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Annie Mole's, daily web log (blog) & “guide” to the London Underground
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Wednesday, July 05, 2006

The return of Oystercard Online Journey History

Picture by LoopZillaIt's back

Well it appears that suspicious partners will be able to spy on their other halves again, as thanks to Martin, I learnt that once again if you have an Oystercard you can see 8 weeks of your journey history online. That's if you use pay as you go or auto top up.

You may remember that in February the national press had reported the more irregular use and strangely enough around the same time, Transport for London withdrew the facility to view your account online.

The website used to say "At present it is not possible to view your Pre Pay journey history on our website. You can check your Pre Pay journey history at the multifare ticket machines at Tube stations or you can get a printout from the Tube station ticket office. Both of these options will give you details of the last eight journeys made."

You could also get a printed statement if you sent your password to TfL by post.

Maybe they've now worked out a more foolproof way for Pre-Pay data to only be accessible to the Oystercard holder (although bear in mind that lots of partners know each others passwords - or at least could make a good guess at them). But hey, it is a handy feature and it seems weird to take it away just because some people were using it to spy on others.

Anyway, enjoy it while it lasts, as you might find the feature mysteriously disappears again.


; Posted by annie mole Wednesday, July 05, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/return-of-oystercard-online-journey.html

London Underground T Shirt

Commuter Clothing

It's not the Tube Fashion Victims come early, but it was quite strange to be on the Tube and looking across at a T Shirt with some people on it sitting in a line in a very familiar way.

London Underground Brixton T Shirt

I looked more closely and realised it was a group of Tube commuters on his T Shirt. It hasn't come out in the picture at all but they are passing through Brixton Station.

It really reminded me of the Frida Kahlo picture of commuters on a bus that I saw at Tate Modern exactly a year ago.


Certainly makes a change to the bog standard Underground T shirts with the Tube roundel on them!


; Posted by annie mole Wednesday, July 05, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/london-underground-t-shirt.html

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

Is it really getting too hot for the Tube?

Ken Livingstone warns of Tube closures due to heat

The Evening Standard must have been jumping up and down with glee when Sheriff Ken said he believed that in the future London would have to close some Tube lines because they would be too hot to travel in.

Tube is Heat Death Trap - Evening Standard

Ken said "You reach a point where the underground will become literally intolerable and you could face the prospect of loss of life." Although he's offered hundreds of thousands of pounds as a reward to find workable air conditioning for the underground, it sounds like the heat will eventually defeat the system. He believes we will have to resign ourselves to closures "if the temperature goes up faster than we fear it's going to".

Personally I think the only way there would be loss of life would be if people were stuck in the tunnels during a heatwave. But as getting stuck in tunnels for more than a couple of hours is becoming increasingly more frequent, perhaps Ken has a point.

We discuss intolerable heat on the Tube, year after year after year, but is the solution really to roll over and admit defeat like this? Surely there must be some systems somewhere in the world that we can learn from?


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, July 04, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/is-it-really-getting-too-hot-for-tube.html

Never knew The Who were trainspotters

The Day We Caught The Train

I wonder if The Who actually tried to find some a driver's view video of the Underground when they were planning their performance at
Hyde Park Calling on Sunday.

The Who - Hyde Park Calling

Neil, me and a couple of our friends joined thousands of others to see The Who at Hyde Park Calling. I imagine The Who wanted to keep to their sixties roots, so perhaps that's why we were treated with some vintage railway footage rather than a driver's eye view of the Jubilee Line or the DLR.

I was initially quite surprised to see the train driver's eye view film making up the background to "Who are You?". Although not so surprising when you recall the lyrics of the song:

"I staggered back to the underground
And the breeze blew back my hair
I remember throwin' punches around
And preachin' from my chair .......

I took the Tube back out of town
Back to the Rollin' Pin
I felt a little like a dying clown
With a streak of Rin Tin Tin
"

Does anyone know where the Rollin' Pin is or what it refers to?

Like most bands from London or writing songs about London, at some point in time the Tube is going to feature. Although there seemed to more of a trend with this in the sixties or with Mod/sixties sounding bands like The Jam. The Tube represented (and still to some extent represents) a hip and trendy, urban London. Throwing in London Underground references is kind of short-hand for saying "We're a bit edgy & street-wise". Although I'm sure Roger Daltry & Pete Townshend have done more than their fare share of Tube travel in the past.

