Falling asleep on the train ( it’s that time of year )

[lazybloke]

A digression - missing the last train.

This was after a late-running Wembley Arena concert in the 1980s. We had to change tubes to reach Victoria but missed one of the connections so emerged at street level in a deserted and unfamiliar part of Central London.
We never would have got to Victoria in time for our last train, and quotes for a taxi home were horrific, so one of us went into a phone box to call a lucky parent for a lift

Quite a squeeze fitting all ELEVEN passengers into a small volvo for the 40 miles home!

 

[Blue Hills]

Do what people do in Japan, hang a a sign with your destination on it and someone will wake you.

Can't see that working here with the Brit as opposed to Japanese (whatever that is) sense of humour. An open invitation to tinkering with the sign I reckon.

 

[craigwend]

(Bus version)

Twas the last big drinking day before Xmas (Pre Mad Friday) - had met friends in the city centre and caught the bus home back to the suburban village...

Luckily only missed a couple of stops after my actual one and only 2 stops before the end of the whole route, which wouldn't have been the worse thing, maybe an extra half mile walk home.

However even in my drunken state I did have a sense of guilt for the little old lady I'd trapped in as I'd slumped forward with no way of getting past me...

Perhaps she'd had wanted to get off on those last 2 stops and not any of the previous 5 miles

 

[Fnaar]

Back in the early 90s, us work colleagues would usually have a Friday evening drink, and usually stayed till chucking out time. I had to get the train from Victoria to Beckenham, and more often than I care to remember, I'd fall asleep and wake up at Swanley. So often that a mate would ask me on Monday "Did you get Swanleyed on Friday?"
I think it was a £25 cab fare home, as it was usually after the last train. I could ill afford it in those days

 

[Bromptonaut]

Been there done that. Early examples on the Tube. Most just overshoots but once got as far as Wood Green. Dashed over the platforms and caught the last southbound by the skin of my teeth.

Worst though was about ten years ago. Been in London with the gang from a previous job. Fair few beers followed by whisky.

Got to Euston as planned for the last Virgin express to Birmingham which stopped at Northampton. Was aware of calling at Milton Keynes and even crossing to the Northampton loop line at Hanslope junction. Next 'minute' we were approaching Rugby!!

Taxi home was £40. I got him to drop me in the village as I didn't want herself asking why I wasn't using the usual taxi co.

Colleague who lives in Hemel missed his stop and jumped off in a panic at Cheddinton. Cheddington station is in the middle of nowhere, it's not even that near Cheddington!! Ended up walking several miles. If he'd stayed on to Leighton Buzzard he'd have been able to get a train back south.

 

[bikingdad90]

Worst one I had and I was stone cold sober… I was stood on the platform waiting for the train to go to my brothers stag do.

Anyway, train arrives and me and about half a dozen other people hop on the train destined for Edinburgh, or so we thought according to the platform sign and the sign on the train door.

Anyway about 5minutes into the journey the conductor comes on the radio saying Carlisle is the end of the line. Not Edinburgh as planned. Me and about a dozen people all panic as we realise it’s the wrong train!!!


Lucikly the conductor was aware of the issue and instructed all those heading to Edinburgh to disembark at Durham and get on the train that was following behind that was the Edinburgh train, he apologised for the train error!!!

 

[Pale Rider]

After a drinking session in the West End a mate of mine overshot his tube stop at Chiswick and ended up at Heathrow.

He was woken by two armed coppers in the days when armed police were a rarer and scarier sight than they are now.

They asked him where he lived.

In his drunken state, he was unable to pronounce Chiswick.

I advised him to move to Kew.

 

[Legs]

Flying home from NZ at the end of my gap-year travels, I switched my body clock to UK time when the plane left Auckland, which was going to involve staying awake until 9pm UK time - 9am NZ time - i.e. staying awake through the night. Predictably enough, my eyelids were drooping by the time I got to the layover in KL, I fell asleep at the boarding gate and had to be given a nudge to wake me up and get me onto the plane.

No sooner were we up into the air again, than I began to suffer a violent bout of bumwee, so I had no sleep whatsoever back to Heathrow...

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I have a few times, but I once caused a bit of hilarity after falling asleep on the Lymington branch.

Yep, 6 miles! 😆

 

[Profpointy]

A work colleague did a classic. He commuted daily from Harrow to Hemel Hempstead by train. One evening he went for a pint with a workmate after work, which escalated as these things do, and nodded off on the train. He woke up with a start when the train stopped at a station, looked out, and he was back in Hemel. He'd slept through his own stop at Harrow ... twice! If he'd kept dozing he'd have ended up in Birmingham.

 

[wiggydiggy]

Not a train but a bus as its a funnier story - Christmas Eve mid 00's I got the last bus about 1800ish from Leeds > Home, but slept through my stop and was discharged at the end of the line. Which wasn't at a depot as the bus finished the line early and I was in typicalyorkshirevillage#1. To this day I have no idea where I went, but there was a pub there who welcomed me with open arms and laughter, and I got a taxi home later that night. I have searched since a few times on bus maps to try and work out where I went but I have no idea. Great night 🍻

 

[Dogtrousers]

I used to commute in the evening from Newbury into Paddington. I'd frequently wake up on an empty train in Paddington ready to depart again. Fortunately I never slept long enough to turn around and go back to Newbury.

 

[presta]

One morning on the way to work one train was late in at Witham, so we dashed over the bridge for the connection, and just managed to leap into the nearest door as the next train left. As we flopped down on the seat breathless, I noticed that the other passengers were all scowling and looking daggers at us, then my mate elbowed me in the ribs and nodded at the window: Ladies Only! To this day, that's the one and only ladies only compartment I've ever seen. There was no corridor, so they were stuck with us for the duration.

On another occasion, the same pair of us were on the way home, and we got on the train and sat down opposite a pinstripe with his bowler hat reading a copy of the FT. Then on totters the drunk, sick all down his jumper, trousers soaking wet, and goes to sit down next to the pinstripe whilst we try to keep a straight face as he shooed him away with his rolled up FT.

On the subject of keeping a straight face, I was on a train from Watford to London with a couple of mates once, chatting and laughing. Meanwhile, there was a rather cute girl sitting opposite me who obviously didn't want to look like she was earwigging on someone else's conversation, but she just couldn't keep a straight face.

all the station lights clicked off

I remember trying to wipe my @rse in the pitch dark at Basildon station once because the lights in the loo are on a timer.

 

[MontyVeda]

A young lad i used to work with got a job in Warrington, which was OK since there's a direct train from Lancaster. He fell asleep and woke up just as the train was pulling out of Warrington station, but it was the 'fast' train to London and the next stop after Warrington was Euston. I think he got to work early afternoon.

 

[Electric_Andy]

I've fallen asleep many times on the train after an afternoons drinking, but luckily my partner has always woken me up. I did get the train back from london to Newton Abbot once, sat in my jogging trousers in 1st class. The steward even offered me a paper but didn't say anything, but I quickly realised the top hat men and scarpered off to cattle class