genwilliams

I'm seeking help with a small carpentry & plastering job in my bathroom. Water has eroded the plaster around my bath, and damaged the wood surround under the plaster, so I'm looking to have this wood replaced, and the plaster repaired and recaulked where the wall meets the bath. (The rest of the walls seem fine!). I'm based in Sydenham. Recommendations from happy customers would be welcomed!

Signed and shared on Twitter. They can't impose these kind of rent hikes and expect small businesses to survive.

Spider spray does help a bit - they don't like the smell (peppermint!) so will avoid rooms where you use it. I love my spider spray. Sprayed liberally on the thresholds of doors and windows! I'm told they are generally averse to citrus, peppermint and eucalyptus smells. All smells I am perfectly happy to have around my home, especially if they keep the horrid little beasties away. That said, there is a tiny little chap who seems to have taken up residence in a glass in my room. He's about 75mm across, and for a spider, *almost* cute (he's a bit like a cartoon spider), so given that he doesn't move a great deal, I'm happy for him to hang out as long as he doesn't do anything surprising.

I'm a pretty trenchant feminist. But if someone offers me their seat on the train (I don't expect them to, I'm in my early 30s so no-one would assume I need it), I'm happily surprised - I'll take it and say thank you. Transport during rush hour can be pretty self-serving and unfriendly, people shoving each other to get on packed trains etc - so something like that is refreshingly unselfish. A chap about my age got up and gave me his seat on the tube the other day and I just thought "how kind!" and thanked him. I can't tell you what his motivation for doing so was, but he wasn't flirty, creepy or patronising, so I just took it as a simple act of kindness. I agree that expectations about this sort of thing should generally be reserved for those less able to stand. But I don't think the pursuit of equality has to stop people doing nice things for each other. I like benefitting from chivalry, and I pay it back to both men and women; I like the idea of delinking it from problematic oldskool expectations about how men & women relate to each other. I guess if men and women all behaved in traditionally 'chivalrous' ways to each other, rather than it being how men "should" treat women (or are told they shouldn't any more), as a society we would just look out for each other more. LadyDeliah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > No don't! With chivalry comes expectations and > preconditions, plus a load of other baggage women > have tried to get rid of for the past century. > > Eff that. I'd rather stand up than have someone > patronise me. > > If someone is less able to stand, whether they are > male or female, they should be given a seat. If > your feet are killing because you are wearing high > or tight shoes, get a pair of trainers.

I don't think one can compare the Overground service in south London to a tube service. The Overground is definitely useful particularly for commuting, but even setting aside the difference in frequency of trains, the seemingly constant engineering works mean that there's often limited or no weekend service anyway. That's true on both the Clapham Junction line and the Crystal Palace line - this weekend was a delight, finding that a return trip that should have taken about an hour and a half took twice that because the Overground was largely out of action. By the way, here's a fun bit of info I was told by someone who works for TFL: contractors often book station/line closures for works, but don't necessarily carry out the works - something changes, and the date gets shifted. The stations remain closed, though, because they didn't bother to cancel the closures and tell anyone they won't be showing up. So that's good, isn't it?

I'd avoid trying to get an appointment at the Melbourne Grove surgery. I've been with them for years, and the service/care isn't bad, but just try getting through on the phone. I called this afternoon, and after a few minutes of the usual merry dance of "Call busy" / try again / "call busy" / try again that usually happens when you call them, I finally got through to an automated message which told me I was in a queue - number 3. Fine. Ten minutes later, I reached number 1, and then the phone started to ring. And ring. And ring. It's a slow day at work, so I let it carry on - just a ringing tone for ten minutes, with no sign of life on the other side. After a total of 25 minutes on hold, I hung up, and tried again. "Call busy". Total time wasted: about half an hour, to get nowhere at all. Useless.

I've been in & out of Kings a fair bit recently, in more than one department, and would like to second the words from other people here; I've been constantly impressed, in particular, by how much care the staff take to just be kind and reassuring to people. Being nice to people sounds like a no-brainer but when you see how full their waiting rooms are, how many people they have to look after, and how calm and patient the staff are all the time, it really does impress me.

My tuppence: the gardens at the back of 123 Grove Park are beautiful - I've been in a couple of times and it's a veritable forest - mostly untrodden by people, so a real haven for the kind of city wildlife that is fast running out of habitat in London. It's now rare to find such untouched spots in London. If the area behind 20/21 Grove Park is comparable, I hope it can be saved!

Haha! I managed to avoid odd stares by pretending to retie my shoelaces when anyone walked past. Obviously now everyone will know what I'm up to. Oh dear.