'I look, feel and smell like a bag lady.'
Overnight coaches. On paper they're such a good idea. Leaving at about 11.30, getting in at about 6.30, and booked enough in advance, costing £1. On this day last year I had great success with it, falling asleep half an hour out of London and waking up half an hour before Sunderland, so I decided to book myself onto it again for a forum meetup in August; I've posted about that before.

Despite turning up an hour early, I was one of the last people on the coach, and the last double seat was right at the back, next to the toilet. I dumped my bag, took off my shoes and jumper and dumped those on the floor as well, and congratulated myself on getting a good double seat.

Wrong. I wasn't last on, someone else parked their arse next to me. That scuppered my plan of putting my feet up on that seat to try and get some sleep. Not only that, but there was a group of people spookily similar to these across the aisle.

And I was drunk. Drunk on a bottle and a half of mixed wines, and 15 minutes into the journey my stomach was curdling. I jumped, in my stocking feet, into the toilet, sat down to wee, and threw up the scant contents of my stomach into the sink.
I should have left my shoes on. The toilet was leaking and I had my feet in a two-inch pool of blue stuff (some sort of disinfectant?), water and other people's piss. Ew. I finish up, rinse out the sink, go back to my seat, where I take my socks off and stuff them in my shoes. Headphones in and settle down, praying for sleep.

Not so. The braying wankers across the aisle are still shouting and singing as if they think everyone gives a rat's cock about how they've spent the day, and the man next to me is dozing off. He leans further and further towards me, and eventually his head drops onto my shoulder as he fully falls asleep. Bloody marvellous.

An hour in, six hours still to go, and I'm still wide awake, Shoulder Boy has fortunately shifted a bit so he's leaning backwards instead of on me, but no, the men opposite are as loud as ever. I crank up the mp3 player to try and drown them out and the battery cuts out on me. I lean over to get another one out of my bag, miss in the darkness, and grab my jumper.

Why is my jumper wet?

I pull it up, and the smell hits me.

I can't describe the horror of realising that your jumper, socks, shoes, bag (mercifully waterproof) and hems of your jeans are soaking in other people's stale piss. Several other people's stale piss, for that matter; I certainly wasn't the only one to pay a visit that night. I dropped my jumper in horror, grabbed a battery from my bag and tried to block it out. But the knowledge and the smell lingered...

At the service station, I rushed for the toilets, not bothering to put my shoes or socks on, washed my hands so much they ended up pink from scrubbing, and bought a caramel shortcake. Back on the bus, stepping into the puddles under my seat made me feel so ill I couldn't eat it.

I cried all the way from York to Sunderland. This part only took about two or three hours but leaving York it felt like the longest time ever. I wanted my washing machine, my shower and my bed. I didn't want to be sat in a pool of other people's wee. And I was at that hideous comedown stage of sobering up, combined with the rattiness I get with no sleep. Not to mention that, even if I put my feet on top of my bag, my jeans were still deeply unpleasantly cold and wet against my legs. And the smell lingered.

I was first off the coach at Sunderland, probably offending some people by none-too-delicately shoving them out of the way, but who cares, they'd probably had a lovely peaceful journey. One small ray of light appeared in that a bus heading up my street was sat waiting at the stand. It was blessedly empty so I didn't ruin many other people's morning with my foul sight and smell.

10 minutes later, I barely stopped to close the front door before running straight through to the washing machine, throwing in my jumper, socks, jeans, and for good measure my t-shirt, with half a bottle of washing liquid. I'm not a long shower person, but I was in there for at least half an hour.

In hindsight I probably should have said something to the driver.

Um. Apologies for this turning into an essay.
(and now for someone completely different, Thu 29 May 2008, 22:06, Reply)