High Society

A little bit of synchronicity this morning, my day yesterday was taken up with travel, from home to Girona, train to Barcelona, further train to Barcelona Prat airport, Ryan Air to Edinburgh, taxi to home.

The crane is viewed from Girona Train Station, it is involved in putting in the final cosmetic features of the AVI or TVE or TVI or whatever acronym they are using this week. This is the high speed train line that will be capable of whisking us from home to Paris in just over five hours, if you are desperate to go to Paris, which I am not, having a healthy disdain for the French on their own turf, or anyone else's for that matter. (The guy that owns the cafe in Ceret is an honourable exception, his quiche is wonderful)

In theory I could take the train from Figueres, 30 k, away from home and be in London in six or seven hours and in Scotland three days after that since they have seen fit to restrict the high speed train in Britain to terminate somewhere about Finchley, I believe. That might be preferable to the plane, since I presume on the train one can draw the blinds down to avoid having to watch Frenchmen eating garlic and making love or the French women having their biennial body wax. Or Sarkozy doing all three simultaneously whilst bribing the electorate from a soap box. The French as is well known do not use soap, at least not in any recognised Christian way.

And so to Edinburgh, where my chosen form of transport is still in the doldrums, the ETP or Eventual Tram project is ever my favourite way of amusing taxi drivers on the 10 minute ride from Edinburgh Airport to home. (They love me as a fare, they have been waiting for perhaps four hours to reach the head of the line, and I bound into their cab, ask them to convey me three miles, and wind them up about the trams) If you want a ten minute crash course in ancient Celtic profanities then suggesting that taxis may have to lower their exorbitant fees to compete with the trams is a quick, easy and fun way to achieve elucidation. I warn you to time it correctly though, as being dumped on the fringes of the city bypass with suitcase and duty free and your birthright being proclaimed on a (very) wet Sunday night is unlikely to make The Edinburgh edition of "101 ways to amuse yourself in Plaid land."

So that crane in Girona has a lot to answer for, it did start my brain going though, and yes, thank you, I did arrive safely!