They think it's all over.....

It is now....... After two manic days in the office The Brinkster is now off work (I hesitate to say 'on holiday') until the new year!!

Monday dawned with a delightfully predictable supply of trains into Worcester Park and I had a trouble-free journey through to Waterloo, at which point I discovered that the Waterloo & City line was closed so everyone piled down to the bus stop to catch the "Commuters' Sightseeing Tour of London". Ah well. Can't have it all.

We've had a few carol singers down Brinkley Road and have ignored a few more (if they must come when we're putting the little Brinksters to bed) and I was out with Miss Brinkster when the Rotary Association came down the road with Santa last Friday, whom the other Brinksters thought was great. Other than that there's been little to report as I've been either stuck at work or out and about on the rounds of Christmas socialising so haven't caught up with any Worcester Park gossip for the last week.

Hopefully having a few days off now means I can catch up on the rumour mill, go and buy some Christmas presents from Broadway Bargains and order Christmas lunch from the Ryan Gate.

..............or maybe not...........

Baker's Oven, cats and dolls

Making the most of the fact I've got the day off I strolled down Central Road this morning on the way to the sorting office to see what's what. Nearly a month ago I posted that the Bakers Oven was being refurbished so I thought I'd show you the before and after

Liking the new sign. Very smart!

With an eye to wider events Alfie the cat's gone missing on the Worcester Park/Stoneleigh border so take a look if you live near there in case you can help (or just like cute cat pictures).

Lastly the prize for the most bizarre Worcester Park reference goes to.......[drum roll please]........ The Doll Palace, which is about "The art of making cartoon dolls (dollz) and Doll Makers" and invites visitors to "Use our huge dollmaker dress up games to create personalized dolls and send them by email".
I'm trying not to get too creeped out here but I know you're wanting the Worcester Park reference:
"I knew I wanted Toby and nobody else. So I ran. Went to the station and got off at Worcester Park."
"Worcester Park?"
"Thats where Toby lives."

If you want to find the rest (including the unsubtle innuendo) you'll have to use Google.

If anyone's interested in the possibility of a pub crawl from the bottom from the Worcester Park to the North End tavern do let me know.........

Train timetable during emergency engineering works

Because of the landslip/landslide affecting all Worcester Park train services National Rail have just posted a timetable of the services that will be running during the day, which can be found here. The long and short of it is that there will be half hourly services running during the peak periods but don't bother using the usual link for running times as it appears to be borked.

For those that like pictures instead of text/numbers they've got one of those too:

Sex addiction and another Worcester Park blog

It seems another Worcester Park blog has snuck in under the radar in the form of 'sweetladymills' blog entitled "Worcester Park surrey". She's started off with a couple of links but hopefully there'll be some genuine posts up there soon!

In other news the local Guardian has a story about a New Malden resident who's rather cast the place in a bad light:

A sex addict driver on the hunt for a prostitute nearly killed two police officers when he deliberately drove the wrong way down the A3 at night, with no headlights, in a desperate attempt to flee the police.

Otuo Abebrese, 30, from New Malden, had been disqualified from driving by Kingston magistrates less than a month ago.

But he told police he was a sex addict and, on the night of December 5, he had not been able to sleep and had decided to drive to find a prostitute in Shepherd's Bush.
...
In court, the magistrates' faces dropped when the facts were read out and the lead magistrate said: I am disgusted. Get out of my sight!'"

Do go and read the story as it's scary/unbelievable what he was preparted to do to get away.

More info from National Rail

Some details of the emergency service operating through Worcester Park because of the landslip have been posted here but to make your life a little bit easier I've reproduced them below:
----------------------------------------------
Train services between Epsom and Raynes Park are being disrupted due to emergency engineering works at Worcester Park.

To help deal with the greatest of passengers using services on this route, the levels of disruption at different times of the day will be as follows:

Morning peak (until 09:30)
The normal service between London Waterloo, Epsom and Dorking / Guildford is suspended and the following special service will operate:
- a half hourly service will run between London Waterloo and Epsom, calling at all usual stations; - a normal service between will run London and Chessington South, with a number of additional services operating in the London bound direction only;
- services between London and Guildford via Leatherhead will be diverted and not call at stations between Motspur Park and Bookham. Services from London will call additionally at Surbiton and Effingham Junction and services to London will call at all stations between Guildford and Surbiton via Oxshott and also at Raynes Park.