Going to see The Who

By the way, one of the support acts Ocean Colour Scene performed their signature hit, The Day We Caught The Train - see how the links are not just thrown together.


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, July 04, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/never-knew-who-were-trainspotters.html

Misery Line Music Video Quiz Results

And the winner is........

Mmm
this quiz seemed to stump everyone (including me!)

I was hoping that someone would show such out and out confidence in answering or that a number of you would give the same answer, that the result would be obvious. Not so.

However with the aid of Stephen Knight (who's more of an expert in these things than I am) I can reveal the answers as follows:

1. Mornington Crescent
2. Mornington Crescent
3. No firm idea to be perfectly honest!
4. C69/77 stock
5. Edgware Road (District Line)


I tossed a coin to get the winner as there was only a choice of two and Alantan wins the tin!

If you feel like watching the video (Be There by Unkle featuring Ian Brown) to come up with absolute and firm proof as to where picture 3 is - feel free.


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, July 04, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/misery-line-music-video-quiz-results.html

Monday, July 03, 2006

More than 30 people killed in underground crash in Valencia

Metro Valencia by Manolo-LopezSubway crash in Eastern Spanish City

This afternoon at least 34 people were killed and more than 20 seriously injured when a speeding underground train ran off the tracks and overturned

"Two train carriages derailed and toppled over in a tunnel just before entering the Jesus underground station after a wheel broke on a curve at about 1 p.m., officials said."

A survivor from one of the carriages described how he made his escape through a door window.

"There was a bang, some very strange noises, everything shook and I passed out. They told me when the firemen came. I don't know how long they took, but that's when I got up". From Yahoo News

I travelled on the underground in Valencia about two years ago and my sympathies are with the families of the dead and also wish the injured a good recovery. Spain is still very shaky following the train bombings by Islamist extremists that killed 191 people in Madrid in 2004. However, this appears to have been a tragic accident and doubtless more news will be uncovered as the day progresses.


; Posted by annie mole Monday, July 03, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/more-than-30-people-killed-in.html

Snakes on a Plane! Samuel L Jackson on the Tube

First "John Travolta" now SLJ

On Friday I saw a man who was the spitting image of Samuel L Jackson. We all had to decamp from our Piccadilly Line train at Barons Court (which was screwed along with loads of other lines) so I managed to grab a picture.

Samuel L Jackson on the Tube

When I heard him talking on the phone, he sounded decidely un-Samuel L Jacksonish, but it was weird spotting him, so soon after Audrey spotted his Pulp Fiction side-kick Vincent, when she'd only been watching the film that weekend. Perhaps if you think enough about celebrities their lookalikes might magically just appear on the Tube?


If you manage to spot any real celebs on the London Underground or failing that good celebrity lookalikes, I'd love to see or hear about them.

I haven't seen a celeb on the London Underground for ages now, which is weird considering I use West End Tube stations daily. Unless you count Gita who used to be in EastEnders who was in my carriage a couple of weeks ago.


; Posted by annie mole Monday, July 03, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/07/snakes-on-plane-samuel-l-jackson-on.html

Friday, June 30, 2006

Moquette Quiz

How well do you know London Underground Tube Seats?

Three parts to this Friday's quiz.

1. Rather than naming all twelve please just name TWO of the lines that the seat upholstery comes or came from. Any smart alecs "Saying, Miss, Miss, I know all of them" and naming all twelve, or more than two, will have to stand in the corner and find their answers mysteriously evaporate. There is however, a bonus point if you don't give the same answer as the person immediately before you.

Name the Tube Moquette

2. Name one of the very first people who designed some moquette for London Transport. Again, you get a bonus point if you don't give the same answer as the person just before you.

3. Moquettes don't appear to have names, which is rather sad. So please come up with your own unique name for one of the moquettes pictured above. It will help if there's some connection to either the line or the pattern, so no points will be given for names like Bert or Fred or Jim. The more inventive the better!

Mind The Gap SocksAs usual the people who get most answers correct will go into Neil's paperclip selection.

To enter leave your email address and/or blog/website with your answers in the comments below. Please leave all your answers in one entry and you can only enter once! You have until 23.59 GMT, Sunday 9th July to make your guesses.

And the prize, a lovely pair of Mind The Gap socks, so if you think of putting your feet on the seats on the Tube (heaven forbid), you can display your sockwear with pride.

Have fun!


