Errant Ramblings: Mitzi Szereto’s Weblog

Mitzi Szereto interviews an Austin Healey for Mitzi TV

Mitzi TV heads to the Connaught Village Spring Festival in London, encountering some cool cars and the likes of Batman, Fred Flintstone, Formula 1 racecar driver and BBC Television’s “Top Gear” and “Fifth Gear” presenter Tiff Needell, and Carrie Bradshaw’s favourite couture shoe designer Jimmy Choo!

Visit the official Mitzi TV website at: http://mitziszereto.com/tv

Mitzi Szereto presenting Mitzi TV

Mitzi TV goes on the prowl in London in search of the famous East End Cockney delicacy, the jellied eel… (Turns out these scary denizens of the deep weren’t our cup of tea. We should’ve ordered the pie and mash instead!)

Visit the official Mitzi TV website at: http://mitziszereto.com/tv

Yes, it’s that time of year again. Spring is on our doorstep, flowers are bursting into bloom, the sun is shining (at least some of the time); those heavy winter coats can finally be put away. A long holiday weekend is on the horizon – the Easter Bank Holiday weekend, which starts on Good Friday and runs through Bank Holiday Monday. Plenty to do, lots of places to go. A perfect time for some Erotic Travel Tales, if you’ve a mind to book a trip out of town.

Well, just try to bloody get anywhere!

The sadistic stooges who run the public transportation system here in Great Britain (and, more specifically, its overcrowded capital London) prefer to hold many of us hostage in our homes rather than allow us to actually go anywhere and maybe, just maybe, derive a few minutes of enjoyment from this bleak joke we call “Life”. Oh, they may not wear balaclavas, but they’re as mean and unscrupulous as any band of hostage-takers you’re ever likely to encounter. Who needs the IRA or Al Kaida when we have these railway charmers in our midst? Foolish little me for making plans for Good Friday for what sounded like a fun night out in Brick Lane consisting of several live bands plus some rather interesting-sounding beer. Easter Sunday held the promise of a cracking good Sunday roast lunch at a city pub with a bunch of American expats, no doubt followed by still more pubs and invariably a discussion of British immigration policies and teeth.

And I was really looking forward to it too.

Well baby, it ain’t gonna happen. Why? Because this weekend is going to be chock full of engineering work on the rail lines, including those of the London Underground. Weekends are usually fraught with this sort of thing at various locations throughout Greater London and beyond, but when it comes to bank holiday weekends, they really get out the big guns. Now it isn’t completely impossible to get where I need to go, but when the routing takes on all the proportions of a clandestine attack on a major world leader, it’s time to call it a day. Both events I’d planned to attend take place in the city, near London Liverpool Street station – generally an easy commute by train, 35 minutes or so. Not this weekend, however. The trains from where I live will not be running past a certain point, meaning I cannot get to either Liverpool Street station or Stratford East London (where I could catch the tube). If I were to even attempt such a journey, I’d end up on some convoluted acid-trip of a route which would take more than two hours one way for what should only be a half hour. And let’s not even talk about whether I’d be able to make it home at night.

Fine, I’m resourceful; I figured I’d be creative and find another way that, although inconvenient, would not be quite as inconvenient as what the National Rail website was proposing I do: I’d get off the train at Romford and change to the Romford to Upminster line, then catch the District line tube from there into the city and directly to Aldgate East – perfect and right where I needed to be! Not the most convenient or ideal routing, but do-able. Well, the District line at Upminster also isn’t running, thereby cutting off yet another large sector of the population from the city. I wasn’t beaten yet though. The C2C train goes from Upminster into the city – so I could still get that train from Romford to Upminster, then catch the C2C and get off at West Ham, where I’d catch the District line to Aldgate East. Hey, not so fast, madam! The Romford to Upminster line isn’t running at all, and what should normally be a short hop on this particular line would now take nearly two hours via, of all places, Southend (no wonder the National Rail website had an ad for the local Holiday Inn posted right above the train routes). And this time frame doesn’t even factor in the other legs of the journey.

Looks like I’m not going anywhere. This reminds me of those deadly virus movies where they isolate whole segments of the population so they don’t spread the disease and infect others. Seems like a hell of a lot of people from the Eastern edge of the capital out past the M25 will be stuck at home this Easter weekend – or not going anywhere near London anyway.

I find it interesting that many third-world countries manage to maintain, upgrade, and expand their rail systems without causing serious disruption to its residents, so why can’t Great Britain? As for our European neighbours, I can’t imagine the French, Spaniards, Greeks or Russians putting up with this crap. There would be rioting in the streets, politicians would be hung from the branches of trees and publicly neutered with a dull knife. Over here in Blighty they only seem to get the fighting spirit when their football team has lost – or, for that matter, won. Sure people may moan a bit, but then they go have a cup of tea, and the rail fares continue to spiral upwards for what has become an increasingly eroded level of service.

