After spending most of Thursday evening abandoned and nasally impaired, the 2mm of late winter snow predictably ground the railway to a further halt this morning. As usual it was everybody’s responsibility but nobody’s fault with Chiltern blaming London Underground and London Underground going with the like we give a flying fuck option.

Progress to Amersham was stately but pleasantly unexciting. From there on, nothing much happened for the next hour, other than the secret enjoyment of pulling faces at the platform based lemmings who shivered in their non train-ness. Not going anywhere is on the dull side of tedious, but slightly enlivened by chuckling at the less fortunate abandoned on a chilly, snowblown platform.

Yet in another inspired decision, the caring railway company decided the best course of action would be open the doors and cram a few more desperate people in. The reasons are occluded although strong evidence to support an alternative approach were readily provided by the full carriages with people already standing, and a groundswell of grumpiness that was ready to explode at any point.

This explosion came during the third halt, this time in the tunnel within spitting distance of Marylebone. And people were spittingly angry as an ominous silence from the PA system was drowned out by a hundred tired, angry and now “ frankly “ sweaty passengers wondering what the fuck was going on. Trains passed us imperiously on either side, while our stationary non progress was marked only by increasing physical and mental temperatures.

We finally arrived at 9:45. The journey had taken a smidge under two hours. My total commute this morning was three hours and ten minutes to travel 54 miles of which eight of them were done on my bike. This compares favourably to the last Monday morning of chaos but this in now way even raised the slightest of wry smiles on my chill chapped face. I just want to find someone to blame/shout at/dismember with the utensil of hurt – anyone in the CR Butlins uniform will do.

The driver did finally honour us with his dulcet tones imploring passengers to Please take all belongings with you. We have had a recent spate of the will to live being left on the train. You can collect these from the lost property office or by moving to another country.

I’m sat on the returning train as I write this and we’re making slow progress again “ this time apparently due to the price of cabbages.

Maybe I can get a bus. Or a helicopter. Are they expensive?

Last night Chiltern Railways put in a truly stunning performance with the emphasis on ˜stunned’. The 7:15 service mooted to arrive at 8pm actually arrived an hour and a half later at 9:30. Well to be fair, the 7:15 never actually left London, with passengers from this and a previously cancelled train shoehorned onto a live one which finally wheezed out of the station at 7:30

I couldn’t believe transporting this sea of frustrated humanity was within its operating parameters “ there were bodies crammed into every available crevice including the bog and luggage racks. So it came as a nasty surprise when somehow another 50 squeezed on at Harrow.

I was lucky enough to have my own seat and an hour long nasal performance from someones’ sticky armpit located fetchingly about an inch from my face. It offered up a complex mixture of smells rarely sequenced together and for good reason. The almost overpowering BO was tainted by fresh sweat and a hint of cheese left in the sun too long. The physical manifestation of this aural disaster was a dirty, gray fungal like growth staining his white shirt. It was essentially mobile biological warfare delivered by a rejected M&S garment. A year ago I’d manage to immobilise at least two people with a similar tactic so I guess this was payback time.

The reason for our progress best compared to a three legged sloth with a head wound was Chiltern Railways bete noir “ the ubiquitous power failure. This is the third time in a month the entire network has gone dark when someone plugs in a kettle.

But our driver was surprisingly jolly. He would cheerfully announce The next stop is Chorleywood but we don’t expect to get there for at least an hour so no rush for the doors. He also reminded us there was a toilet on board but dashed our hopes that the red cross would be coming through the train with food parcels.

At Rickmansworth our crawl became a shuddering halt and we stopped dead. A physical state all the trapped passengers were wishing on the kettle pluggerinner. And in an astonishing example of hope over intelligence yet more people stuffed themselves into our sardine can. This had the unfortunate consequence of moving the armpit of hell a couple of inches closer to my wrinkling nose. I was already fairly pissed off but plunged further into the kind of abject depression that only an announcement there are four sectors of track filled with trains all stopped on a red signal ahead of us. We will be here for quite a while can bring on.

To divert attention from my aural system shorting out and the nasal passages melting under the continued whiffy onslaught, I began to stealthily read the book of a fellow Chiltern Railways’ prisoner marooned on the seat next to me.

It was a romp of a novel where the muscular Christophe was vigorously attempting to deflower the virginal Melanie in the hay loft. Never heard it called that before – anyway my commuting pal was a bit of a slow reader but that was just fine as we seemed to have all night.

Typical of the evening, just at the exciting climax when a horse stomped into the stable and shot Christophe with an elephant gun declaring you fiend, you have had sex with my favourite set of stairs, she got up and left. Well the book was in French and I was doing my best.

At this time we emerged from a mobile blackout area and carriage lit up with a hundred beeping phones indicating voicemails from enraged spouses. One guy was desperately trying to convince his wife that he wasn’t in the pub but she wasn’t having it. I grabbed his phone and shouted no he really is on the train but he didn’t want to call you because you’re such an untrusting stuck up bitch. Marriage counselling needs no training really, some people just take to it naturally.

The driver came back on and suggested that if you hadn’t frozen to death or disembowelled yourself with a small spoon to alleviate the boredom, the next station might be Amersham. Here the entire platform was devoid of life so I assumed any remaining passengers had given up and taken to shanks pony. Except for two drunks who mistook our train for a bar and spent the next 20 minutes shouting at each other. Their conversation could be summarised as embarrassing places we’ve been sick in

By the time the train arrived at my station, I had given up the idea of applying for compensation unless it offered 30 minutes alone with the chief engineer. And I was allowed to take in the spoon of hurt.

Not sadly a physical metaphor for some flawless athletic performance or even the predictable outcome of finessing Creme Caramel with a blowtorch. No, I’m on fire on the inside according to the giver of pain, who has the thankless job of jump starting my creaking carcass through the power of chiropractics and money.

And while there are hundreds more photos and sufficient tall stories to give a giraffe vertigo only a couple of beers away, I know how much joy you take from my whining hypochondria so sit back, relax and spend some quality time with the idiots guide to anatomy.

The tingling in my fingers escalates to an elbow biting howl as pain marches up my arm and garrisons itself in the shoulder muscle. Apparently this is due to a distorted trapezium which sounds like hated geometry lessons from my youth. All that “how many sides has a pentagram ?” and “What’s the difference between a parallelogram and a rhombus?” nonsense – if only I knew how totally bloody pointless it all was, I could have saved myself much angst and frustration with a simple “sorry sir, I don’t really give a toss”

Anyway, this triangular muscle is the size of Belgium due to a level of inflammation last seen in the Great Fire of London. To paraphrase that oh-so-jolly song “the shoulder bone is connected to the elbow bone and the elbow bone is connected to the penis if you’ve been born unlucky,etc” hence hurty limbs and throbbing shoulder. Obviously I’ve cut out some of the complex medical stuff there.

The upshot other than medical bills that put me in mind of US Medicare is no riding of bikes for two weeks, much riding of the horrible tube and general one handed uselessness if asked to perform any difficult act such as painting. On the upside the newly prescribed Co-codamal donkey stunners are pretty damn powerful. So powerful in fact, they come with a stern warning that the recipient had better not operate machinery or drink alcohol otherwise the world may explode or some such catastrophe. I’m assuming that attempting both simultaneously would turn that into dangerous machinery.

I’m treating that caveat in the same way Italian drivers regard stop signs. Interesting, possibly informative but only to be obeyed on a case by case basis. Still to stay on the safe side, I’ll stay away from the heavy machinery for a few days.

And on that happy note, it seems the sun has crested the yard arm in a fridge opening manner.