Where should I begin?

There have been so many incidents, it really is quite difficult to know where to start, and had I have known I was going to write this Blog, then undoubtedly I would have put notes and commentry in my diary, and hoped and prayed no one would ever find it. My first epic adventure was in January 2008, and during my first week, I travelled from Derbyshire to Somerset, Somerset to Weymouth, and back to Derbyshire, all in 4 days and I was exhausted to say the least. I stayed in a little bed and breakfast for my first 2 nights, which was run by a middle aged couple. It was set in the beautiful countryside and was charming, but sadly the room was nothing like I had hoped or expected.  I arrived at 6pm, this was a B&B, there were limited shops, it was January, and I was in a room with a single bed with no television. Oh my god, I hadn't packed a book, I hadn't taken an Ipod-what the hell was I going to do. I quickly unpacked and noticed a bible, but nothing was going to make me read that, I am sorry but I am not a religious person and to be honest, staring at the ceiling for 4 hours seemed like much more fun. After I had finished unpacking, I decided to go for a walk which I thought would a) pass some time away and b) make me feel a little more tired and hopefully it just might exhaust me so much, I would drift off, in to  a deep sleep and this nightmare of an evening would be over very quickly. Whilst this seemed like a bright idea, I wasn't aware I would be walking along country lanes with tiny pavement facilities, catering for woman the size of super models (which unfortunately I am not)and limited lighting; but hey, what the heck, I couldn't get lost, there was one road in and one road out.
I walked for about 5-10 minutes and was relieved to find a little Late shop. What could I find to eat which would keep me comforted throughout the long night ahead in my room, where I had nothing to do. It wasn't as if I could throw myself around the bed, attempting to do some yoga exercise, it was too small  and I would have fallen off the other side-imagine what the owners would make of that. Anyway I searched the entire shop for something scrumptious to eat, something which would get my tasete buds soaring and keep me occupied for an hour. Who was I kidding, a Late shop was hardly likely to provide me with that kind of luxory. I looked at the sandwiches, I didn't fancy Spam, I shuffled the salads, again nothing exciting there. I couldn't even spin out the time trying to search for something to eat. Suddenly I saw it, the meal of my dreams and something to get my taste buds going, that well known nutritous pair-a "Kitkat" and a "Packet of Crisps". So that was it, that was my sumptuous meal for the night, there was no other shop open, so this was my only choice and I needed to make the most of it. I would enjoy heaps of calories and taste, and eat absolutely nothing that would do me any good, and nothing that would help enable me to walk comfortably on these tiny narrow pavements in the future. I paid for my goods and on leaving the shop I realised, I had run out of pavement, there was no where else to go, so sadly I returned back to my room, desperately trying  to walk as slow as possible without looking like I had wet my pants. It was 6.20pm, this entire time wasting experience  had only taken 20 minutes and worse still it had only burned about 2 calories. I wasnt't exhausted, I wasn't sweating and I was just about to shove a load of  E-numbers and sugar in to my system, What a complete drip, I only had myself to blame. The night dragged desperately, I  had a shower, wrote down a to do list, for things I would like to do, if I had anything with me to do, and the highlight of the evening was using the toilet where I began counting how many tiles had been used in the shower cubicle. I was relieved when morning arrived, I ate real food, spoke to real people and just couldnt wait to spend my second night there, which was, in all honesty, exactly the same as the first night. there wasn't even another guest in the house I could have befriended and invited to my room for bible readings or tile counting, it would have been much more interesting if there had been two. However the silver lining was around the corner, when, on the third night after travelling even further I stayed in this charming hotel, in the middle of a busy street.  The hotel had a bar and a beautiful room, I was elated. It was sheer heaven and the pain of the two previous evenings disappeared as I sunk into my kingsize bed, watching some trashy soap on a huge TV, eating a delightful, within budget meal, on room service. This was the life, if you have to be away from the person you love, you may as well love the place you are in.

Why have I started this blog?

I decided to write this blog, as a result of writing a couple of news sheets for my colleagues at work, which actually takes the mickey out of all of them, in a very sarcastic and funny way.
Having spent a number of years previously as a police officer, I wrote these articles describing myself as an undercover researcher employed to take a close look at their antics out of the training room and their work ethos generally. Firstly these people are exceptional colleagues who I admire both personally and professionally. So you can get the picture this was actually a "piss take" to use a quote which is not meant to offend anyone who might read this. The feedback from my unsuspecting colleagues when this article was emailed round the office advertised as a new "gossip magazine" was great. It achieved what it had intended to do-bring a smile to the faces of people I cared about, who worked in an often very stressful environment. So that's the brief background, but also, I have travelled up and down the country training in every part of the country and have had some funny experiences along the way with taxi drivers, hotels and on the trains and naturally I have met some great individuals, so I thought I would share the fun, the drama and the frustration with anyone who might want to read it, and hopefully on a boring and depressing day, or a stressful and manic day, there may be a snippet in here that lifts your mood. Nothing runs smoothly in the life of the travelling trainer.