Daytime and evening (between 09:30 and 15:30 and from 19:00 until end of service)
As morning peak, although the additional services from Chessington South to London Waterloo will not run.

Evening peak (between 15:30 and 19:00)
As morning peak, although additional services will run from London to Chessington South only.

In addition to the above, replacement bus services will run between Malden Manor and Leatherhead and between Leatherhead and Effingham Junction, calling at all stations.

South West Trains passengers may travel on Southern services. Customers wishing to travel between Dorking and Epsom should use Southern services.

London Underground are accepting South West Trains passengers between London Victoria and London Waterloo.

This disruption is expected to continue until Monday 17 December.

Landslide chaos - day three

Gave up on any idea of a train from Worcester Park this morning and jumped straight on a 213 for New Malden and got there before 7.20 in time for the 7.25, with traffic being lighter than I expected. The number of people who got on the bus outside the Worcester Park make me suspect that there were no trains of any shape or size this morning. The whole journey took me an hour and 20 instead of yesterday's hour and 50. My "Nanook of the North" commuting outfit came in useful as the outside temperature was registering -4.6 when I left.

Last night I came back via New Malden and got a 213 to WP, which was reasonably swift. The fact that the slip road off the A3 is closed for the roadworks seems to have helped ease the traffic.

If you have any good alternative routes can you post them and give an indication of time vs a normal day as they may be helpful to people wh oare struggling. The ones I've heard of so far (thankyou for the various contributions!) are:
- 213/151 bus to Cheam station,
- 213 bus to New Malden station,
- 213/151 bus to North Cheam then 93 to Morden,
- 213 bus then walk to Malden Manor (trains every half an hour),
- Walk along path by Green Lane school to Motspur Park (ditto),
- Wait at Worcester Park and just hope...........

On the bright side I've got a day off tomorrow...........

Transport woes

It took an hour and 50 to get into work this morning instead of the usual hour. Aiming for the 7.12 I got to the station and a delightfully empty train with only a smattering of passengers pulled in at 7.17, then stood there for several minutes before departing without opening its doors......... back towards Stoneleigh! Working on the theory that they were using it to test the work they'd done overnight and that it would be back in due time I persevered, and I was right...... it did return........ 30 minutes later.......

The now frozen hordes piled aboard and endured a slow commute to Waterloo (no heating of course) and for me it was a swift trip through the drain to Bank.

My "Plan B" was either going to be bus to New Malden and then train from there (discounted because of the traffic) or bus to North Cheam then Morden and in on the Northern Line......... so when I heard at Bank that the Northern Line was suspended in both directions from Morden to Stockwell I was just about glad I stuck with "Plan A".

Emergency engineering works at Worcester Park

Check Worcester Park train times here.

Emergency engineering works at Worcester Park

Last Updated: 13:22

Route Affected:
London Waterloo, Clapham Junction, Wimbledon, Raynes Park, Worcester Park, Stoneleigh, Epsom, Leatherhead & Guildford / Dorking

TOC/s Affected: South West Trains

Description: Train services between Raynes Park and Epsom are being disrupted due to emergency engineering works at Worcester Park.

London Waterloo to/from Dorking services are currently suspended.

London Waterloo to/from Guildford via Epsom services are being diverted via Cobham. They will run non-stop between Raynes Park and Effingham Junction.

Buses are replacing trains between Raynes Park and Epsom in both directions, calling at all planned interim stations.

This disruption will contimue until at least the end of service today, Monday 10 December


Easements:
Southern are accepting South West Trains passengers. London Underground are accepting South West Trains passengers between London Victoria and London Waterloo.

A Brinkster Weekend

Christmas is approaching, as I'm sure you've noticed, so our days and weekends are taken up with the assorted fairs, fetes, plays and pantos that come with the season.

Saturday dawned with the assorted young Brinksters bouncing around the house with the anticipation of the Cheam Common Junior School Christmas Fete. They insisted on being there from the moment the doors opened and many games were played, some prizes were won and Brinkster Junior came away from a toy stall with a £1 treasure that has kept him engrossed ever since (result!!). Brinkster Minor, aged 3, homed in upon the Munal's selection of delicacies and then proceeded to work his way through all of them with great relish, to our pleasure and surprise. We didn't get to try the Laser Quest thing but apparently it was very good judging from the responses and the queues.