; Posted by annie mole Friday, June 30, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/moquette-quiz.html

London Underground Fashion Victims

Fashion Victims on the Tube

Here's this Friday's look at our slaves to fashion on the Tube or people with their own noticeable look when it comes to clothes. There's a bit of a lurve thing going on this week with people wearing T-Shirts inviting some personal attention. Still anything's better than football shirts at the moment.

Playboy Girl

Hugh Heffner would be proud of this lady

Playboy Girl

Fortunately she was just leaning against the pole rather than doing a dance around it.

Kiss Me Quick

I'm pretty positive this guy wasn't a tourist and I'm sure someone will tell me that Kiss Me Quick are a trendy new band that are making it big on the Net or somewhere

Kiss Me Quick

In any case he didn't have "Or Hug me Slowly" on his back.

Hugs Not Drugs

Unlike the young man below, who was wearing a very Peace and Love orientated T shirt

Hugs Not Drugs

I wish I'd been able to take a proper picture of him though, as he had the most amazing, just got out of bed, back combed, Shockwaves, hair style. The picture also doesn't show his purple star "Christmas Cracker" bangle very well.

Tattered Bum

How many more varieties of tattered jeans are there?

Tattered Bum

Although you can't see it in the picture very well, she had her travelcard in this back pocket, so I just hope the pocket doesn't wear even more, otherwise she'll be in for a bit of shock at the barrier.

Yeti Uggs

I know that we've hardly been having a heatwave in London, but is there any need to wear these Womble/Yeti Ugg boots in late June?

Yeti Uggs

In fact let's scrub late June from my last sentance, is there any need to wear them at all?

That's it for this week. The previous entry for London Underground fashion victims is here and all of them together can be seen on the following Flickr set.


; Posted by annie mole Friday, June 30, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/london-underground-fashion-victims_30.html

Thursday, June 29, 2006

Counting on the London Underground

Sesame Street's The Count would be pleased

I often see a lot of blog entries from people where they count things in a sort of Bridget Jones Diary type of way. You know the score - number of cigarettes smoked today 12, number of crisps eaten 18, number of pounds lost 1, etc. I can't say I've ever been particularly interested in counting things since I have been at school. However someone sent me a link to an interesting "
watchers" project where a number of things in south east London have been counted, with pictures taken to represent them.

A station assistant at Bermondsey London Underground Station must have been fairly bored and he counted the number of people hurrying through the station in one day.

Station Assistant at Bermondsey London Underground Station

It was only 41. Which really doesn't seem a lot to me, but I suppose as it's not in an interchange, or maybe no one is in a particular rush for anything at Bermondsey. However as I have no idea how many people in total pass through Bermondsey Tube I'd never really know if 41 is a lot.

If you're travelling by Tube today perhaps you might consider counting something, on the way in or home, so we could do a comparison. Obviously, we haven't all got the time to stand at a Tube station for a whole day to count things, so here's a few workable possibilities:

Number of people reading Metro in your carriage
Number of people standing in your carriage
Number of people listening to an iPod, walkman or some other personal stereo in your carriage
Number of people with rucksacks in your carriage
Number of posters that have been graffitied (is that a word? - but you know what I mean) in your carriage
Number of pigeons on your platform

If there's anything else you'd like to count or make a suggestion for people to count, feel free and leave in the comments below. Thanks muchly.


; Posted by annie mole Thursday, June 29, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/counting-on-london-underground.html

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Wembley, Wembley Quite Contrary. How does your garden grow?

Pinner, Pinner, no longer a winner...

No I haven't gone entirely mad, but summer's here and that means it's time for that special date in London Underground's calendar. It's not the announcement of this year's "Staying cool on the Tube campaign" or Sheriff Ken's prize for inventing air conditioning on the Tube. But the London Underground Annual Station Gardens competition is underway. Hoorah, hoorah, hoorah.

I know that many of you who travel on the Tube will think that a "station garden" is a platform that's been cleared of all the tin cans, crisp packets and pigeon droppings. You might be forgiven for thinking that a garden is some moss that's grown up between the cracks in the platform or some weeds or buddleia trees that have been allowed to take over the sidings. But no, there are 33 entrants in this year's
LU Station Garden competition which is double the amount from last year.

Photo by Fossie1

Southfields is one of the stations that has entered, and it came 2nd in the Cultivated Garden section last year. The competition is to reward "employees who go beyond the call of duty and spend much of their free time creating a pleasant and colourful environment for their colleagues and the travelling public to enjoy by planting and keeping Underground station gardens."

