I’m off the whole of this coming week, thanks to the long hours I’ve been doing these past few weeks.
I am looking forward to catching up with family and friends, relaxing, and doing very little else before heading off on Saturday to Glasgow.
Over this weekend I’ve had couchsurfers to stay, and we headed up north to explore some of the sights. I took a few photos, none of which are any good.
I had a day trip to Cupar yesterday.
And it was longer than it was supposed to be, thanks to First ScotRail.
Cupar is in the “nice” bit of Fife, and lies on the main line between Edinburgh and Dundee. To get back to Inverness, you either change in Dundee and Perth, or carry on north to Aberdeen and change there.
The way the timetables worked out, I was doing the Perth route, and after my meeting was at the station ready to board the train.
When it arrived, I waited at the end carriage while an entire old folks’ home’s worth of elderly people hobbled slowly off with numerous large suitcases, as I and various other passengers waited patiently. However, they took so long to alight, that by the time they had done so the doors were closing. Only one of us managed to leap on before the doors closed, leaving a handful of us stranded as the train began moving away.
There were no staff around – and because it was a long train on a curved platform, if a conductor had got off towards the front of the train he’d have been unable to see round to the back where we were obviously still waiting to get on.
Quite shocked at this, the handful of us left stranded on the platform were amazed that if indeed there was a conductor that they’d not bothered checking all the doors before closing. Admittedly the train was running a few minutes late (there’s a surprise) but that’s no excuse.
We agreed to go and present ourselves en masse to the ticket office at the station, and to his credit the man there put us all in a taxi to Dundee, where we were either changing or finishing our journeys. While he was sorting this, we all discussed our travel plans, and agreed that if we hadn’t all been so polite and patient with the elderly passengers getting off, we’d be on our way to Dundee by now.
It’s a dog-eat-dog world, boys and girls. Every passenger for themselves.
Anyway, by the time the taxi was sorted and on its way to pick us up, I was going to miss my change in Dundee for Perth – the next train from Cupar to Dundee twenty minutes later would have worked, but it was the cross-country train from England, and was cancelled for some reason.
So, I would either have to wait for the next train from Perth (which would get me home at 2315) or go via Aberdeen (arriving Inverness at 2225). As opposed to 2058 as I should have done if it wasn’t for being Left Behind.
The ticket office man at Cupar told me that because I would end up being delayed by over an hour, I’d be entitled to compensation – probably in the form of vouchers.
For train travel.
So, let’s get this right. Due to the incident at Cupar I’ve been travelling more today than I should have done. I spend more time on trains than is frankly healthy. And what do I get when things go wrong?
Another bloody train trip!
I’ll not be going to Cupar on it, that’s for sure.
I will be writing an email of complaint (polite, of course), and will of course keep you posted.
It’s only the first day of a four day working week, but I’m already knackered.
Maybe it’s the fact that I am still in pain from the big match at the weekend (see photo), or maybe it’s my body and mind slowly beginning to anticipate a forthcoming week off.
Ever since returning jet-lagged and not a little overwhelmed from New Zealand, I’ve really struggled to keep on top of things - work has been monumentally busy and I’ve had very little chance to unwind. However, thanks to accruing lots of overtime since returning from the trip, I am off the whole of next week.
I can’t wait.
However, before that comes two work trips, Arbroath tomorrow and Cupar on Thursday. Not long to go til the weekend…
In other news, have you ever found a website not working and wondered if it’s just you? Wonder no more.
Greetings from the train, just approaching Darlington. I’m on my way back from GGF in Nottingham, and am enjoying the wireless internet that National Express trains have as standard.
What they don’t have as standard, however, is power sockets, so I will shortly have to switch off my dying laptop and find something else to do, like look out of the window at the miserable, flat, grim landscape of the north-east of England.
And what’s worse, the train’s running late due to engineering works, and there’s very little leg room where I am sitting.
However, all is not lost - Team North won the football yesterday, levelling the series at 2-2. We won 4-1 on the day against Team South, braving some horrendous weather conditions. I played little better than mediocre, and am exhausted and battered at the end of it all. But I am of course delighted that we won.
I get home much later tonight, and thankfully have tomorrow off, meaning I can nurse my numerous football-related bumps, bruises and aches, and get some much-needed sleep.
Oh, and talking of epic pain-filled victories against the forces of evil, Happy Easter everyone.
On the first weekend of April, I will be returning to Weegieland for the first time in ages.
It’s a mixture of work, pleasure and a dentist’s appointment. I am looking forward to catching up with friends and visiting St Silas on the Sunday.
Being Glasgow, I expect it will rain.
In other news, I was in Cupar today for work. Tomorrow I head to Edinburgh, also for work, stay over, and then the day after it’s down to Nottingham for GGF.
I may not blog until after the weekend. In which case happy Easter.
I love a lot of the news satire that you can find in various nooks and crannies of the electronic interweb.
DeadBrain, The Onion and the Daily Fortnight are well-known, but there’s plenty examples of spoof and satire closer to home: Scottish contributions include The Daily Mash and the Jaggy Thistle.
A few sites have even come from the Highlands - the long-abandoned but still-online Amadan is a great laugh, although the humour (or Hugh Mor) is somewhat impenetrable to anyone without an understanding of the Gàidhealtachd. More recent examples I’ve enjoyed reading are A Gurn From Nairn, Inversnecky and Newsbleat.
Newsbleat is particularly amusing, with its 10th March article making me laugh out loud:
Never mind Inverness’ Asda saga; Nairn looks set to get a Sainsbury’s.
Is the sunniest town in Scotland, the Brighton of the North, ready for the upper crust of supermarkets?
