Travel chaos blog #2: I've got a new daddy

National Express , originally uploaded by steve near cambridge.

Too much of my Christmas Eve was spent stuck in Swindon coach station, another depressingly non-descript transport hub full of frustrated festive travellers.

This time it was a coach gearbox to blame - naturally, I took the inconvenience on the chin and tried to get some shut-eye during the delay. Alas, some of my fellow passengers were far more vocal, with their immediate demand being a National Express-paid-for taxi to Cirencester.

Unfortunately for the quiet minority, a ready-made replacement for Calais pig-man was in the making. He arrived in the form of a 48-year-old self-titled all-action "make sure you grab life by the balls" project sales manager. Sadly, I didn't catch his name.

He assumed the role of lead passenger, congratulating the driver on his sensible approach and assuming a paternal role that the 32-year-old average-aged passenger so desperately required at 2:30 in the morning.

If his calming influence and confident demeanour hadn't materialised, I would have probably melted into a urea-tinged puddle after a bout of panic-induced vibration in my plush leather seat avec drinks holder and power point.

Despite saving my life, I still despise this man. He was an egotistical show off, full of self-congratulation, arrogance and tales of survival so blatantly exaggerated that he might have well told me he was Mahmoud Ahmedjinidad on his way to Marks & Spencer to buy a green t-shirt.

His most cringe-worthy act was to befriend two 30-year-olds with self-confessed sleep problems. They were project sales manager's perfect victims - barely able to muster a reply and unable to sleep. He could show off all he liked, safe in the knowledge that he would be given a mandate to continue his hyperbolic ramblings by the polite mumbling replies of his self-conscious newly-adopted adult children.

Never has the journey from Swindon to Cheltenham seemed so long - I heard project sales manager's anecdotes from his time as a kayak instructor in Canada, disabled kids' helper in Australia, marketing lecturer at Brighton University, flower picker in The Netherlands, competition-entering mountain biker in Europe and bare-chested survival specialist in the Far East.

Merry Christmas. Unless you're pig-man, project sales manager, Enis, Enis's wife or the owners of Cafe Churchill in Westminster - all of whom I hope receive fish hooks and laxatives disguised as festive treats in their stocking tomorrow morning.

Chaos and Kebab Man in Calais

Cross-channel holidaymakers became condensation-inflicted refugees last weekend after the suspension of Eurostar services between London and Paris, and I was unfortunate enough to be one of them.

I wasn't among the sorry few to be stranded in the Channel Tunnel for 16 hours without heating, food or water - but I did, like thousands of others, try to get back to London by boarding a ferry in Calais.

In hindsight, I would rather have built a sleigh from splintery fence posts and been towed to the ferry port by a Parisian poodle with a problème gastrique.

But the very helpful and patient (no sarcasm intended) Eurostar staff at Gare Du Nord insisted that sea travel was the best option, and issued passengers with a hotel budget for the night and free train tickets to Calais - because Eurostar trains cannot cope when it's a bit nippy out.

Following a delayed departure from Paris the following morning and a mass embarkation of Les Rosbifs at Lille, we made it to Gare de Calais Ville, the armpit of the French rail network. It took one hour to exit the station, such was the number of stranded Englishmen, women and children.

Two coaches stood statically at the head of a scrum of big dads wanting to travel to the ferries, with these the only vehicles provided by Eurostar, the ferry terminal and local authorities to the port.

Befriending some fellow strandees, the best course of action was to walk the miserable two miles to the ferries - luckily, we flagged down a taxi en route, the driver of which was the recipient of a few je t'aimes.

It was snowing and cold on arrival and the queue stretched far outside the ticket office. Then a man-pig turned up (bottom left of pic), shouting to everyone that he was cold and wanted to go inside - as if the other few thousand people were there to build northern France's biggest snowman.

This individual was a disgrace to humanity - a selfish, loud-mouth lover-of-kebabs who thought he was god's gift to comedy and interpersonal skills, when in truth he was a foul, vomit-inducing sight whose every breath triggered a mucous-infested vocal cord.

He sounded like a breathy elephant having an orgasm in your ear, interspersed with a rhino stampeding through a Walkers crisp factory.

I'm no fattist - but this man got through three king-size packets of crisps in a matter of minutes, washed down with a few tins of Sprite. Dessert consisted of Calais ferry terminal's finest deep fried potatoes. I cannot stress how bad this smelt for anyone within 100 metres of this one-man junk food feast machine.

His gorging was punctuated by attempts to force in-front of everyone. Naturally, I challenged his pushings - "Don't you fucking take the piss out of me, I just want a ticket", was his eloquent reply. I may have said something at this point which contradicts the non-fattist stance outlined previously.

Without launching into a tirade of abuse against a man that none of you have probably seen or are unlikely to ever see, the more frustrating aspect of my 13-hour journey between the French and British capitals was that no-one seemed to know what was going on. I spent three hours standing on the same tiles in the terminal building, unable to move for fellow passengers and without any information about when the next ferry would be departing.

