Like everyone who lives or works in London, I've been impacted by the current tube strike in the capital.
Today I sat for forty minutes on the A40, not moving an inch, with the fuel light on (even I knew this signified I was about to run out of juice).
Eventually, of course, I abandoned my scheduled meeting in North London and turned around at Paddington, reaching the petrol station with not a great deal to spare.
After I had crawled home I encountered the kidult in the kitchen frying herself a bit of bacon. She listened very sympathetically to my tale of woe before announcing - somewhat gnomically - this was a "metaphor for recession".
My mate, the lovely Pat Brown, rang me to tell me that she was about to get on a bike to try to get from her house in Bermondsey to reach a meeting with Ken Dytor and Jack Jacobs in St John's Wood. Pat is a lady of a certain age, like myself. "Good luck, dear" I said. I then looked out of the window and saw it had started to rain. Gawd love her.
Over the last two days I've heard of stories of people walking, cycling, roller skating and taking the most complicated routes to go about their normal business. The volume of traffic (understandably) has dramatically increased as people resort to their cars (as I learnt to my cost). So congestion and pollution have increased and life is that bit more stressful.
