Easter walk up Maze Hill

After church and a quantity of chocolate the boys and I went to the Barrage for a walk up the artificial hill built on part of the old Tees Yard. A good view from the top but still very cold!

Saturday morning picture show

Taken Daniel to see the big hit new release Monsters Inc....

A week late

Yesterday I had to travel to Denham for a supplier conference. I had decided to travel south on a more interesting route, and to redeem some rewards points to try the first class lounges.

I went into the lounge at Darlington and had a couple of coffees and some biscuits waiting for my Cross Country service to Sheffield. This was a once a day service using the Great Central route from Mexborough through Kilnhurst avoiding Swinton. The old road was slow as expected and the Voyager cramped, but made an interesting change from the usual blast down the East Coast.

I had 10 minutes in Sheffield to change onto an East Midlands Meridian to St Pancras. Considering these are mechanically clones of Voyagers the contrast is stark - plenty of room, plenty of tables that line up with windows. How could these trains have a layout so right when their voyager cousins are so wrong?

On arrival in London I spent an hour in the lounge at Kings Cross - more coffee, more biscuits, plus fruit and crisps. Then over to Denham. It was raining hard in London, but on arrival at Denham we were just ahead of the leading edge of the storm, allowing me to walk up to head office without getting wet.

And that's when I found out I was a week late! But the buyer was very accommodating! That meant that my expected 2 hour meeting lasted half that, so a taxi in the teeming rain to Gerrards Cross (photo) for a non-stop 168 blast to Marylebone, then another spell in the Kings Cross lounge before my train home.

A day trip to Watford

Had to go and see Costco, so an early (7am) train from Darlo. I'm in Denham on Monday so a large number of tickets collected together as shown on the picture!
As usual the train south was nowhere near loaded, and the early start allows for Breakfast on expenses, so a Sausage and Egg Panini on the train went down well.
On arrival I had enough time for a few photos on Euston Road on the walk to pick up the Watford train. On the return to Euston I passed on the first two trains to get one routed on the Fast (a wait of 15 mins!) - all were 350/1s, but the UF route meant we hit 110mph, a new pantograph mod on the fleet allowing the 10mph increase.
On the way back, into St Pancras for shots of the station statues before my usual Subway from next door to my old bedsit.
The 14:00 Aberdeen on a Friday was always likely to be busy, so I found the train on P5 and looked for unreserved seats - and found just half a dozen!

A confession

I kind of forgot about this project. Not for very long, but long enough for it to be over a week since the last blog!

What has happened since? Not a great deal, that's part of the reason why. Got a busy period coming up at work, so will be back on again soon!

One bit of news was me passing my 6 month probation at work. Have been asked to look at how I would expand my team heading into next year, so need to work on a pitch for how we get funding. Also, would I potentially be interested in moving into a planning role? Would be a vacancy in summer 14. Hmmmm.....

A trip to Denham

Had to go to Musgraves so off on my usual 1E03 off Darlington. Thick fog from home all the way to Grantham, then beautiful and sunny. Chiltern have reduced the service to Denham to one an hour, so plenty of time for a gentle stroll the mile or so to their office.
Stopped off at the canal for a few pictures in the sunshine, before the meeting and other stroll back again. A long way for a 35 minute meeting!
And finally a refuel, having coaxed 493 miles out of a tank at 45.1mpg

Patrick's birthday sipping diesel

Off to church this morning. A baptism service complete with ducking pool! John gave a great sermon on how religion is not faith, and that being religious is often a badge of outward signs that aren't relevant to the Gospel.
Later went down to Sheffield for Patrick's birthday tea at Frankie and Bennies. Went to the wrong one of course, as they've open one at Parkgate and I went to Meadowhall!
Drove gently! Took the Picasso! Got my best ever fuel economy....

Grrrr Cars!

An annoying afternoon. The an was to clean the cars, so oiy came the Hoover and got the inside of the Picasso clean. Had a look at the i30 and spotted a nail stuck in one tyre. Checked the pressure and it was waaaay down, but hopefully it can be repaired.
So swapped the cars over so the i30 was on the drive and changed the wheel for the still-pristine spare. Next job was top off tyre pressures so out came the inflator from the Picasso. Has been tempremental for a while but didn't work at all in either car.
Off to Halfords and chinged £20 for a replacement. Picasso fuel economy awful plus mega tyre noise, with the new Falkens on the front down on about 24psi. Fiddled with fuses which had blown on both cars thannks to duff inflator, the Picasso has random strips with different sized fuses thrown in at random around the car - insanely French.
Blew the Falkens back up, blew up my spare wheel. Still need to wash the cars so do both!
A busy busy afternoon.....