Tag: commute

7th OCtober – Sorry, only just had time to sort this out.

This is a very close pass. He was agressive behind me at the lights, and didn’t appear to care how close he came. The back end was very close indeed. This actually scared me.

I cannot understand the necessity for such an aggressive manoeuvre, particularly at a junction where I have to be particularly wary of traffic from the filter at the left. I had full lights on at the time, and he pulled up behind me at the lights, so he knew full well I was there. Shocking.

October 11th – I was in Telford for the day, and a commute that started in bright sunshine ended in steady rain at my destination. I noticed as I stood on the covered walkway waiting for the rain to pass that the northbound platform was lined with a tree with bright, orangey red berries, yet leaves a bit like those on a cherry tree. I have no idea what this is, and the birds don’t seem to be very interested, either.

It put me in mind of cotoneaster, but the leaves and berries are way too big.

Anyone help me out here, please?

September 13th – A grim commute in both directions. The wind and rain had arrived and seemed set to be in for the weekend. I’d suffered a thoroughly enervating week, and had had quite enough. Train delays and overcrowding made for a tough journey home, and I was glad to be coming back along the quiet lanes between Shenstone and Stonnall with a following wind.

The green, the fresh air and smell of the rain cheered me, but it was oh so hard. It’s a long time since I was this glad of a weekend.

August 6th – I’d been in Darlaston, and returned home via the cycleway down the Goscote Valley. Despite small areas of tipping and litter, it’s lovely at the moment; the pastures and wastelands are bright with willow herb, wort, convulvulus and budleia, and the Ford Brook has tall swathes of Himalayan balsam growing tall. It’s an unwelcome species, but it is gorgeous to look at.

All the way through Goscote I watched two buzzards wheel and soar on the warm breeze. You wouldn’t think this area could be so peaceful and beautiful.

Walsall still has the capacity to surprise.

July 31st – The promised rains came, but during my commutes, they were patchy and drizzly. It was an odd day; I lost something in the morning, and found it in the afternoon on the station platform, still where I dropped it. I sweated in waterproofs. I saw the aftermath of quite a serious road accident. Sometimes, you’re glad to get home in one piece.

The rain was nice; refreshing, warm, not driven by the wind, just gentle, cleansing. I caught the waterlogged backlanes of Stonnall, and looked for the raindrops on willow herb and brambles.

Not all rain is bad.

July 23rd -By the time of my return, the sun was shining hazily, and things seemed to be drying out a bit. It was still threatening, but the ride home was dry and uneventful. At Nuneaton, the light was interesting, and highlighted the exaggerated perspective of the railway and it’s architecture. I love the accentuated vanishing point, the repetition and recursion. The forest of overhead metalwork – every member in that mess of stanchion, gantry and wire does something. 

For a quite simple idea, the railway is incredibly complex and deeply fascinating.

July 23rd – The predicted thunderstorms hit in he early morning, and I set off to Leicester in a lull when it had stopped raining for a while. As I got o Lichfield, the heavens opened again, and emerging late at Leicester, it was evident I’d just missed the storm there, too. The wet roofs of Knighton Fields glistened beautifully in the weak sun.
Not a great commute, but much better than expected.

June 27th – I came home in a rainstorm. It was drizzling steadily as I left Leicester, and it was steady, too, at Nuneaton. By Lichfield Trent Vally, is was heavy, and driven by an evil wind. I battled home without waterproof trousers, I was soaked, the traffic was horrid. Summer this year seems elusive…