Thunderbolts and lightning, very, very frightening......

SO I thought I was going to a standard issue info day of the university of Leiden. A simple train trip, 2.5 hours to and 2.5 hours fro, in the meantime following two studies round. Conclusion of the info day itself: I am not going to Leiden next year.

But the real story begins bout halfway along the trip to Leiden:
After about five minutes after embarking from Schiphol (had to switch trains there) some seriously close and brutal lightning flashed in our face. I thought nothing of it.
Also I heard two freight trains had collided near Utrecht, no worries still.

But upon my return in the train yesterday afternoon I heard Lightning had struck... TWICE and several parts of the rail system was without power.... bummer you'd say.
Nothing too bad.... But the funny stuff happened in Den Haag (where I had to switch on the way back). The train that was gonna go al the way to Assen (where I needed to be) wasn't going. so I had to take another train that went in the same direction, thinking I would get another train heading North in Utrecht.

Well was I in for a surprise. The entire Rail system around Utrecht was shut down. Apart from the two lightning strikes and the collided freighttrains, one truck was hit by a train while on the tracks and somewhere further to the east trees had been blown over onto the tracks. On top of this there was an increasing number of powerfailures in the railsystem. So we were stranded.

I was thinking of taking the bus further but the sudden weather changes (snow, frost, rain, stormy winds, etc) and a bus packed like a sardinecan relayed that idea (the prospect of being packed up in a bus like black people in ships back in the day and being stuck in traffic for the next 5 hours while it's freezing outside can do that sometimes).

And on top of that the telephone network of my provider was down for 1.5 HOURS! So no call home to my worried-sick momma. Happyness struck though when the call came through from the NS that we could get to Amersfoort (bout 1/4 way there) via Hilversum (don't break your head over the geographical shit TAS). Taking the second train to Hilversum (as the first was another sardine can), after informing my old gaffer of the plan, I was happy to be out of that forsaken place..... when i got home the news said there were over 5000!!! people stranded!

Next we had to freeze our ass of for about 20 minutes because the first two trains from Hilversum to Amersfoort were stacked so full the doors couldn't close properly.
Finally got to Amersfoort, where I got on a decent train to Zwolle, from where I got a good train to Assen. YAY!

All in all it took me 7 (YES SEVEN) hours, to do what should have been a 2.5 hours trip.

Anyway im glad to be home and I did have some fun, meet all sorts of people in such circumstances (sp?), actually met some poeple, soldierboys who had just spent a week in the bush and who were accidentaly from my gf's town, people from my school's town and some other people from round Veendam, who were a great many laughs worth. It's so funny that in such times you bond so well and the world seems so small but that in a normal situation people couldn't care less who's sitting next to them.

And during all this..... I was thinking............
"Oh my god, I'm wearing blue boxers".......

Erwin

PS:In the train from Zwolle to Assen I encountered the worst kind of Lesbians.... the kind that wants to smack the fact that they are lesbians in your face, actually not just yours, they want to smack it in EVERYONE's face, you, me, your dad (who probably won't mind), that little girl from across the street, your grandmother, that little rabbit in the bush and YES even the TREES!
I mean these chicks were about 16 or 17! And they were stuck to eachothers face!
It's frustrating to know that you are so far away from your hubby and yet so close to something that's such a turn on........... DAMN YOU TRENDLESBIANS!