So on Wednesday I left to get my train for my mini-holiday and I get to the train station and it is a half hour late. I get on then it gets stalled for almost a half hour as well so I miss my connecting train in Picadilly to the airport, waiting another half hour, finally get to the airport but all the counters are closed with not a soul there even though I still had 45 minutes to departure, defeated for the day and already late (22.00) I resign myself to staying at an airport hotel so that I might negotiate an exchange of tickets or something to save my trip; hotel is way too expensive, even though they have free 'wireless' the connection doesn't work, so I ask them at the reception and they say they can't do anything about it, air conditioning doesn't work either, like an oven, didn't get a wink of sleep, get out of bed at 6:30, head back down to the airport asking the staff where the Tuli counter is, no one has a clue, finally find them after being told to go in 3 different directions and even though I have evidence from my train tickets they refuse to cut me any slack and insist I but new ones and the next flight isn't even till midnight so after all this I decide to cut my losses and return crestfallen to York, being dirt poor I can't just throw over 200 quid out the window and then spend more...
Lessons to be learnt:
*Never take the trains in the UK, if you don't have a car, take a coach because you probably will get to your destination faster walking than with the train.
*Never fly out of Manchester, it's the 3rd time I have had problems there with the staff and general misdirectedness.
*Don't stay at airport hotels unless ABSOLUTELY necessary.
*It's better to have money than be poor.
That was all just Murphy's Law writ large in one's face...
