Now I’m not working at Euston anymore, (the UK railway isn’t really in need of any improvements after all) I’m back to travelling out to Godalming in Surrey every day. Back to the horror and twisted justice that is South West Trains.
There are some bonusses though. On the train to Guildford you get to see a normal suburban house with 2 astronomical observatories in the garden. The rows of neatly tended gardens, lawns, vegetable plots. The patio furniture is out, although this April is not going to let them get away with that. Then every few gardens, you get one that ‘lets the side down’. That ‘could do with improvement’. That frankly looks a bit too bohemian (or ‘pikey’) for the Surrey landscape.
Then as you go further, the houses get bigger, and further away from the railway because the gardens have grown. Plastic garden furniture gives way to wood. If you were going to find a severed ear in England, it would be here.