Passengers in various states of thought and repose, as the train pulled into Rochdale on the way into work. Or, I suspect for the guy immediately opposite me, home after a rather heavy night.
Another train shot, though this is a portrait of a person rather than a locomotive. Somehow yesterday’s loco just seemed much happier to be where it was. Then again, I sympathise: when is 7am on a Tuesday morning in February a time of vim and vigour?
Off we all go to our various duties and assignations, early on a Wednesday morning. And what was I doing in Wakefield Kirkgate station — a town that has never before featured on the blog (thus becoming named location #270) — at 7.40am? Well, you don’t get to see every aspect of my life on here.
Blog-wise, it’s two months since I pulled duty on a 6.32 train out of Hebden Bridge — arrives Manchester about 7.10, like this morning, if it’s feeling energetic. The bloke in yellow is the owner of the fold-up bike on the other side of the shot: he looks the least keen of all of them, but then again he has his onward transport sorted.
It’s actually not a bad place to catch forty winks, the train home — I manage it frequently. Like these two gentlemen, I am tired…. but have now just three days left before my summer break.
Long day for me today. In on the 7am train out of HB and back on the 17.45 from Manchester, on which this shot was taken. I felt like the woman in the middle.
I don’t make a habit of getting the 06:59 service from Hebden Bridge to Manchester — a two-carriage cattle truck most days. But when I’ve a 9am meeting that can’t be missed, it’s the safest choice. At least it is getting light at that time now. Don’t normally frequent the waiting room either, but it was raining outside today. Welcome to Monday.
11 years of using the Calderdale line, and one learns which services have CTS (Cattle Truck Status) and which are safer. I will never aim to catch the 1726 from Manchester, for example. It just ain’t worth it. The 0742 from Hebden (depicted here just about on its arrival to Manchester) is usually not so bad but today, for some reason, it suffered from a massive case of CTS.
Why monochrome again? Because it hides a multitude of white balance sins.
After two blissful days working at home, welcome back to sodding Northern Rail’s dreadful recent performance on the Calderdale line. Just to put this in perspective, over the last two weeks I have lost a total of 7 hours of my life to delays — that’s a whole working day. This is how it feels.
The point of this blog is not just to find the day’s ‘artistic’ or ‘creative’ side but also to try to epitomise my day. This shot sure does that. Sometimes I’m this close to sodding off back to Fiji.
Being 42 