The Wheels Have Fallen Off the Wagon
A crisis breaks...since 7.30 this morning Clapham Junction station has been without electricity and they have blundered their way through the snow and cold in a weird approximation of customer service. I work elsewhere but the echoes are loud and are sending our managers into a panic. The emergency power has failed and the electrician came with further bad news...the problem will not be fixed until tomorrow morning. Jesus!
It is now 3.00pm in the afternoon and our side of the earth is slowly and surely turning away from the sun...there is no way such a station can run in the dark. It would be dangerous and farcical. So now a bell begins to toll and will reach its crescendo in one hour’s time when thousands of desperate commuters will discover Clapham Junction is completely, utterly and totally shut. An announcement is ready to go out over the public address system here any moment and we are poised to hear the collective moan of despair from the public. Clapham Junction is, of course, Britain’s busiest station. This will cause chaos...
3.15pm, and the idea of replacement buses has been discarded. It would send the evening rush hour into murderous freefall; nothing would be able to move on the roads. So what the hell is going to happen?
Well...we’re not responsible, so all we have to worry about is the operational side of the crisis. It was not our decision to close the station...the blame will fall elsewhere.
And this is a managerial problem. All I can do is shrug and continue staring at a computer screen, waiting for the working day to end. With everybody else having either gone home or tied up with the current crisis, I am at a loose end...I have already wasted enough time reading the papers today...and the news outside our bubble is no better than the stuff within.
In particular, Hunter S. Thompson has shot himself in the head and his body was found at his home in Woody Creek yesterday...now everywhere in the world there are conservatives feeling just that little bit safer in their beds. God only knows why he did it and I do not wish to know either...anyone who finds any kind of doomed romance or gonzo spirit in this thing are deluding themselves. It is not a good death and certainly does not serve his memory well.
But what the hell. It was his choice, after all. He had his reasons and we only show ourselves up by slavering over the grisly details like rabid dogs in a butcher’s shop. And his unexpected and violent end can only breed a thousand unwanted conspiracy theories. This is a pity and does not feel Right.
In a strange way his death is not shocking. Tragic, indeed, but the fact he survived this long is something way beyond medical logic. His work, his writing that exploded like fireworks of acid over each and every page, is a piece of history and has felt like that for many years now. So his death feels like the final inevitable station on a journey he began long ago; he bought the ticket and took the ride, whilst everyone else ran alongside the train trying to keep up.
And now he’s gone. So now who the hell do we plagiarise?
3.40pm. The wheels of process are rolling...London Underground are accepting tickets of affected overland services, and the buses will soon be equally complicit. But the question that is being asked, in a particularly peeved tone, is simple. Why the hell we were warned just one hour before the station was due to close? Are the communication channels really that bad? But there are a hundred companies involved here, and each one contributes more and more noise to the signal. If you put your ear to the cable all you hear is crazed static...bad snatches of panic and failed connections.
3.55pm, and the last train to stop at Clapham Junction will soon be departing. Posters have been created and emailed out to stick up around the network, but we can do little to prevent the upcoming turmoil...we simply have to manage the roughest edges. Our goal is to appear to be doing everything we can, to stop this from becoming a PR nightmare. And, of course, to keep the public from blaming the wrong people...i.e. us. This is unlikely and there will be enough public anger to go round.
Ah, well. This will blow over soon enough. Every day a million commuters find themselves yielding a sigh at some fresh hell on London Transport, and this is no different. I am willing to put any amount of money that tonight, for instance, the East London line will be walking with a slight limp, as it is every day on my way home.
4.05pm. Mother of shitty death! The last train to leave Clapham Junction, due to leave a minute before four, has just collapsed in a wheezing heap. The damn thing has failed in the station and a million windows in London have just shattered under the stress of a train full of screaming passengers. Oh dear...the situation is bizarre and the station manager is juggling several phone calls at once trying to work out what the hell is going on.
Now he tosses the phones aside and heads through the door. “It’s all fun and games here today,” he says to nobody in particular, before giggling madly and rushing off to find a radio.
Hmm...well. Seems like the right time to bail on this situation, wipe my mind of the thing and head home. I am just grateful I am heading east, preferably as far away from Clapham Junction as I can go...
