Just to be original, a National Express story
I will warn you in advance that this story probably isn't going to be funny. It's a story about a journey too boring to be funny but if you still read this and feel shortchanged, consider yourself lucky that it only wasted one minute of your life rather than 10 hours.

I have been on a National Express coach once and I will never go on one again. Edinburgh to Manchester. Via Glasgow.

My journey started with a 30 mile journey to get to Edinburgh in the first place so I'd gone through a bit of my boredom reserves by the time I met up with my travelling companion Barry at Edinburgh bus station.

Still, we were on our way to a few days visiting our friend Andy for his 21st and we were going to have a great time, nothing a little bus journey could get in the way of. However, even though our spirits were high we realised quickly that 3 things were going to ruin our journey.

Firstly, it's a long distance to travel when you're going on a slow ass bus and there just isn't enough leg room. I felt really bad for Barry who's over 6'.

Secondly, for those lucky enough not to have endured a long distance National Express coach, here's the deal. There are two drivers who take it in turn to (a) drive and (b) be the worst, most irritating compere/half-assed comedian/letch on the planet. Within 30 minutes my mate and I were describing fantasies of standing up and shouting "Shut the f*** up already! I don't want to hear your suggestive comments over the intercom about how you'd show that 50 year old, Michelin woman in the third row a good time."

Finally, and worst of all we made the mistake of sitting one row from the back seat. Right next to the chav family from hell.

Like when Super Nanny "observes" the latest contestants of Britain's Worst Parents, we could see what we were in for within 2 minutes. The parents had no desire to controls their little brats and just ignored them. This resulted in shouting, throwing, fighting and general "Mummy, mummy, look at me. Look at meeeeee. You're not looking!"

The two things I remember most of this journey was when one of the little cherubs was acrobatically dangling upside-down off the seat by their legs and shouting something. I ignored it while praying that somehow the bus would turn or go over a bump and they'd fall off (don't worry, I bought my ticket to Hull long ago). But the most unbelievable thing was when on the back seat of the bus the dad of Damian's cousins started rolling a joint. Barry and I were just looking at each other in disbelief. At one of the breaks in the journey waiting outside he started smoking it and I remember Barry saying, "Go on, ask him if he's got a spare."

So we get to Manchester Airport hours later, absolutely drained and we're waiting to be picked up by our mate. Ten minutes late and he's still not arrived. It wasn't until a while later that I realised that I'd told them the wrong terminal number. Barry was not happy with me.

So there you go we found our friend eventually and we had a great weekend. I've bored the b3tan community once again with my poor, poor story telling but I don't care. My message is clear - don't go on a National Express coach. It will finish you off.
( djtrialprice, Fri 8 Sep 2006, 12:30, Reply)