Manchester De-Brief

So I had to go to Manchester at the last minute this weekend for work. I worked pretty much the whole time. (I know, not supposed to blog about work, but that's why I went, and didn't see much.)

A few random thoughts:

1) Why are the food shops in so many major train stations so poorly designed? The worst by far is the Marks & Spencer Simply Food in Euston Station. You have to go all the way through the food court to even get into Marks, and you naturally go to the center display cases where all the sandwiches, salads, etc. are. But then as you head down towards the cash registers, you realize you don't have a drink -- and all the cold drinks are at the far end of the store!

This would not be an issue if a) the aisles were not rather narrow and b) everyone wasn't pulling around suitcases or extremely bratty children.

Then once you've finally queued and paid, you need to go ALL THE WAY BACK THROUGH THE STORE to get back into the station. This would not necessarily be a problem, except IT'S A TRAIN STATION and people have to make their trains! You would think the people who design shops inside train stations might take that into account.

2) Manchester Piccadilly station looks really very nice on the inside and the outside. All very modern-looking, as in 2000s modern not bright-orange fixture 1970s modern.

3) Manchester reminds me of Akron, if Akron were a bigger city, like Cleveland, and without the hills. Lots of red brick and post-industrial chic. It really was like walking around downtown Akron -- only a lot bigger, and completely flat (whereas downtown Akron is built on the side of a very steep hill).

4) I was staying very near Manchester's Chinatown. It was a very small Chinatown. I went to one of the best restaurants. The food was really good, although every once in a while a gnat would seem to fall on my table. I was very tired or I would've made a fuss about this. I think they were coming out of the air duct.

5) There was a statue made of scrap metal in the foyer of our Manchester office -- the foyer on its floor (rather than the main building entrance). I didn't really pay it much attention till I was leaving today and I realized what it was: a robot playing a saxophone. And I could not stop laughing.

Yes, I talked about work twice in this post. Let's see if I can do a better job.