Good afternoon.
I want you to promise to watch tonight to witness the living proof that I am here. I so nearly wasn't or so nearly might not have been, just to get the grammar right.
I was verbally brutalised last night and threatened with legal and fiduciary sanction by the forces of locomotive oppression. My car was in the wrong place, for reasons too tedious to couple to the rest of this brief but meaningful fable: I dashed on to a train to "another place", wallet to the ready to pay the small difference in fare and clutching my expensive First Class annual season ticket: ( it was that or a holiday home on the outskirts of St. Tropez but I needed the ticket to get to work).
"Why aren't you sitting in First Class?" she bellowed at me.
"Couldn't see it", I said.
"Why didn't you tell the Guard and pay the difference before starting your journey" she harrassed.
"Didn't see him... or her", I said.
"I could charge you a penalty fare" she gloated. She didn't but I was incensed and not a little frightened.....
Big mistake.
I want you to promise to watch tonight to witness the living proof that I am here. I so nearly wasn't or so nearly might not have been, just to get the grammar right.
I was verbally brutalised last night and threatened with legal and fiduciary sanction by the forces of locomotive oppression. My car was in the wrong place, for reasons too tedious to couple to the rest of this brief but meaningful fable: I dashed on to a train to "another place", wallet to the ready to pay the small difference in fare and clutching my expensive First Class annual season ticket: ( it was that or a holiday home on the outskirts of St. Tropez but I needed the ticket to get to work).
"Why aren't you sitting in First Class?" she bellowed at me.
"Couldn't see it", I said.
"Why didn't you tell the Guard and pay the difference before starting your journey" she harrassed.
"Didn't see him... or her", I said.
"I could charge you a penalty fare" she gloated. She didn't but I was incensed and not a little frightened.....
Big mistake.
Tonight we lead on the unequalled incompetence of our railway system!
It has taken them three times as long as the French to complete the high-speed channel link. They still haven't decided what to do about the now spare platforms at Waterloo. And they say - despite guaranteed fare rises - that they haven't got the money to sort out more than one of five spare platforms by the end of next year. Phil is the fat controller for us and, if he was, it would be a darn-sight better set up.
By the way, listen out for the time of the final Eurostar departure from Waterloo: made us laugh.
No humour at all in our other big story: a childminder accused and convicted of shaking a baby to death faces three years in jail. She protests her innocence and has many voices claiming to support her. Many, though not all, annonymously. Juries are virtually omnipotent and the law is the law. But it is an intriguing story. Ronke wears the red gown and wig.
If you had a spare £450 m, you might turn all five ex-Eurostar platforms at Waterloo into functioning SWT platforms and have enough left for a coffee and a cookie or two. If, however, you run Croydon, you might chose to spend it on turning your north Kent commuter dormitory into the home of Gaudi, the cradle of the 1992 Olympics, the greatest city of culture Europe has ever boasted. Why the burghers of Croydon have gone on a 'Barcelona' binge: Robin plays Norman Foster for you at 6.
Denzel Washington is just drop dead gorgeous and not a little gifted in the old acting department: Steve gets nervous with him but what is in a name? Rather a lot, as you'll see at 6.
Finally, it is thought to have cost Howard Carter his life, Lord Carnarvon his fortune and countless other people varying degrees of hyroglyphic horrors. The subject of this bizarre banter had a broken leg, his "manhood" was stolen and he was barely old enough to vote when he died: just as well ancient Egypt was an absolute monarchy, for him then!
Liz has a sneak preview of the absolute glory that is London's Tutankhamun - Take Two.
Polish your jewels and gild your nether-regions: our very own Nefertiti will take you to the world of Oris, Isis and all without a note from Oasis - sheer joy.
Liz has a sneak preview of the absolute glory that is London's Tutankhamun - Take Two.
Polish your jewels and gild your nether-regions: our very own Nefertiti will take you to the world of Oris, Isis and all without a note from Oasis - sheer joy.
It's at O2 so the tube, DLR, a bus or a cab will get you there. If you live south west of London, all you have to do is get to Waterloo first - I'd take sandwiches and be prepared for a Tutankhamun-scale delay!
See you on the other side - at 6.
Alastair and Katie.
