Je deteste les trains francais

Well I survives two nights in Paris and made it the INSEAD Q&A session (10 minutes late) so I'm happy to say I acomplished my goal for the weekend.  It also looks like I'll even be making it back to the farm without too much adventure. I really should have figured out today's travel schedule yesterday while I was at the station so I could guarantee my seats, but I was too tired at the time. Today when i arrived I checked the bus schedules from the two towns I could travel through and realized I was actually cutting it quite close.  Fortunatley I made it through te long reservation line in time and there was still a seat available.
Now here's where the obligatory ranting and raving comes in.  I hater the french train system.  To be fair, the british system is probably even worse - for some reason there seats are smaller than most planes - I seriously couldn't sit in them without facing some awkward diagonal direction or amputating my legs.  The french trains are much better in that regard - unless, as so often happens to be the case for me, you're assigned one of the table seaats where four people share a little table and the same legroom.  The other day I had the misfortune of having  to upgrade to first class to get where I wanted to go.  But I still ended up in a table seat. Being in first class it  was just two people facing each other, not four. Even so, i'm not so sure wha was first class about it. There was no water in the bathroom (no spiegs, i didn't soap up before discovering that ;-) and I had to sit sideways to fit in my seat. The table was to low - my legs didn't fit under it.  At least not if i didn't slide my feet all the way under my seat at an uncomfortable angle.
One day i'm going to build scale model furniture exactly 10 percent smaller than normal so that people who are 5'8" can see why those of us who are 6'3" are always squirming in our seats and inevitably develop so mant back problems.
So today is like any other. I'm across from another relatively tall guy who was kind enough to trade seats with a short girl that wanted to sit next to her friend. These seats should be reserved for couples because in order to fit across from each other we've both had to spread our legs and precariously weave them together with each of our knees in the other's crotch.  Couples or short people. The ticket people need a bi button to say 'tall passenger' avoid seats 51-58 at all cost.
The real problem with the train system here though is the sevice. It's not limited to the train system either. The other day I walked up to the information desk at the toulouse bus station and said I wanted go to cazaubon. The attendant plays with her computer for a minute and the asks me which bus line that is.  I look at the sign that says information and think, "why would i be talking to yoiu if i knew that?" I pulled out the slip where i had written down which towns the bus stopped at. They said there was a bus that left at the time I expected abd went to the first town on my list, but they didn't know if I could change to another bus there. I asked another person. Same response. So then i tried to buy a ticket. No. This wasn't a sails desk, just travel information. You buy the ticket on the bus.  When the bus arrived, the sign on the  front of the bus listed all the towns i had expected.  S somebody tell me, what was the point of the disinformation desk? Job creation i suppose.
Everywhere seems to be the same though. The bus drivers and train conductors seem to know what they're doing.  But once you get into the station they're really mostly all useless.  It'd like the stereotypical dmv worker in the states. Any little thing you ask is greeted with an agonizing sigh of, "oh no, you can't be serious. You want me to do my job?" YES! That is after all why you're here, isn't it?
I was hoping it would be a bit diferent now that I can speak a smattering of french. Clearly there's much more o infiltrating the system than just that.  Maybe one of these days.