The boredom and anger dispersed for a moment when one guy started playing Knockin' On Heaven's Door on guitar - a welcome distraction for those contending with man-pig.

More waiting, more confusion, more anger, but we finally boarded a ferry and reached the White Cliffs, with the promise that shuttle buses would transport Eurostar passengers to Dover Priory railway station for the onward journey to St Pancras. This did not happen.

So, just a couple of things to prepare ahead of my next trip to Paris - I need to find a fence and get one of these temperament-perfect pooches. Bon voyage pour maintenant.

Cheryl Cole gives birth to an 18-year-old boy

Celebrities' special powers, I thought, extended to to Kim Woodburn's ability to digest pulped cockroaches and mealworms.

But I was wrong. Cheryl Cole has usurped Woodburn by spawning a male son thanks to the magic of immaculate conception.

Because he has no father, 18-year-old X Factor winner Joe McElderry has inherited all of his mother's features, including face, place of birth, regional accent and singing voice.

Oh, and free flights to Los Angeles, expensive fashion taste and victory in an ITV Saturday night talent show/karaoke competition.

Collective bum-wiping: Manchester to Singapore

Toilet Humour, originally uploaded by pocketcanoe.

Something startling occurred to me this morning during the usual work routine. I was writing a story about Manchester Airport, or more specifically, its toilets.

They are officially the best in Britain, at least, according to a slightly ambiguous and misleading Manchester Airport press release. WCs in Terminals 1 and 2 won five-star ratings from the Loo of the Year Awards, which are recognised by the British Toilet Association. Impressive stuff.

But this pales into insignificance when you consider that Manchester Airport's 20 million annual passengers get through 43.93 million metres of bog roll per year.

As the airport light-heartedly points out, if unrolled, this would stretch between Manchester and Singapore four times and Manchester and New York eight times.

A quick sum points to the inescapable fact the average Manchester Airport passenger uses almost 2.2 metres of bog roll during their wait in the terminal - the equivalent of a person standing 7.2 feet tall.

I genuinely don't get it - how is this possible? And isn't there an environmental concern considering paper comes from trees and most used tissue is flushed down the toilet?

An article in the Guardian published earlier this year suggested that the amount of soft toilet tissue used in the US was causing more environmental damage than the country's gas-guzzling vehicles.

And according to charity WWF: "Every day, about 270,000 trees are flushed down the drain or end up as garbage all over the world.

"In fact, every time you use a toilet roll or other tissue products you might be directly contributing to this environmental destruction."

Airports and airlines are taking their fair share of flak from environmental campaigners, and Manchester probably isn't doing itself any favours by jokingly announcing that its passengers bum-wiped a collective total of 44,000km in 2009.

But maybe I'm wrong, and more passengers will be persuaded to fly from Manchester instead of Liverpool or Leeds Bradford, safe in the knowledge that they almost certainly won't combine their Mediterranean-induced tan with a bout of conjunctivitis or hepatitis.

Cafe Churchill, Westminster

MALUB090924-109.jpg, originally uploaded by martinlubikowski.

Today I paid a miserable visit to Cafe Churchill on Parliament Street in Westminster. It is so awful that I can barely find the words to describe this aggressive little cesspit of an eatery.

The few waiters and single waitress are initally friendly, welcoming and efficient. Then they become pushy and abrupt, asking if you want everything 'large' - which is actually 'regular', but it gives them a mandate to charge exorbitant prices for apparently edible produce which is so below par that I'd rather spend my money in Charing Cross McDonald's. After the pubs close on a Friday night. Even a Saturday night.

Churchill's menu is littered with grandiose terminology. I opted for the Imperial Hot-Dog, the cheapest item on the menu at £5.60. It arrived with a salad consisting of three anaemic lettuce leaves. Mmm, yummy.

The waitress bullied me into ordering chips. Soggy, re-heated oven chips, about ten of them. £3.50. Three pounds and fifty pence. On top of the £5.60.

The 'Imperial' did not describe the hot-dog, but must have instead related to the despotic waitress who served me, whose priorities included the establishment of a warped little empire via the cafe's menu.

She served me a bland frankfurter on an equally bland white baguette. The ketchup was clearly watered-down and the cheese was from one of those cheap packets of sliced processed yellow squares found in corner shops for 15p.

The bill was sky high, which I was expecting. I was not anticipating the adding-on of a service charge however. This is a grubby little cafe, tips are discretionary, no?

No. When I asked for it to be removed, Ms Despot informed me it was a compulsory charge, and that I had to pay it because it said so on the menu and I should have noticed it.

This experience angered and saddened me. I'd always choose an independent cafe over a Starbucks, Caffe Nero or Costa Coffee because they're (almost literally) being eaten up in London, which is a massive shame.

In conclusion, do not go to Cafe Churchill. It is utterly atrocious and stays afloat by targeting tired tourists sheltering from the rain. And stupid people like me.

Just so you know when to cross the other side of the road, it's located at 49 Parliament Street, SW1A 2NH, just south of Whitehall.

This is (probably) my last cafe review, I promise.