Affordable Football At Watford For £15
Today, Ipswich play a home match against Bournemouth and the match will cost me a proportion of my season ticket and the rail fare. The minimum that I could do this for, is probably about forty-five pounds, although I pay more for better seats in the ground and on the train.
But on Saturday at Watford, my Senior Visitors ticket cost me just fifteen pounds, as transport to Watford was free, as Watford High Street station is accessible using my Freedom Pass.
So next season, when Ipswich are away in somewhere unattractive or inaccessible like Middlesbrough, Blackburn, Blackpool or Yeovil, I might look to see which teams are playing in London and buy myself an affordable away ticket, as often these are very reasonably-priced, judging by some of the tickets that I’ve bought this season.
Adjusting My Energy Direct Debit
I’ve now been with Ovo Energy for three months or so now and I’m beginning to see what my usage is going to be. It’s all a bit complicated as in that period, I’ve changed the boiler for a new and hopefully more efficient one.
So every so often, I take a look at my Direct Debit and see if I should change the amount, I pay.
This morning, I found this article about energy prices on This Is Money, so as they are saying this.
Small energy companies are trouncing their giant rivals, with two suppliers now offering average households cheaper gas and electricity bills for less than £1,000 a year.
First Utility has nudged Ovo Energy off the top spot by launching a one-year, fixed-rate deal for combined gas and electricity at £994 a year. It is called the iSave Fixed July 2015 and is based on medium energy users – typically a family of three or four sharing a three-bedroom house. Ovo’s dual fuel Cheaper Energy Fixed tariff is only marginally higher at £998 a year.
So I did drop my Direct Debit a bit, but I suspect it can go a bit lower.
I’ll have to work out a proper Control Engineering based philosophy so that I minimise my payments and never go into the red so to speak.
The Overground Advantage
I think that the London Overground has a tremendous advantage over other rail lines that are being developed. Look at this picture of the new extended platform on Willesden Junction station.
An Extended Platform At Willesden Junction
The platform has been extended for the new five car trains which will start to run later this year. It would appear it has been a simple job, as there was nothing in the way of the extra platform.
Most of the developments in progress on the Overground, like the lengthening of platforms and the addition of shelters and small shops for coffee etc., seem to not require too much work, as most of the stations seem to have been built fairly well, with longer platforms, than are currently used. So some of the lost space is just being regained.
But also remember that many of these stations had been neglected for decades before they were incorporated into the Overground.
So they have the great advantage that any money spent shows a tremendous improvement.
It’s a bit like buying a wreck of a house, which looks so much better after you’ve cleaned out the previous owner’s junk and painted the front door.
So perhaps other lines in London and the wider UK could benefit from the sort of procedures that are being applied to the London Overground. In truth, I’ve come across quite a few stations across the UK, like Middlesbrough, Huyton, Bexhill, Wigan and Hartlepool, that have been made much more attractive for passengers without breaking the bank.
After all, if you have clean stations with good facilities and the trains have comfortable seats and they are clean and on time, you will probably go some way to increasing the number of passengers.
My worry about this lengthening of London Overground trains from four to five cars, together with longer and better stations, is going to be far too successful, in getting others to use the route.
At least though, the Class 378 trains can probably be lengthened again to six-car trains, by the simple process of sticking another carriage in the middle.
Vicarage Road On The Up
I’ve probably seen Ipswich play at Watford, five or six times in the past and have always been struck at the dilapidated main stand to the left of where the visiting supporters sit.
This year though things are different, in that not only are the seats less rickety in the Away stand, but that a new stand is going up to the left.
Vicarage Road On The Up
One thing that wasn’t different was the result! I can’t remember ever seeing Ipswich win at Vicarage Road.
A Gluten-Free High Street In Watford
I went to see Ipswich play at Watford yesterday and ate lunch in Carluccio’s in the High Street there. Their restaurant is actually in a sandwich between Nando’s and Jimmy’s World Grill, both of which seem to cater for gluten and other allergies.
A Carluccio’s Sandwich
There is also a Pizza Express on the other side of the road.
