8:05am - Leave the house in high spirits, full of Coco Pops and January optimism. Step on a dog-turd. My luck holds, it’s long since hardened.

8:10am – Through the use of colourful language and a sharpened stick, I battle my way to the 20 square centimetre area of the platform that I KNOW my usual set of train doors will pull up to. Proceed to hold/beat back the thronging, briefcased masses like a Spartan at Thermopylae. But with less beard.

8:20am – Train is late. And my spear arm is nearly spent.

8:22am – Watch in abject horror as the “whimsical” train driver decides to sail onwards an extra six feet today. Cue an almighty free-for-all for pole position by the time the doors open. All chances of finding one of the few remaining seats in the carriage rapidly evaporate. Utter, utter bastard.

8:30am – Silently curse the seated masses from my vantage point squashed face-first against the Perspex partition. A fat man in a polo shirt is simultaneously playing a game of Patience and watching an episode of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” on his laptop. Make a mental note to hurt him grievously should the chance arise.

8:33am – Only at Herne Hill. Torturous. Through a Herculean effort, manage to extract my book from my coat pocket and elbow myself enough room to read “The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe”. Perks me up a bit.

8:35am – Imagine the fat Trekkie strapped down in the vault from “The Pit And The Pendulum”, awaiting his agonising doom. Chuckle evilly, and unexpectedly loudly. Some odd looks from nearby passengers.

8:40am – The Phantom Farter. As with every other day this week, someone lets fly a silent but devastating air-biscuit between Elephant & Castle and Loughborough Junction. At close quarters, there’s no escape. My fellow commuters look furtively around with a mixture of total horror and grudging admiration at the sheer audacity and pungentness of the deed, but once again the culprit isn’t apparent. I’m keeping a closer eye out tomorrow. This reign of terror cannot continue indefinitely.

8:50am – We pull into Farringdon station. The whole train collectively braces itself.

8:50am + 03 seconds – All-out carnage as over a hundred designers, suits and advertising creatives run hell-for-leather for the alcove leading to the staircase, fully 2.5 people wide. I grab a small elderly woman who was dithering fatally, and pick her up for use a makeshift shield and battering ram. With an improvised battle-cry of “Have some, chuckleheads!!” I ascend as quickly as the carnage will allow, stepping on as many toes, faces and groins as are necessary to proceed. A smug-looking designer with preposterously tight jeans and an “eccentric” haircut spots an opening and tries to beat me to it, but is quickly felled by a roundhouse blow with the old lady. The top of the stairs is in sight.

8:51am – As the smoke clears, I exit the station in a cheerful frame of mind, pausing only to set the old lady on her way and punch a Free Paper Provider in the face. Onwards to another busy day.