The longest ride

Had a leisurely start to the day today. I didn't have to be in London until 2pm so I thought I'd have a "normal" start, cup of coffee, take Nikki to work, that kind of thing, and catch whatever train I could get to Piccadilly in time for.

That train turned out to be the 9.15 and a big mistake. It made the day's start a lot more leisurely than I anticipated.

We'd been travelling about an hour (on what is usually a 2-hour-ten-minute trip) when I became conscious that the countryside whipping past my window wasn't countryside I recognised. Almost at the same time this impinged on my senses the train manager came on the PA to announce that, owing to a car on the line (I think he said "car" although it might have been "cow") we'd been diverted on to the West Midlands line and this would add ten minutes to the trip. I went back to my book while one or two passengers called colleagues to let them know they'd be late.

A few minutes later the train came to a standstill. We were somewhere near Nuneaton and this time the PA informed us that several other trains had also been diverted and we were now queued behind four of them. This was expected to add another ten minutes. However, after those ten minutes had passed and we still hadn't moved, a third announcement revealed that one of the four trains had broken down. We were going to have to reverse direction, returning northwards to the previous set of points where we could transfer onto another line. This second diversion was expected to add yet another twenty minutes to the journey time.

Now it was my turn to make a phone call. Even though my meeting was at 2pm, I'd been taking calls all morning trying to set up another meeting for sometime between 12 and 2 and this was clearly not going to be possible.

In the end we pulled into Euston just before 1pm - more than an hour later than scheduled and with only just enough time for me to get to Westminster.