What not to buy at a car boot sale

TV warnings of delays on the northern half of Thameslink into St P have thus far proved false. But the late-running 7.37 is standing room only so I opt for the 7.42 all stations service starting at St Albans.

It's only a couple of minutes late, but it turns out to be one of the tattyest WAGN trains I've seen. As I look around the as yet mostly empty last carriage, possibly a quarter of the seats have loose cushions, and almost all the lower cushions have holes in them. Some have part of the metal upholstery poking through. I had assumed that Thameslink were working to sort this problem, but looks like they missed this train [I recall that in the early days on the blockade, the seat of my trousers caught on a sharp metal piece of the upholstery of a similar seat, and I had to throw the suit out; not a great loss as it was already quite old, but a reason for caution today].

There's an, admittedly, childish part of me, that feels that as compensation for all the disruption and inconvenience Thameslink could at least provide a better service in other ways than we would normally get - for example by leasing some better additional stock; I can't help but wonder whether these wagn trains were picked up at the railway equivalent of a car boot sale for 10p each - but only after haggling over the price. The question I suspect that nobody asked of WAGN is 'why do you want to get rid of them?'