Get Ahead of the Games says Mr Johnson

Regular readers of this blog will know how much I love public transport in London. I think of it as a free show on the way to a show. This is  especially true since the invention of the mobile phone. I can't understand why people complain. In the past I'd sometimes listen in to dialogue conducted in a language I was studying. Nowadays I'm often treated to a stream of  novelty language, as a young woman scolds an errant boyfriend, or I overhear an exchange of confidential business details between suited gents.

.Just recently, like everyone else, I've had to listen to announcements by  Boris.  He tells us in an insistant voice that as we are about to welcome one million extra visitors a day to our city, we need to plan our journeys and 'get ahead of the games'. I'd have thought people already planned their the optimum route to work. I know I thought long and hard about alternatives when I commuted two hours there and back Lewisham to Twickenham on weekdays. I had to allow for delays and cancellations. Last Saturday it took me three hours to get from Chessington to London Bridge, because of a signal failure in Surbiton. It required some detours by bus and much waiting on cold damp platforms. It seems silly when I  can go from Euston to Preston, 200 miles, in just over two hours. And whatever happened to waiting rooms?

We've been pestered, too, by a series of cartoon images on posters and tube barriers. As if being  even more squashed will be fun, akin to  being an extra in a Disney film.

Thank goodness the only journeys I'll make will be outside  rush hours.  'Plan your journey'  must take the euphemism prize for 'Get up at the crack of dawn to have any chance of getting to work by lunch-time!'