Daylight
Posted: Wed 7 February, 2007 Filed under: Depression, Domestic, Travel Leave a comment »Over the last couple of weeks, its been really noticeable the way the days are getting longer, and brighter again.
I’m no longer travelling to work in darkness, and when I leave the office to come home there’s still some light in the sky – and that’s only going to keep on improving over the next few months. I’m enjoying the daily commute more now, although sometimes it can be very distracting, being able to see outside, the fields, the woods, and the animals that populate them.
I particularly love seeing the unexpected – a flash of movement in the peripheral vision can become a fox or deer when I focus on it.
But really it’s just having more sunlight that lifts my mood, and makes me happier.
Wind and Trains
Posted: Thu 18 January, 2007 Filed under: Domestic, Getting Organised, Travel Leave a comment »Getting home was – hmmm – interesting. Yeah, that’s a good word.
There are no trains running to Attleborough – none at all. Quite how One is expecting people to get home, I’ve no fucking idea. But I’d lay money that all the customer services people (all two of them) fuck off home before 5pm tonight.
Luckily, I’d opted to leave early so that I could be certain of being back in time for the appointment with the IFA. So I left the office at half two, got to the station, discovered that basically there’s no trains going at all – reduced service my arse, bunch of cunts.
Then I got lucky for a second time. I called Avis, who I’ve dealt with before, and got the last car that they had available. Ten minutes later, I was at their office, hiring a Ford Focus. Nowt special, but it suited my needs. I got home just after four.
There may have been a bit of speeding. I blame a tailwind.
SatNav – Initial Thoughts
Posted: Sat 6 January, 2007 Filed under: Domestic, Reviews(ish), Travel 2 Comments »Well, in general I have to say that I’m pretty impressed with the TomTom. It’s got some idiosyncracies -including, at one point, directing me through a couple of very dodgy little side-roads in order to go round a church one way when there’s a perfectly good A-road going round it the other way – but it’s successfully navigated us to the three houses we were looking at today.
The set-up of the entire thing was dead easy too, and so far I’ve been impressed with the entire thing. Well, except for those little routing idiosyncracies, of course.
Anyway, that’s the first day of proper use for it, so I’ll write more about it once we’ve got used to it (and used it) a fair bit more.
SatNav
Posted: Sat 6 January, 2007 Filed under: Geeky, Travel 2 Comments »Over the weekend, swearwords may be issued. (I know, that’s hardly a shocking revelation)
We’ve invested in a TomTom 710 Sat-Nav for the car. Lots of people we know have recommended TomTom products, so we’ll give it a thrash, see how things work out.
Oh, and that RRP of £350? Nope, didn’t pay anywhere even close to that – Amazon had it on for £100 less so we got it there instead.
As we get used to it, I’m sure a review will follow…
Price Rise
Posted: Wed 3 January, 2007 Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, General, Travel Leave a comment »Ah, the joys of a New Year, the time when a train operating company’s thoughts turn to a) profit, and b) gouging customers. And thus, yesterday’s objectionable New Year price increases – always above inflation, usually for no good reason, and most certainly not indicative of any improvements in the service.
However, you can tell that I’m now out in the sticks.
My month’s season ticket for travel between Norwich and Cambridge has gone up from £240 to £250. For once, that’s “only” a 5% increase.
Last year, when I was in Berkshire, it went up by 8%, so a “mere” 5% increase isn’t too bad at all, although obviously it’d be better to not have a price rise at all…
Visiting the US?
Posted: Tue 2 January, 2007 Filed under: Security, Thoughts, Travel 1 Comment »In the Telegraph, there’s a very interesting story about what the USA does when you book a flight to visit them. The short answer? It’s probably better to pay cash
By using a credit card to book a flight, passengers face having other transactions on the card inspected by the American authorities. Providing an email address to an airline could also lead to scrutiny of other messages sent or received on that account.
Quite honestly, with attitudes like that, what on earth makes the US expect that people would still want to visit them?