But don’t worry, be happy! The Olympics are coming to London, and those of us who live east of the city will be made to suffer even more than we already do just so the tourists who come here to spend their money can enjoy a state-of-the-art British public transportation system (now if that isn’t an oxymoron I don’t know what is) – with nice places to wait out of the cold and wind (been to the train platforms at Stratford lately? Perfect for catching pneumonia!), and nice shiny trains that aren’t reeking with the stench of greasy chips, or littered with the gnawed-over remnants of fast food, empty beer bottles and ripped-open condom packets (I don’t even want to think about where the contents of said packets have ended up).

I don’t know about you, but I wish to make a complaint! http://www.youtube.com

I don’t ski. And neither does my suitcase. However, it’s quite possible it will be in Colorado for the skiing season.

I suppose I shouldn’t really complain. My navy-blue American Tourister had a reasonably peaceful afternoon upon arrival on Saturday at San Francisco International Airport, where it was tagged and placed on a conveyor belt on its way to being deposited into the belly of an aircraft. At least it knew where it was going. Unlike myself, who spent several hours running back and forth between the pay phone and the airline check-in desk, wondering if I’d ever make it back to Blighty.

You see, I was supposed to fly to Denver, then change planes to London, had the flight to Denver out of San Francisco not been delayed by two hours, thereby making the connection an impossibility. Apparently San Francisco International Airport is notorious for delays, as is this particular airline. Several conversations with telephone reservations as well as the check-in people at the airport later, I ended up with a colourful hodgepodge of bookings, offering me routing through Chicago, Washington, and Los Angeles (along with a couple of standby reservations), the airline neglecting to mention that I was no longer on any Denver to London flights for either the original day or the following day, despite my being told at check-in that I had two bookings from Denver to London for both Saturday and Sunday, and despite my suitcase being checked through from San Francisco to Denver to London, and despite my boarding passes from San Francisco to Denver to London, and despite a non-refundable Denver hotel reservation only moments away from being booked and paid for. (The airline refused to pay for a hotel.)

Who is this glorious airline? Will I be sued if I tell? Let’s just say that their name begins with a “U” and ends with a “D”. And I will avoid them like the bloody plague next time I get my arse booked on a flight to America.

By the time I made what would be (or so I thought) my final flight booking, which was to be via LA (with yet another hotel room due to be reserved and paid for so that I could fly out to London the next afternoon), I went racing back through security to the check-in counter, jumped the queue (don’t cross me when I’m stressed), and tried to get my suitcase back. Well, U****D wasn’t having it, despite the nearly two hours they had in which to retrieve it. So while I was panicking about having to stay at a hotel overnight with nothing but the clothes on my back and a couple of Granny Smith apples, someone FINALLY decided to do something that actually made a bit of sense: get me on another airline to London that same evening. Ergo I was placed on stand-by with British Airways (ahh… civilisation). After trekking to the international terminal and finally locating the BA counter (do they want people to actually find them???), a new boarding card was placed in my sweaty little hand.

Of course the fun wasn’t over yet. I must’ve looked either very dodgy or very deranged – or else it was because I came from the big bad domestic terminal and from another carrier, but I got singled out for an extensive security search. Now, get your mind out of the gutter – we aren’t talking strip search here, although I did receive the cheap thrill of getting air blown on me in some glassed-in cubicle. Ooh, the life of an erotic writer!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, I can take it; I’ve been through worse in my lifetime. But I definitely draw the line when it comes to my bear. You harm one hair on his furry little head and you’re dead meat, mate! Well, the poor guy was removed from his warm and cosy little backpack, placed on a cold metal table, and treated to the indignity of being manhandled by some security geezer at SFO. I sat by and kept a very close watch, since Teddy is still technically underage – and there ARE laws against this sort of thing in America. Teddy survived unscathed (wish I could say the same thing about myself), and Mr. Security Man offered us both a bright California smile. I should add that the gentleman seemed far more involved in a relationship with my shoes, a characteristic I find rather worrisome in a man.

Now for the contents of my errant suitcase: I’m quite worried about the fate of my sexy little Staind vest top, which I need for this Friday night, since I’m going to see the Massachusetts lads at the O2 Arena in London. Add to this some cookies from Trader Joe’s and the earrings I bought in Wales – these things are not so easily replaced. Teddy also had a nifty pair of shades in the suitcase, which sadly he never got to wear, since he spent most of his time in bed or else avoiding a rather dodgy feline character named Oliver.

It’s all well and good to file a lost baggage claim and get a few quid out of the deal, but trying to replace all those items, and taking the time to replace them… well, I’d rather have my suitcase back than a few paltry pounds in my pocket and the aggro of having to go shopping to try to replace what is, for the most part, irreplaceable. You see, I hate shopping. Yes, I am a woman who hates shopping. It takes me up to three hours just to buy a pair of knickers. Don’t believe me? Ask my mother, who thought I was kidnapped by sex traffickers at a Macy’s in South Florida when I vanished in the lingerie department.

All I can say is, that suitcase better bloody well get here and soon, or else there will be major hell to pay…