Last night was the day I took Herself and Others down to London. I’d already worked all day (as usual) so it was always going to be a late one.

As it turned out, I got everyone down to central London (Kings Cross / St Pancras) in two hours flat, dropping them off at 9:50.

By that time I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch, but wasn’t massively hungry, so just headed back up, thinking that if I got hungry I could stop at the services near Stanstead airport. (Birchanger Green, not that it means much) It was 10:45 by the time I got there, and by that point I was hungry enough that I could’ve eaten a scabby donkey between two pieces of bread. (Which is, of course, why I was even considering something from Motorway Services)

Only it turns out that Birchanger Green pretty much shuts at 10:30.

• Burger King – closed, cleaned up, and one lowly person wiping the surfaces.
• KFC – closed, deserted
• Waitrose – closed, deserted, barriers in front of the doors
• “Eat In” – open, a poxy range of crap (and overpriced) sandwiches, with a queue of people that outnumbered the sandwiches available.
• Shop – closed, barriered off.

And that was it. Nothing else. I assume it stays open for people in dire need of a piss, and that’s about it.

Bear in mind, Birchanger Green is the only services on the entire M11. And it shuts at half-ten.

Call me naïve, but I always thought services were supposed to be open super-long hours – if not 24-hours. That impression appears to have been wrong.

But I wonder how much business Birchanger Green loses by closing at half-ten ? The car-park was at least a third full when I got there. You’d think that being open ’til half eleven or midnight would make sense – particularly when they’re the only one in god knows how many miles.

Very strange.