Although Southfields is nothing like a garden compared to the winner from Pinner in 1966, which was so resplandant with its 3,000 plants and flowers you can hardly read the station's name.

Pinner Station Garden Winner 1966

Pinner is sadly no longer in the running and a number of other prize winning station gardens from 1966 seem to have fallen by the wayside too including Kilburn, Hammersmith (did it ever have a garden?), Moorgate, Barons Court, Finchley Central and Snaresbrook.

But hats off to the following stations whose station gardeners upkeep the gardens in their own free time and only receive an allowance to buy seeds and plants: Baker Street, Bank, Bermondsey, Canons Park, Chesham, Cockfosters, East Acton, Earl's Court, Elm Park, Epping, Farringdon, High Street Kensington, Highbury & Islington, Leytonstone, Loughton, Notting Hill Gate, North Acton, Northolt, Northwood Hills (last year's winner), Queensbury, Rotherhithe, Shepherd's Bush, South Kensington, Rickmansworth, Ruislip Gardens, Southfields, Stanmore, Stratford Market Depot, Surrey Quays, Watford, Wembley Park, West Ruislip and White City.

Most of them, as you might expect, are in the more suburban outer zones of London. But it's good to see Baker Street, Earl's Court, Shepherd's Bush (although the mind boggles with Shepherd's Bush - maybe they've had an influx of containers since I was last there), Bank and High Street Kensington. It goes to show that it's not just the "leafy" suburbs that have keen station gardeners.

Do you have a station that you think should have entered for its horticultural displays? Or is your regular home or work station amongst this year's entrants? Or do you think there's a forgotten station somewhere that could benefit from some Ground Force treatment? Gunnersbury would be my favourite as it looks more and more like the hideous concrete carpark that surrounds it and is in desparate need of something to brighten it up.


; Posted by annie mole Wednesday, June 28, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/wembley-wembley-quite-contrary-how-does.html

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Cycles on the London Underground

Where to get on yer bike

Someone emailed me to ask whether you could take bicycles on the London Underground. I knew that there were some stations where you could and some where you couldn't, but I didn't realise that this also depended on the the time of day.

Bicycles on the London Underground Poster

So I looked at the cycle map and also the list of lines with the restrictions and I was puzzled by a number of things and wondered if you could enlighten me.

Not being allowed to take a bike at all on the Waterloo & City Line makes sense, (not that anyone can do much on the Waterloo & City Line at the moment anyway), but why no bikes at all on the DLR? I'm positive that I have seen people with bikes on it, so is that only a fairly recent rule?

The Victoria Line is entirely underground, so I imagine that might be the reason why you can't take bikes on it, but how come you can use bikes on the sub surface section that of the District Line? Is it anything to do with the depth of the stations there?

Is the rule of not carrying bikes in peak hours due to the amount of space they take up or for some other reason? If it's a space issue, why then are people allowed to carry enormous suitcases the size of small camper vans? Or large rucksacks? Particularly the people who seem to forget they have a rucksack on their back and insist on pirouetting through the carriage, knocking over people who unfortunate enough to be standing behind them.

I'm confused, please help!


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, June 27, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/cycles-on-london-underground.html

Scavenger Hunt London Underground Quiz

And the Winners are......

Thanks to the people who entered the
scavenger hunt to search for Tube related items on the internet. Inventiveness prizes go to Jon Justice particularly for his pre 1910 Tube poster, Fimb for taking a picture of smiling Tube staff (in the pub!), plus I decided to give Wilson in Toronto a prize for being first. You all did very well with points for giving different answers to the person before you, but the overall winner is Chz who wins the London Underground Playing Cards.


Well done to all who entered and you've still got a few more days to guess the locations where the Ian Brown video was filmed!


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, June 27, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/scavenger-hunt-london-underground-quiz_27.html

Central Line Suspended

Is it possible to have a day on the Tube at the moment without a whole line or part of a line being suspended? The entire line is out due to signal failure in the White City area.

Good luck if you're trying to travel on the Central Line this morning as you'll have problems. Check out the
Real Time Delays section on the Tube's site for more info.


