Lightning Speed

Monday was not the most efficient commuting day. I left my house 5 minutes late (at 7:20am) and the Bakerloo Line was down (so I had to hike three levels up and down at Baker Street Station to get to the dodgy Circle Line). That train actually arrived within 1 minute (sometimes it even says 10 minutes) but I still missed my 7:52AM departure from Paddington which would have got me to Slough at 8:07 and to the office by 8:25am. But no, I got the 8am sloooooowwwww train (twice as long), had to wait for the Slough shuttle bus, and then due to morning traffic, didn't get to my desk until 9:05am. Not an ideal start to a Monday.

Since I haven't been feeling well, I decided to leave work early, catch the 5:20pm shuttle to catch the 5:35pm train and be back in my neighborhood, at the gym by 6:30pm on an exercise machine. Instead, it's 6:30pm now and I'm just leaving Windsor. In case you didn't notice, Windsor is not part of my normal commute, although it isn't really that far from slough (about a 10 minute drive). I got to Slough station, boarded a train to Paddington, and then sat there for about 20 minutes when it was announced that all service from Slough to Paddington was suspended because of *lightning* and subsequent signal failures.

We then disembarked, boarded a local slow train to Windsor which (as I learned later) arrives in a completely different train station than the London trains arrive/depart, and we took a gentle (aka snail's pace) ride to Windsor. It felt like being on a kiddie choo-choo. Anyway, we get out at Windsor and I just follow the crowd [they seem to know where they are going, and I don't think they all live in Windsor with the Queen]. The exit to the train station meanders through a quite nice shopping and food hall-type outdoor mall, and I think, where are we going?

I join the few hundred people walking around the outside of Windsor castle, stopping traffic because we can't be asked to stay on the sidewalk, and I jump around puddles, glad that it rained earlier and not *now* and glad that I already switched to my walking shoes from my towering high heels. I'm already carrying a ridiculous amount of bags for a daily commute (laptop backpack, purse, lunch box and gym bag; all black - I'm so Parisian) and I trundle along with the rest of the London commuters.

Eventually, we pass the Thai restaurant I ate at a few weeks ago with my team and I already have a better sense of Windsor Village. I'm still following the crowd, not sure where this other train station is. Eventually we are entering a brick archway et voila, the Windsor & Eton Riverside Station, as opposed to the just the Windsor & Eton station. (I'm so glad to be a lemming; I would have taken a while to figure this out).

I board the train, miraculously find a seat, and then realise that instead of the 15 minute fast train from Slough to Paddington, this is a ONE HOUR train from Windsor to Waterloo, which will then be another 30 minutes to my house. I calculate that I'd get home at nearly 8pm and as I write this, I quickly decide that so much for summer resolutions, I'm not making it to the gym tonight. Instead I am going straight home, relaxing for an hour, and then taking a melatonin and going to bed. I think 4 hours of commute time is enough for one day.