Standing on Chelmsford railway platform today while waiting for a
train to London I have a clear view across the University campus where
Ultralab was based, in which I worked.

The sports hall and student bar is now demolished and I'm guess once
the rubble is cleared Ultralab's North Block will be next.

Today while in New Milton, Hampshire, visiting a school, I passed a
retro games store and on my way back to the station I purchased an
immaculate boxed Sega Dreamcast for £20, a memory card for £5 and £9
worth of games.

I never owned a Dreamcast, but have heard so many times over the years
that they were an under valued console that was excellent, just badly
marketed and overpriced.

Jus (surprise surprise) had a Dreamcast when she was younger and
requested (on the phone) at the time of purchase that some 'Tomb
Raider' titles were bought too, she has been playing them this
evening. I've been playing 'Crazy Taxi' on the good advice of Hais.

The Dreamcast sits alongside the Megadrive we bought two weeks ago,
and I'm impressed by the graphics, the sound quality and the condition
it is in. First time we turned it on it asked for todays date,
starting at 1998 as default, where have the last ten years gone? They
flew by.

Wow! A train company that knows what it is doing. This morning I
boarded an overcrowded and dirty National Express East Anglia train
from Witham, changed at Stratford onto the delayed, sticky, smelly and
noisy London underground and now I'm on a clean, pleasent and on time
South West Trains service from Waterloo.

The air condition works, the train is quiet and I've been welcomed
aboard. The trolley cart running through the train was a lot less
expensive in comparison to National Express who charge £1.30 for
breakfast bars that only cost 40p in the shops.

All I need now is free wifi and plugs at my seat and I'd be even more
impressed.

Walking round Lakeside this evening almost every store has a sale on,
few customers and some of the small independent stores have gone into
receivership or are closed.

Less than half price in Morrisons, so Jus bought loads.

Jus and I are in Morrisons and I'm amazed by the number of offers.

Its clear to me that people are being careful about what they are
spending, but because the price of petrol, living cost bills going up
and spending therefore going down that shops like this are
suffering.... as us customers think twice about the impulse buys
supermarkets have traditionally thrown at us as we wander around
picking up.

Justina has taken to baking cakes, her latest was todays Chocolate
Peppermint Slice, which tastes great. Yesterday she made 'Rocky Road'
like you get in Starbucks, another hit. Roll on tomorrow!

Today Hal, Hais and I are at Barnfield College for the regional RSC conference. Last year it was held in Norfolk at Easton College, which we enjoyed exhibiting at. We are delighted to be invited to this years conference to exhibit and run the podcasting sessions. Our SMS wall is also on display and in use for delegates throughout the day to text in thoughts, ideas and comments.

For the past year I have been travelling standard class to Norwich on
National Express East Anglia to get to City College to work on RUGroom.

This morning I am catching the (surprise surprise, late running) 7.07
from Witham to Norwich and might miss my connection for the last part
of my journey to Great Yarmouth.

Anyway, booking the tickets for the trip yesterday from
thetrainline.com it was more cost effective for me to travel First
Class on the way up, and Standard on the way back.

The ticket I have for this trip (which National Express will nodoubt
check the usual four times they seem to inspect) cost £16 First Class
as opposed to over £20 Standard Class purchased at the station (no
standard tickets were available for this train on thetrainline.com, I
guess the few limited discount tickets had already sold.

The return journey standard ticket has cost me £6.00, bargain.

This is the first time I have used thetrainline.com for a long time
after it became virtually impossible to explain a ticketing error to
various representatives in a thetrainline.com oversees call centre by
phone. Thetrainline.com might be a cost effective way to buy train
tickets cheap, so long as you make no changes to plans and stick to
the strict schedule you agree to at time of purchase.

The First Class carriage is almost empty, a National Express employee
is busy on a laptop near by and a dew seats ahead a young lady has
just joined the train at Manningtree.

About a month or so ago, colleague Hal MacLean and I travelled
standard class from Kings Cross to Doncaster. The seats were
comfortable, carriage was clean, bright and modern and there was free
wireless Internet and power plugs at every seat. Yet here on the
train I'm on at the moment I'm in First Class with none of that, and
the train is opperated by the same company, National Express.

Although the seat I'm sitting in right now is roomy, its not very
comfortable, but atleast it is quiet (I somehow usually end up in the
carriage with the screaming toddler).

I also tried booking some tickets through raileasy.com and won't be
using them again.