From there Miss Brinkster and Brinkster Junior (still clutching his treasured toy) went to the Polka Theatre in Wimbledon to see The BFG, which was very good fun and well staged. For the celeb-hunters amongst you I spotted Martin Marquez (Of The Bill, Hotel Babylon, and many more) and the Children's Laureate Michael Rosen in the audience.

Back to Worcester Park and I was called into action as the household face-painter (they'd resisted the temptation at the fete) so by tea time there was a tiger and a monkey rampaging through Brinkster Central leaving carnage in their wake.

Sunday found us at Kew Gardens by 9.30 in the cold to engage in a few more Christmassy activities, by which I don't mean forcing prospective young Jewish parents to sleep in unsuitable accomodation but some of the more Victorian activities. First stop was the Rotary club stand by the Princess of Wales Conservatory which had brewed up a batch of mulled wine to chase away the morning chills (the kids had lemonade) and then on to the Snow Dome, which was actually foam disguised as snow but could just as easily be shoved in faces without the disadvantage of being too cold. Then on to the Plant-omime with my guest spot as the Genie in Alladin, a quick trip to see Santa and finally a horse and carriage ride before heading back to the car. We collapsed at home and the spent the remainder of the afternoon watching movies!

Kew has free open evenings on the 14th and 15th so do head over as most of the stuff is on and if you're trying to get in the Christmas mood it's a good way to do it.

Quiet week - non WP related

After the Hamptons proposal being knocked back on Monday it seems to have been a quiet-ish week in Worcester Park. Rather than post something completely inane (well, more inane than usual) I thought I'd introduce to you the "BCB Wall Breaker".

In my professional travels I come across some fabulous (and some not-so fabulous) gadgets and at an exhibition this week the must-have boys toy rapid entry equipment was this. You fill up a normal water cooler plastic bottle, stick it in this thing and bring it up to 200psi and 'boom', bring the house down! There is a video demo of this thing in action but I can imagine it came to life when a couple of bored techies were sat around (probably watching Braniac) and saying to each other "Hey, if you can use water pressure to power a vehicle maybe you could blow a hole in a wall with it!".

I can't think of a single occasion where I'd find one of these useful but I still get the overwhelming urge to want one anyway....... It's rare that I find something so cool and yet bizarre/ridiculous all at once.

Any WP news anyone or can you top that for a pointless/niche gadget?

Hamptons expansion rejected

It was the important Hamptons planning meeting last night and the Council have rejected St James proposal. With so much money on the line I assume there will be an appeal but it's good news for now. For more details go to The Hamptons Blog.

It seems like Sutton Police are experimenting with Segway personal transport for officers. If you're in need of a chuckle it's a good read but I can't quite picture a police Segway in hot pursuit uphill on Central Road.....

Rendezvous?

The defunct "Rosy Miller's" coffee shop up near "Model Road and Rail" is reopening under the name of "Rendezvous" sometime this week. The sign says "coffee shop and more"*, by which they hopefully means cakes, buns, tea, etc but the open-ended invitation does nothing to help dispel the reputation of that end of Central Road for providing "unusual services".


On a different note Mrs Brinkster has been led to believe that the new "Ciaran" barbers is an offshoot of the hair salon by the station. Apparent confirmation of this would appear to be in the fonts they use for their signs:

Photos from the worcesterparkblog and bluejamred
*italics mine.

Reflections - Guest blogger

Friday night's Worcester Park Traders Association Christmas evening was a tad damp, as those who were out in out can testify. I think the adult-eye view might be to say that it was a washout but as "Christmas is for the kids" I thought I'd hand over to a guest blogger for the first time. Please welcome the blogging debut of the 7-year old Brinkster Junior to give his reflections on the evening's activities:

"I liked the games best, because they're so fun and because I won a gun and a Christmas present. I played a dart game and a one where I had to throw footballs and I liked the football game best.

I went on a spinning teacup ride, the big wheel and a turning-round duck ride and they were fun because they made me feel excited.
All of the rides were exciting so it's hard to choose a favourite.
I had a really great time."

Didn't mention the rain once. Mission accomplished I'd say!

Photos

I'll do a proper post soon but for now here are a few photos from last night's Worcester Park Traders Association Christmas evening on Central Road.