At work, its been a tense week in many ways. Preparing for the first bulk appeals of the season is always an uncertain experience, but I feel really strongly that our responses and preparatory casework is solid. Meanwhile, other forces are conspiring to make life less pleasant... Change has picked up apace this week, which has led to lots of work.

Looking forward to the weekend, and the diversions via rare freight-only lines around Hallen and Filton. I think the timetable is becoming clear, but I still need to check my research. Planning on a 3 in 7 rover, giving me plenty of opportunity to get around during the Easter break. A birthday/leaving the country party on Easter Monday too.

Gave in and ordered books today. Added to my burgeoning Thomas Hardy obsession, along with Iain Sinclair's "Lights Our For The Territory". Also took the chance to pick up Mary Lou Lord's new CD on Loose. Weird to think I bought her last proper record in Kitchener, Ontario. Seems like a lifetime ago.

Took the opportunity of an up-to-date GNOME to build Abiword and Gnumeric. These projects amaze me in how they can stay so stable, move so fast, and generally just work. Catching up with both from CVS was as ever, a pleasant surprise.

Reported the customer information system at Highbridge (and presumably other stations) to Wessex Trains. On arriving yesterday it was still set to GMT, but was reporting the correct train times. So when I arrived at around 7pm it announced "The time is 17:58, the next train to depart is the 19:05". Several customers actually believed it, and just left the station! Wessex claim they will fix it. Lets hope so.

I've been running round in circles...
I keep looking for the doorway...
I'm going to need two lives to follow the paths I've been taking.

A strangely lacklustre day in lots of ways. Woke up feeling rather groggy - I can feel the seasonal allergies approaching, and it will take a couple of days for the antihistamines to start working. Bright and sunny out. Had decided on a journey along the coast to tour 'dubiously named seaside resorts' - namely Littlehampton and Bognor Regis. Always strange, having allegedly grown up in one resort, and now living in another crumbling temple of Victorian leisure time, seeing how its done elsewhere is compelling, if a bit depressing.

Chaos at Temple Meads with Portsmouth bound services - the 0822 delayed indefinitely and requiring fitters attention on arrival. 0922 delayed by signalling. Platform changes and much grumbling of passengers later, and we're off - in a rather cramped 158749 from the London end of Platform 1 - which already contained 158748 meaning we only just squeezed on. I suspect 748 may have been the 0822 in fact! Somewhere around here the weather turned wet and somewhat thunderous.

Otherwise, the journey ran rather smoothly. The odd few minutes adrift here and there on the coast, as ever. To Littlehampton first - a rather grim little place with no character, but a rather large station. Didn't hang around much here. Headed straight to Bognor Regis. Slightly better. A massive station - one can imagine huge excusion trains arriving here. The circulating area is vast, and the booking office now houses a small market! The town itself is a little more bustling and pleasant than Littlehampton. Wandered around a bit. Excellent service means four trains an hour out of here, Weston can only dream of such service!

Very sleepy in a hot 150238 on the return leg to Bristol. Lots of strange swapping and changing of units connected to us at Westbury. End result is a stray 153 between platforms 6 and 8 at Temple Meads, which no-one seems to know what to do with! Read a great deal of John Halperin's "Gissing - A Life in Books". Excellent, detailed but rather depressing stuff. On getting back to Weston, wandered aimlessly for a bit.

An odd day. New track and interesting travels, but still feeling restless.

I took the opportunity during my visit to Wakefield yesterday to take some pictures of Gissing's birthplace at 60 Westgate. I've placed the gallery here

It was always going to be a busy week. Trying to get appeal responses written at work, alongside various other pressing tasks, during a week of endlessly needing to be in other places! Flagged an Online Admissions Consortium meeting in Trowbridge yesterday, because things in the office needed more attention - e-mailed in apologies and our position on things, which I was pleased to see was sort of adopted as the position of the consortium. Wouldn't usually have passed by a midweek rail trip, but had today to look forward to - certainly the longest continuous trip since my return to the rails, and a visit to areas I'd not seen for maybe six or seven years! Official reason also was to visit Gissing's birthplace and wander around Wakefield a little.

Set out on the as-ever jammed 0829 from Weston, which goes all the way to Wakefield. Found my reserved seat easily, and marvelled at how the crowds thinned out after Bristol. Practically had a carriage to myself after Derby in fact. Smooth and quick journey - the 221 is a more comfortable DMU than I'd been led to believe, and it picked up time nicely where we were held back here and there.

North of Birmingham route was lined with photographers, especially on strategic bridges - out for the 'Twilight of the Grids' farewell tour hauled by Class 56's. Got confused around Sheffield, and misremembered the route. Was expecting the rather dull bit of eastward crawling via Mexborough, but didn't see it pass by. Only later discovered that we gone via Bolton-on-Dearne (since we weren't calling at Doncaster) and I'd scored a little bit of track I'd otherwise have found hard to ever get!

Hot and sunny by the time I arrived in Wakefield. Vague memories of being here chasing D9000 a few years back when it did a Leeds-York-Derby run following a footex. Wandered into town and took some pictures of the Gissing Centre and the house. Will try to get them posted hereabouts soon. Wandered around the town, which was pleasant enough - found only one bookshop, stocking no Gissing whatsoever! Very nice pint of John Smiths' from the the keg at the Black Horse on Westgate.

Annoying start to trip back. Much confusion about seat reservations left me standing to Sheffield, with rebellious thoughts and mentally composing a letter to Virgin as we travelled. Finally sat down, and got some reading time after Sheffield. Pleasant journey as far as Birmingham, when some legal types sat down and discussed things too loudly for my liking! I'm just never happy it seems... Pleased to see a couple of Wessex staff working together to corner a pair of young fare-dodgers at Yatton - perhaps sprinting into a seat and shouting "quick, pretend to be asleep!" with the guard a few feet away isn't the smartest way of avoiding payment. Equally funny was their attempt to exit the station by a back route, walking directly into a wall and being cornered! Smart work, girls!

All-in-all a very pleasant day off and a trip which mixed discoveries with memories - always nice.