and, after briefly toying with the idea of staying there for the day - having a dip in the sea, riding the dodgems on the pier, doing the Quadrophenia tour, or just getting pissed for the whole day - decide that I'd better take the next train the fuck outta there.
So I do, and eventually get to Redhill (via Gatwick) at about 10.30am.
I can't imagine anyone out there had as big a nightmare as me in getting to work today, but please tell me if you did. Or fuck it, if you didn't then just make it up. I'd feel a whole lot better...
And all of this because of the poxy Northern Line being down. It's real 'butterfly flaps its wings' kinda stuff isn't it?
By
Cheezy, at 12:00 PM
I 'worked from home' and went to see Serenity while 'on the job' (so to speak).
Two things. 1) You don't have an Oyster card? 2) You went to Brighton?!
Fuck me! That sucks...
By
Stef, at 10:40 PM
Poor you! I remember our very first trip which went something like this - we booked into a b & b somewhere in the wildest of Kent, having been in the UK for three months...we travelled out of some shitty station and ended up close to Hever Castle. We wandered across fields, I got bitten by a horse and foal (they tried to eat my hair), we visited Hever Castle and Penshurst Place. Our b&b host stuck us on the train back to London, didn't tell us to change at a certain station, so we didn't. We ended up going to Gatwick. We panicked and fled the train at Gatwick, thought we were jumping on a random train going to London. It didn't. We panicked some more, to the amusement of the other passengers. I was shitting myself, certain that we are going to be tossed in jail for carousing on trains we haven't paid for...we ended up going backwards, instead of forwards in the train and got to Brighton. We wandered about the platforms, located a genuine train going to London, got on it, clutching our bags and swore never to go anywhere ever again...
But that was a long time ago - now, even when DRUNK (FG, not me!) - manages to get off at the right station.
By
Liz, at 10:53 PM
Blimey, Brighton must be the 'default destination' for any trains that you board in error!
By
Cheezy, at 8:01 AM
Once, when returning from Watford to Birmingham on a Friday night, I had a choice of either waiting 1.5hrs for the next direct train or jumping on a train to Milton Keynes and changing but there were only a couple of minutes to get the connection.
I got to MK with 2 minutes to the connecting train, couldn't find a screen telling me which platform to go to so I ran around. On the next platform was a train and the paper sign in the window said "Birmingham". Success! I head the whistle blow so I jumped on sharpish and heard the doors lock. I looked again at the paper sign and it was Birmingham to Euston. Non-stop from MK...
I passed back through Watford and arrived in London around 7pm on a Friday night, now further from home than I was two hours before.
Grrr..
By
Stef, at 8:42 AM
This post has been removed by a blog administrator.
By
wendwiz, at 7:11 AM
I'm starting to feel like I got off lightly... at least the time that I wasted technically belongs to my boss!
By
Cheezy, at 3:40 PM
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