Evacuated!

Ooh, a bit of excitement at the office today.

I live in Blackpool and work for the University of Northumbria so I rent a room at a local college and am a "remote" worker.

This morning we had our usual Monday morning telconference meeting and when I looked out of the window afterwards, this was the sight that greeted me.

The road had turned into a river and there was quite a spectacular waterfall over the sleeping policeman! I popped into the next office to find we were being evacuated as the water was coming from the river that had burst its banks and water was rising rapidly at the main entrance.

In fact there were only 2 minutes separating these photographs which show the same view.

We went out the fire exit and waded out to dry land. Then it was a case of find the shallowest route to the car and hope I could get home wihtout any problems! The A6 and the West Coast railway line were closed nearby but I was heading for Blackpool and managed with a few slowdowns for flooded areas, one being a bit longer than the others whilst a tractor dragged an eejit out of the middle. See, making all that spray wasn't a good idea then!

Addendum

The Ladies Over The Water are killing themselves laughing at the "sleeping policeman". It's what we Brits call speed humps... This one is missing, presumed lost at sea...

Letchworth

It's been a busy old week - I've now got back from Letchworth, just about.

Horrible journey, it's a Friday night, it's half-term and the M6 was crawling. I shelled out my hard-earned to nip up the M6 Toll but as soon as it ended I was back down into first and second gears and that's how I stayed until Stoke on Trent.

There had been some sort of incident on the slip road of Junction 15 and it had caused a rare old tail back. It took me over 6 hours to get home.

Anyway this is where I've been - the Goldsmith Centre of North Herts College. Photo from Flickr, courtesy of John Sanderson. I didn't take any photos down there. Some nice scenery down that way though.

Tom Tom was navigating which meant going over lots of those stupid bumps in the road that are supposed to calm traffic and instead only do your suspension in and make a row, annoying anyone unlucky enough to have one outside their house...

So I'm not quite sure where I was, but at one point there was a gorgeous stone-built red-tiled country church with a rather strange looking tower, seen against a green field and wonderful blue sky. I almost stopped but the thought of traffic building on the M6 kept me going. In the event it wouldn't have made much difference!

I delivered a session on Risk Management at a IT Technical Forum organised by the local JISC Regional Support Centre. They call themselves RSCs, but to anyone outside the Further Education Sector that normally prompts some conversation about Shakespeare...

Busy weekend looming as well so no rest for the wicked! Will try to keep up with the entries!