When relying on websites goes wrong

This weekend I went to the Wild West erm… Country to visit Tigger, which was great fun. We ate curry, went for walks, and I got a magical mystery tour of various ancient fort, burial and religious sites, too!

Also living in the very same town as of this year, is an old uni mate called Lanky. He’s married to The Teacher and they have the most gorgeous little girl who has just turned 1.

It was great to see them all and wonderful reminiscing about our time in Pompey. I felt a pang of nostalgia for the old place even though only Uni Housemate and Christoph are the only ones left there.

*sniff

Anyway, I don’t know about you, but I hate the reverse journey home after a lovely weekend. You know the feeling where you don’t want to leave so you know you should get the leaving done as quickly as possible.

So, with a lunchtime train booked, I was feeling quite umpty about the whole thing. I’d also been keeping an eye on the train status on my phone so I would know if it was delayed. So far that morning, all London-bound trains were listed as delayed.

This made me more umpty. Poor Tigger! In the end he took me for tea and cake, which made me less(ish) umpty but then… CANCELLED flashed up on my phone next to my train time!

DISASTER!

Tigger offered me a paper bag to breathe into.

Tigger then suggested we go to the station anyway to find out what was going on and weirdly, there was my train, listed, and actually waiting on the platform for me.

Cue the realisation that the National Rail website I use as the font of all travel knowledge, is WRONG!

I tweeted them to ask why they had got wrong info on the site but had no reply, but I only hope it was a one-time error.

And the journey? My empty train chugged through the countryside back to London in perfect time, even depositing me at Clapham in time to get a connecting train home.

AMAZING!

So what have I learnt this weekend? How to tell the difference between buzzards and other birds; where the mole is at the fairy rings; not to stress about my train from three hours before; that Tiggers get you places on time; never to look at National Rail’s website for reassurance as it won’t be there, and finally that millionaires shortbread tastes much better when shared.