Eurostar let down by partner?

As I tweeted last night (and with apologies to my non-UK readers who will find this post more than usually uninteresting)

Great service from @EurostarUK, but why do they consistently put my booked National Rail seat in an area prioritised for the disabled?

and then having realised that this was not the fault of Eurostar but of 'First Great Western' (which is a very odd name because there was a Great Western long long before this 'first' one).

Great service from @EurostarUK, but why do @FGW issue seat bookings with three digits when the seats only have two digits?

@FGW and @Burtshire both replied to me **with the former** asking whether I was confusing the coach letter with a number.  [**Corrected with apology to @Burtshire]

@Burtshire  No. Coach D seat 820 (which means 82 but has caused altercations) and is still marked as a seat to be given up for disabled @FGW

@FGW Thanks for replying - but Coach D (not a digit when I last checked) seat 820 (and yes that's a zero). That happens every time.

Eurostar did reply too.  This is their only mistake in the whole matter.

@plasma_engineer Hello, unfortunately at present the booking process on our website does not allow a choice of seating for domestic services

which smacks a little of abdication, and

@plasma_engineer It may be worth calling FGW on 08457 000125 to see if they are able to change the seating for you, subject to availability

Just how am I supposed to know in advance that my seat is one that is reserved for the disabled?  @FGW seems not to know, so how could I?  It would have been nicer to hear them say that they would take the matter up with their supplier.  However, I'm still a fan of Eurostar and a detractor of UK National rail in general.

And as I promised to @burtshire, here is a photo of the reservations.

First Great Western seat reservation oddities!

Although this by no means a matter of life or death, having got a seat reservation for the first or last 45 minutes of my journey I do rather take exception to the risk of not being able to use it.

Perhaps it shows something more subtle about the relationship between Eurostar and First Great Western.  Eurostar sells FGW/Underground tickets at a very favourable discount.  I can imagine FGW regarding these passengers as a lower class than their usual 'cattle class'.

And that really IS saying something!

Sunday Selection 8

Continuing a new series where there is little additional content from me, but I simply share a few items, new and old, that have pleased me this week.  As almost every week, I see items on the web that I find interesting, amazing or  or amusing.  This disjointed ramble might be on any of my normal topics - or on other topics entirely.  My thanks go to the friends who helped me to find them.

First: An interview with Bertrand Russell.  It is not very long but it is his message to the people of the future.

Podcast of the week: Skeptics with a K, episode 78.  You might love or hate the style of this podcast, but I'm a keen listener.  The three presenters from the Merseyside Skeptics Society have a certain laddish charm and they have a knack for finding interesting topics.  Sometimes they start into a story that appears somewhat tangential (as in the surprisingly disgusting one about clearing out a cupboard in this episode), but don't give up too early!  They always conclude with an interesting learning point.  In this episode they also celebrate the legal difficulties that are being experienced by homeopaths in UK this year, and I was glad to hear that 2 of the 3 presenters were also not great fans of the Olympics.

Quote of the week: 
“When Muslim parents hate their host culture so much that they will kill a child who seems to embrace it, then they are guilty of intolerance – the kind that non-Muslims are wary of showing, lest they be branded racist, or bigoted.” 
Wow! Something sensible from Cristina Odone, in the Telegraph

Tweet of the week:
If the Bible was a good morality guide, we'd not need the Declaration of Human Rights. Humanity: Higher morals than God since 1948. #Atheism from @CrispySea

Atheist news of the week:  How Christopher Hitchens fell out with Gore Vidal

Exciting science of the week: The landing of Curiosity, the new rover on Mars was much more exciting than anything that the Olympics had to offer.  Amazingly, this picture was snapped by another satellite that was orbiting Mars.

Curiosity snapped on its chute, descending to Mars.

See the pictures that it is collecting every day at this link.  I'm sure that there is a lot of good stuff to come from this amazing project!

And finally . . .

Favourite places: Mars (Is this cheating?) 

This image, from here, shows how Curiosity landed there this week.

Curiosity's surprising landing on Mars (from here).