; Posted by annie mole Tuesday, June 27, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/central-line-suspended.html

Monday, June 26, 2006

Northern line fooked again

Northern Line by Owen BMore Misery on the Misery Line

About 150 passengers were led through a Northern Line train this morning due a faulty track at Waterloo. The line is now suspended between Kennington and Charing Cross and you can expect delays to the rest of the serivce this morning too.

I wonder how this will add or aid its reliability targets? Although Tube Lines who run the Misery Line said that they hit their targets for the first quarter of this year despite recording delays on every single day.

"LU targets are set according customer hours lost, so a train delayed at Bank station at rush hour will weigh more heavily on Tube Lines' figures than a late night train to High Barnet," said Thisislocallondon. So delays appear to be relative.

Although, Tube Lines trumpeting about their reliability does lead one to think that delays are seen as a reliable part of the Northern Line service. Perhaps if you didn't get delayed on the Northern Line you might be worried that something was actually wrong with the line.


; Posted by annie mole Monday, June 26, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/northern-line-fooked-again.html

District Line Buskers

"Thank you Turnham Green you've been a wonderful audience"

If you've been "lucky" enough to travel regularly on the District Line, I would be surprised if you had not come across the infamous "If you can't have a shave in the toilet, where can you have a shave" buskers. They've been doing the rounds on the District Line, since the early 80's but in all of that time, they only seem to have two songs in their reportoire.

If you can't have a shave in the toilet buskers

The first is the aforementioned shaving song, which is a protest song, lamenting the times when they used to shave in public toilets (mainly in the one that used to be in the underpass at Hammersmith Broadway). But they were always asked to move on, when all they wanted to do was keep themselves "clean and respectabull".

The second is their classic "This train is going to Richmond, this train. This train is stopping at Earl's Court, this train. This train is going to Richmond, change at Gunnersbury for the North London Line. This train is going to Richmond, this train". Alternatively if you catch them going into town you'll catch the B side "This train is going to Barking, this train, etc etc".

I finally managed to make a recording of the Toilet Song, which apparently isn't available in the shops, or on the internet (let's hope they don't read this blog). They were playing to a fairly relaxed carriage on Friday night and it was the first time, I'd ever heard them get a round of applause.

They did very well in this carriage with a fair number of coins (but not "cheques, luncheon vouchers or Indian rupees" which they also accept) going into their omelette collecting pan. They even managed to sell a copy of the Toilet Song CD for four quid.

The Shaving Buskers pictured in Winter ClothesSo if you've never heard them before click on this link and enjoy! You'll never see them on the official Carling Busker circuit, as I imagine a two song repertoire wouldn't be enough to get them through the London Underground auditions or "Busking Idol".

However, I wouldn't have thought they were too sad about it. I've never heard of any Tube ones that have been "discovered" or made it big, but a number of them apparently get paid by record companies to "demo" or play certain tracks, as it's cheap way of getting songs heard by millions of commuters.

Do you have a favourite busker on the Tube? Or have you ever bought one of the CD's that a number of buskers are producing now?


; Posted by annie mole Monday, June 26, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/district-line-buskers.html

Friday, June 23, 2006

Misery Line Music Video Quiz

How well do you know the Northern Line?

We've done a number of these quizzes in the past, where you have to see if you can guess where on the London Underground a particular music video was filmed (
Madonna and The Scissor Sisters in the past). Thanks to Pedro Gomes who sent me a whole collection of online videos he's found related to the Tube and amongst them was a Creep style music video with vocals by Ian Brown, that's clearly shot on the Northern Line. But where?

Our heroine and her friends leave a station and walk down one of those typically long & seemingly endless corridors on the Tube that are a dream for horror movie and music video makers

Which station do they leave

1. Which station is this?

They get to a point where they go down some stairs and the boys go one way, leaving the girl alone to go home another way. She gets to a deserted station and sits down

Which station is she sitting at?

2. Which station is she sitting at?

She sees a pretty spooky looking person at the far end of the platform, but not paying too much attention she gets onto her train and leaves.

Which staton does she depart from?

Now you know what continuity can be like on these videos and artistic license is often used with gay abandon.

3. Is she leaving the same station as the one in the picture two? If not what station is it?

Like the woman in Creep she's on a deserted carriage, so she puts her feet up and listens to her walkman. She's wearing some pretty cool boots here

What type of train is she on?

So one for the tube geeks, sorry ... experts, here.

