Steven HeywoodIt's always a disappointment when you hear: "The next station is Chigley," but they actually said: "Chinley."
Guess who's going to be getting another Northern Rail complementary return ticket.
20 minutes and counting stuck at a signal in Trafford Park..
Still, we don't need to invest in additional rail capacity in the Northwest, do we.
"This is the Northern train to Liverpool Lime Street. We are currently running eleven minutes late due to Transpennine Express' inability to run its trains on time during peak hours. Or any other time. We would like to apologise for the delay."
Other countries have train services. We have hostage situations.
Granny and grandad with the kids playing one of those utterly wearisome guessing games. "Does it have legs?" "Does it have fur?" "Can you eat it?" "Do you plug it in to use it?" Turned out to be a bloody amphibious landing craft. Stalybridge evidently marches to a different beat.
There's a special circle in Hell for middle-aged couples sitting in trains watching a film on her 'phone with the sound turned up so they can both hear it.
"For any passengers worrying about missing the Buxton train at Piccadilly, there's no need to worry as the guard for that train is sitting next to me."
Good news: three hours late we get into Preston.
Bad news: We're awaiting train crew.
Good news: I had a three-quarters of an hour wait at Oxford Road ahead of me and this seat's more comfy than the big flowerpot on platform five.
Bad news: the company of very drunk old men from Chorley who've just got on include a Father Dunne tribute act.
It's a great journey this. The Oxford Road train was cancelled. This train to Victoria is stuck outside Wigan because a train's broken down at the station. No rush though because the connecting train to Oxford Road from Bolton has been cancelled. As has the one after that. The good news is that we're likely to be so late getting into Wigan we won't have long to wait for the next train to Oxford Road. We can't miss that because it's stuck in the queue behind us.
A child on the train has just piped up: "I spy with my little eye something beginning with yellow," and I can't make up my mind if they're going to be one of the great thinkers of a really evil web designer.