4.20pm. Ye gods! Last second reprieve...now things have turned on their head...with everything having been set up for an impending disaster, there is a strange rumour that the power will be operational within ten minutes. But the trains are still not going to stop...what the hell is going on?
Ah, fuck it. I give up.
It is now 3.00pm in the afternoon and our side of the earth is slowly and surely turning away from the sun...there is no way such a station can run in the dark. It would be dangerous and farcical. So now a bell begins to toll and will reach its crescendo in one hour’s time when thousands of desperate commuters will discover Clapham Junction is completely, utterly and totally shut. An announcement is ready to go out over the public address system here any moment and we are poised to hear the collective moan of despair from the public. Clapham Junction is, of course, Britain’s busiest station. This will cause chaos...
3.15pm, and the idea of replacement buses has been discarded. It would send the evening rush hour into murderous freefall; nothing would be able to move on the roads. So what the hell is going to happen?
Well...we’re not responsible, so all we have to worry about is the operational side of the crisis. It was not our decision to close the station...the blame will fall elsewhere.
And this is a managerial problem. All I can do is shrug and continue staring at a computer screen, waiting for the working day to end. With everybody else having either gone home or tied up with the current crisis, I am at a loose end...I have already wasted enough time reading the papers today...and the news outside our bubble is no better than the stuff within.
In particular, Hunter S. Thompson has shot himself in the head and his body was found at his home in Woody Creek yesterday...now everywhere in the world there are conservatives feeling just that little bit safer in their beds. God only knows why he did it and I do not wish to know either...anyone who finds any kind of doomed romance or gonzo spirit in this thing are deluding themselves. It is not a good death and certainly does not serve his memory well.
But what the hell. It was his choice, after all. He had his reasons and we only show ourselves up by slavering over the grisly details like rabid dogs in a butcher’s shop. And his unexpected and violent end can only breed a thousand unwanted conspiracy theories. This is a pity and does not feel Right.
In a strange way his death is not shocking. Tragic, indeed, but the fact he survived this long is something way beyond medical logic. His work, his writing that exploded like fireworks of acid over each and every page, is a piece of history and has felt like that for many years now. So his death feels like the final inevitable station on a journey he began long ago; he bought the ticket and took the ride, whilst everyone else ran alongside the train trying to keep up.
And now he’s gone. So now who the hell do we plagiarise?
3.40pm. The wheels of process are rolling...London Underground are accepting tickets of affected overland services, and the buses will soon be equally complicit. But the question that is being asked, in a particularly peeved tone, is simple. Why the hell we were warned just one hour before the station was due to close? Are the communication channels really that bad? But there are a hundred companies involved here, and each one contributes more and more noise to the signal. If you put your ear to the cable all you hear is crazed static...bad snatches of panic and failed connections.
3.55pm, and the last train to stop at Clapham Junction will soon be departing. Posters have been created and emailed out to stick up around the network, but we can do little to prevent the upcoming turmoil...we simply have to manage the roughest edges. Our goal is to appear to be doing everything we can, to stop this from becoming a PR nightmare. And, of course, to keep the public from blaming the wrong people...i.e. us. This is unlikely and there will be enough public anger to go round.
Ah, well. This will blow over soon enough. Every day a million commuters find themselves yielding a sigh at some fresh hell on London Transport, and this is no different. I am willing to put any amount of money that tonight, for instance, the East London line will be walking with a slight limp, as it is every day on my way home.
4.05pm. Mother of shitty death! The last train to leave Clapham Junction, due to leave a minute before four, has just collapsed in a wheezing heap. The damn thing has failed in the station and a million windows in London have just shattered under the stress of a train full of screaming passengers. Oh dear...the situation is bizarre and the station manager is juggling several phone calls at once trying to work out what the hell is going on.
Now he tosses the phones aside and heads through the door. “It’s all fun and games here today,” he says to nobody in particular, before giggling madly and rushing off to find a radio.
Hmm...well. Seems like the right time to bail on this situation, wipe my mind of the thing and head home. I am just grateful I am heading east, preferably as far away from Clapham Junction as I can go...
4.20pm. Ye gods! Last second reprieve...now things have turned on their head...with everything having been set up for an impending disaster, there is a strange rumour that the power will be operational within ten minutes. But the trains are still not going to stop...what the hell is going on?
Ah, fuck it. I give up.
posted by Jamie at 7:02 PM
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