4. Give me the name of the type of train that she's on. The more exact the better in terms of the stock.

She attempts to get off the Tube at some point but the doors don't open long enough for her to leave. So she sits back down, appears to doze off and the mysterious character that she saw earlier comes over and touches her cheek.

The video ends the following morning, with a station cleaner coming onto the train to clear the rubbish.

What's the final station?

He finds her apparently asleep and goes over to wake her but she's turned into a withered old lady and we can only assume that the mysterious character has stolen her youth & beauty.

5. What station does the cleaner find her in?

Film Lover Travels Underground TinIt will probably help you in the quiz if you can find the video itself, but try not to give the link away to others when you answer!

As usual the people who get most answers correct will go into Neil's paperclip selection. To enter leave your email address and/or blog/website with your answers in the comments below. Please leave all your answers in one entry and you can only enter once! You have until 23.59 GMT, Sunday 2nd July to make your guesses.

And the prize, well it's the nearest I have to something that's Tube and film related. It's a handy little tin featuring a 1930's "Film Lover" London Underground poster. Use it to carry small knick knacks (whatever they are).

Have fun!


; Posted by annie mole Friday, June 23, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/misery-line-music-video-quiz.html

Batty Tube Map

The mind boggles

What happens when you get some international architects and ask them to give a vision of what London might look like?

You get a Tube Map where the names of the stations all have the word "bat" in them!

Batty Tube Map - click to see full map

Many thanks to Matt from Londonist for sending me a picture of the architect's vision for London which is part of "The World in One City - Sketches of London" free exhibition that's currently on at The Gallery in York Way, Kings's Cross.

It's on until Sunday 25th June if you'd like to see which country & group of architects produced this and quite why it's a vision of London's future. But in the meantime if you'd like to make a guess... feel free to do so in the comments below!


; Posted by annie mole Friday, June 23, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/batty-tube-map.html

London Underground Fashion Victims

Fashion Victims on the Tube

Here's the weekly look at commuters who could be considered slaves to fashion, are displaying a particular trend or have an unusual sense of "style" when it comes to clothes. Yesterday I was at Hammersmith at the same time as two ladies who had come from Royal Ascot races and there's two very different styles here:

Mumsy Ascot

This is more of the traditional approach to Ascot and she's cleverly wrapped up with a cardigan - although it is a bit School Run
Ascot Outfit 2

Not so sure about carrying some fishing rods on your back with this outfit though! Even Twiggy on the poster opposite seems to find that a bit funny.

Trendy Ascot

Now we see a much more interesting & unconventional approach with the "hat"

Ascot Outfit 1

She's also gone for the "I don't care if it's too cold to wear this dress, and I'm not going to cover myself up" approach. It's not called Glamoursmith for nothing.

Matching Merrells

Last week we had the Birkenstock Sisters and this week we have Matching Merrells

Matching Merrells

It's a very sporty look and I spose trainers like this are one of the most practical things to wear on the Tube, but they do make you look as though you're taking part in a triathlon.

Oversized Sunnies inside

I don't normally see men in oversized sunglasses, but there's always an exception

Oversized Sunglasses Inside

He's also doing the classic victim thing of keeping his sunglasses on inside the Tube.

Blingtastic

Quite a lot of bling going on here

Blingtasitc

Blingy bangles, tick. Blingy rings with little chains hanging off them, tick. Designer "Gucci" bag with extra bling, tick.

Leopard Skin Overload

And finally, can you ever wear too much Leopard Skin?

Leopard Skin Frenzy

Leopard skin trousers & a leopard skin jacket. She looked a bit like the offspring of Pat Butcher out of EastEnders and Bet Lynch out of Corrie.

That's it for this week. The previous entry for London Underground fashion victims is here and all of them together can be seen on the following Flickr set.


; Posted by annie mole Friday, June 23, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/london-underground-fashion-victims_23.html

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Keeping up with Football on the Tube

The next result will be arriving in 2 mins

Yesterday I was wondering how the Tube Staff got to keep tabs on the World Cup. Some of them have radio coverage as TVs aren't allowed, but looks like some staff are keen on keeping the whole platform informed.

Travel Info

Martin spotted this brill picture in Flickr by taken by Bruno Girin. Bruno said "What if you are stuck in the tube rather than in the pub watching the game? No worries, the station staff will make sure the important information is displayed!"

Quality!


; Posted by annie mole Thursday, June 22, 2006 Permalink COMMENT HERE
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2006/06/keeping-up-with-football-on-tube.html
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