For the first time, I used the Overground to get to Watford, by travelling to Watford High Street station. This station is due to be rebuilt in the next few years as part of the Croxley Link project. As the Watford Junction station and the tracks through it are also being remodelled, it looks like Watford is getting a full transport makeover.
So Who Will Ipswich Be Playing In 2014-5?
I am assuming, that Ipswich at least manage to stay in the Championship next season. After all it is now impossible that they’ll get relegated. And they might go up to the Premiership! But only might!
At least it is unlikely that we will be playing Leicester, as it is not a ground of happy memories for me. Especially, as after one of our losses there, C told me she’d got breast cancer in the morning.
It looks like the other place to go up without a play-off will be either Burnley or Derby. I hope Burnley beat Wigan on Monday, as although I like going to Burnley and will do next Saturday, it is a long way to go for the day.
But who will be coming up to the Championship?
Wolves and Brentford are definitely up and as Molineux is one of my favourite stadia and Brentford is relatively local, I can’t complain there.
The others with chance of promotion would seem to be Leyton Orient, Rotherham, Preston and Peterborough. My preference is for the Orient, as they are local.
A Picture With Memories
I first saw this picture from an episode of Mad Men in The Times, but it is prominently displayed here on the Closer web site.
When tights arrived in the 1960s, C bought herself a red pair. She used to wear them with a red maternity dress of a similar style and length to the dress thatJessica Paré is wearing in the picture. C also wore the long blonde hair in a similar style at the time. One difference though is that C would have been in flat shoes.
For many years, we kept the dress, especially as I had made it. but it disappeared a few years ago. The tights lingered on for years too in her tights bag, as for some reason they just didn’t ladder or fail and she probably last wore them in the mid-1990s.
Altaeros
At a brief glance, the idea of a flying wind turbine, is akin to putting cows and pigs in the sky.
But enter a company called Altaeros Energies.
Look at their press release and video here.
It may seem wacky and totally off the wall, but the designers could have something.
When I did my electrical engineering degree in the 1960s, power was generated by either water from dams or steam generated by burning coal or oil or from nuclear.
There was no natural gas in the UK, and using it to generate electricity wasn’t in anybody’s book of ideas.
Now a good proportion of our electricity is generated directly from gas.
So don’t make any predictions about how we will generate electricity in ten or twenty years time.
The only certainty, is that a good proportion of our electricity will come from an unexpected source, that is totally discounted or even unheard of at the present time.
Après Bob, Le Déluge
It would seem that the successors to Bob Crow at RMT are out to inflict more pain on Londoners, than Bob Crow ever did, with five days of strikes in the next few weeks, as reported here on the BBC.
But Londoners will in the main survive and get on with their business, just as they did when Adolf gave the city, quite a few years of much more dangerous strikes.
As someone, who uses the Underground and Overground a lot, I pass by ticket offices quite a bit. Many are crowded with long queues at the ticket machines. Only a few stations seem to have long queues at the actual ticket offices themselves.
So to cure the problems of the queues at the ticket machines, Transport for London will introduce more and better machines at stations.
The ability to be able to use a contactless bank card as a ticket as well as Oyster, which is already happening and is supposedly working well on buses, will also contribute to a reduction of those needing the ticket offices.
If the machines and contactless cards do cut all the queues, then we could have have the situation of fully-manned ticket offices, where staff see hardly any customers at all.
Surely, the RMT should be stopping the installation of more ticket machines and the using of contactless bank cards as tickets, if they wanted to stop the closure of ticket offices.
Where else will this worrying new militancy turn up?
Lights, Fun, Action At Kings Cross
I heard of this art installation in the Standard, so I went to Kings Cross station to have a look.
It’s certainly fun! It’s part of the arts program at Kings Cross and is called Identified Flying Object. This page gives more details.
It should win an award for the most innovative use of LED ropelights.
However, I do feel there is a case for someone to be on the swing in the middle covered in a few more ropelights or perhaps some photo-luminescent paint.
The possibilities are endless!
The Anonymous Widower 