Blonde's Eye View: Dear Bob

The misery of a London tube strike stays with you for days.

And not just because that's how long the blisters from walking take to heal.

It turns the already sorry experience of commuting into the kind of epic journey you might find in Dante's Inferno.

An early start, crowds, buses, bikes, taxis and boats, all means are attempted, and for the lucky few some even work.

Cheeky friends have been teasing me for weeks, suggesting I try out one of the Boris bikes in my pencil skirt and high heels.

Well this Tuesday I was desperate enough to give it a go - but I couldn't find a free one.

All forms of transport were more stuffed than Bob's last kebab. I resorted to good old pedestrian power.

Like having to pay vast sums for painful dental surgery, struggling against the odds to make it to the office feels deeply wrong.

My work is OK, some days I even enjoy it, but never enough to spend two hours fighting to reach it.

I wouldn't even do that for the new shoe department at Selfridges.

More Tube strikes are planned for October and November.

I can only assume the drivers returned from their summer holidays in Costa Del Skive, took one look at the gathering rain clouds and thought better of it.

Tuesday's strike on a tepid September day was uncomfortable enough, imagine it on a bitterly cold, dark November one.

People often talk of the "Blitz spirit" as Londoners struggle on in the face of challenge.

This only highlights the irony of the decision to strike on the 70th anniversary of the first day of the Blitz: emphasising just how spoilt Bob's band are compared to those who were truly hard done by.