Sainsbury’s slogan is ‘Try something new today’.
‘New’? In Nairn?
This is the town where shops still shut for lunch, even on Saturdays, and have half-days on Wednesdays. The local newspaper is still black and white. And refreshments are provided in tea rooms, yes, tea rooms - get that Starbucks latte outta my sight.
So Sainsbury‘s, if you’re wondering what the secret of success in Nairn retailing is…
Stock one of everything, wear brown overalls, display death notices in the window and give the customer what they really want rather than what you’re trying to shift. Then, if you’re lucky, you might stand a chance against the mighty Tradeway, Fraser’s electricals and the Watson fruit and veg mafia
Brilliant. I don’t really know a great deal about Nairn - known to be the fastest town in Scotland - but that description should resonate with the experiences of shopping in just about any small town or rural area.
Maybe these sites are a sign of the continued economic and cultural renaissance of the Highlands, but it’s certainly about time we laughed at ourselves a bit more.
Next weekend is Good Good Friday, the annual Easter-time Join Me gathering in Nottingham. Amongst all the kindness, charity fundraising and catching up with friends, will be an incredibly important event, one of the highlights of the joinees’ calendar - the North v South football match.
As I blogged last year, the South are 2-1 up in the series. It’s no exaggeration to say that among Team North, the lust for revenge has been intense, and our plans have been several months in the making. Our shirts are even being individually sponsored - though the fellow joinee who is sponsoring my shirt has refused to tell me what I will be advertising (which both intrigues and scares me).
I’m playing left-back (despite being right-footed, and indeed being grossly unfit and rubbish at football) and today I bought some cheap football boots and shinpads. I even went for a walk to get some exercise.
This year it’s serious.
I’ve just got back from a phenomenal gig at the Ironworks.
Kyte were awesome - lively, smooth, energetic and very down-to-earth and likeable. Quite why they’re not better-known, I have no idea. It was great that they came all the way up from England to Inverness.
Pl3xus was another support act who I was thrilled to discover. From Inverness, Pl3xus is a one-man electronic music outfit, and the soft, catchy music has echoes of Boards of Canada and other such names. I loved it, and can highly recommend a listen.
The “big names” of the evening, Shutter, are also from Inverness. In the same vein as Mogwai, Shutter were just as I imagined after listening to them online: loud, explosive, raw, and absolutely fantastic. Their instrumental rock music was complex, skillfully-played, and quite simply awesome. I truly hope they become more widely known, as they’re a great advert for music in Inverness.
I took some (not very good) photos.
I always enjoy going “up north” because the scenery is wonderful, and there was a real sense of journey on this trip because I sailed, rather than flew, to Orkney.
Orkney is one of my favourite places in Scotland, and I keep telling myself I am going to do a holiday there some time so I can see something outside Kirkwall, the main town.
On my drive back to Inverness this morning, I decided to avoid the A9 for a change and went “cross-country” via the likes of Tongue and Lairg, a road I’d never done.
It boasted dramatic scenery, the full spectrum of weather (rain, sun and even a spot of snow), and surprisingly good Five Live reception.
Other highlights of the trip include deciding that Thurso is not as grim as I thought it to be on previous trips (though still pretty grim), and that the Orkney fudge and whisky cheesecake at the Kirkwall Hotel was not as lovely as I remembered (though still pretty lovely).
The long week - and particularly the 4.45am start this morning and choppy crossing from Stromness to Scrabster - was exhausting. A short nap this afternoon when I got home didn’t really help, and in fact left me strangely jet-lagged.
Ah well. Now I’ve uploaded some photos, I can get an early night.
I left church fairly promptly after the evening service tonight, because I had stuff I needed to do. I was probably one of the first to leave.
As I headed out, a group of youths who were looking across the road at the church with some excitement approached me and asked “excuse me, is that a bouncy castle in there?”
I paused for a moment. No, I had heard them correctly. They asked if there was a bouncy castle in church. It not being a question I am used to being asked, and there being nothing going on after the service that I could imagine being easily mistaken for a bouncy castle party, I wasn’t sure how I should respond.
Should I lie and say “yes” as a way of getting them into church?
Or should I say “no” and disappoint them, leading them to recount in years to come the reason why they never explored faith - there was no bouncy castle in church one night when they were teenagers.
I went for the non-committal and hopefully mysterious “pop in and find out”.
“Are you allowed to go in?” one of them asked. I almost laughed, but managed not to.
Of course, for some people, church is something so off the radar that they wouldn’t have a clue about who can and can’t get in - and such preconceptions are so hard for well-churched folk like me to get their heads around. How appropriate that we heard a bit about the Church Without Walls movement in the service.
“Well,” I replied, “they let me in, so they’ll definitely let you in.”
And so they approached the building. As I continued walking along the road, heading for home, I looked back towards the church myself, and saw through the windows - much as I expected - nothing to suggest any bouncy castle-related activity going on. The three teenagers got close enough to reach the same conclusion themselves, and turned around and ran off up the road in the opposite direction from me.
Now of course, I could have handled that situation better. I could have stayed and talked to them longer. I could have invited them in and shown them round and offered them a tea or coffee (unfortunately we don’t do buckfast after services, or whatever it is kids of that age drink).
I could even have attempted to draw a parallel between jumping on a bouncy castle and our relationship with Jesus, though I imagine even the most creative children’s speaker would struggle with that metaphor.
As it was, I can only hope they come back some other time.
And when they do, there’s a bouncy castle.
In other news, I’m away for work to Thurso and Orkney most of this week, so may not blog until next weekend.
