Even More Commuting Dilemmas

I was on the way home a few nights back and somehow managed to get to the station in time for an earlier train than the one I normally get. This is good in some ways, since I would be home earlier, but bad in others because the train was already mostly full when I arrived. However, despite the fact that there were already people standing in the carriage entrance spaces there was still a dreaded middle seat free. Quite why these are so dreaded I'm not sure but some people definitely prefer to stand rather than risk sitting too close to someone - because let's face it, those seats aren't really wide enough for three people to sit comfortably. I on the other hand am very much not one of those sort of people, so immediately made a beeline for the seat.

One of the guys sitting there obviously wasn't expecting anyone to sit next to him because he'd put his bags on the empty seat whilst at the same time drinking both a can of soft drink and a coffee. Now, the problem wasn't that he was reluctant to move, it was that while attempting to gather his bags off the seat he, almost inevitably given that he was holding two drinks as well, slopped coffee all over his leg. Let's leave aside the facts that drinking coffee and lucozade at the same time is a little odd and doing so on a train, which is subject to sudden lurches, is asking for trouble somewhat. The problem was that I felt somehow responsible given that the only reason he had spilled his drink was because I'd made him move his stuff. I also had my headphones firmly screwed into my ears so I couldn't really talk to him properly.

In the end I decided to just pretend I hadn't noticed, after all it wasn't really my fault he'd spilled his drink.

The next night I saw the opposite. A rather large lady was squeezing her way through the train carriage holding a large coffee which she managed to slop all over the white shirted arm of an unfortunate chap sitting in an aisle seat. I should add that the train was stationary at the time and it was one of those cups with a lid, so she was being really careless. He was rather unimpressed as you can imagine. The lady lurched on as if nothing had happened leaving him to shout after her ineffectually. I don't know if she actually realised what had happened or was just hoping to get away.

In that circumstance I would definitely have stopped to apologise, just so you know.