civilservant

i was interested to hear that they thought they had several times more clients than actually proved to be the case. when i heard the original estimate, i can remember wondering where all these kids came from I've wondered how the original estimate was arrived at - but whether this was a genuine mistake or a cunning attempt to inflate the perceived need, it raises strong concerns about the organisation's accountability and governance

i haven't noticed that there've been more noise-related threads recently than there have ever been but: if someone is new to East Dulwich and encounters a noise problem; they hear about the power of the Forum and register in the hope that they can get advice or help - what's so suspicious about that? isn't that what the Forum is actually about? ETA but i seem to have spotted at least one poster who seems to specialise in anti-anti-noise posting - it takes all sorts

by all means have a word with the pub first but also have a look at the conditions governing their licence: these stipulate their opening hours, live music, use of outside space etc The Cherry Tree's are here: http://app.southwark.gov.uk/Licensing/LicPremisesGrantedDetails.asp?systemkey=850811 if they hear your, then fine; if not, you'll need to get in touch with the Southwark Licencing Team whose contact details are at the bottom of the licence good luck - it's not a pleasant situation to be in

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I am a car owner. I am not 'anti car'. But anyone > with any sense can see that the potential harm > represented by a motor vehicles overshadows that > posed by a small, light, relatively slow, self > propelled bicycle... and by a significant order of > magnitude. The fact is that the amount of > 'concern' expressed about the 'carnage' bikes > cause, is ridiculously disproportionate. The > number of threads talking about the 'dangers of > bikes' is getting silly. I am a pedestrian i haven't driven since i got my driving licence i think cycling is a good way of reducing one's ecological footprint i would cycle on the road if i thought it was safe enough i have no problem with other road users so long as they obey the rules but... i have a problem with anyone, cyclist or not, who behaves on the road in a way that is selfish and endangers others (or themselves) i also have a problem with anyone who thinks it's ok to behave that way

Clearly this shop failed to pay its way. it's a hard job making a toyshop pay when so much more is available on-line, and many shops aimed at children sell clothes and books as well. but I can understand why the kids would be upset, middle class or not - being in a toyshop is lovely, it could even be magic. Woollies did fit the bill once, now TK Maxx is a source of wonder, all just as valid Aladdin's caves as good sweetshops or bookshops or delicatessens (like Sesame next door) and even though I admit I rarely bought anything there - only last-minute birthday party offerings, it just didn't have much I wanted to buy - I'll miss it too.

now, now, miga, what was all that about? everyone takes risks and many people break rules - that IS a pretty obvious fact, isn't it? well done for pointing that out. but i'd have thought that it's also pretty obvious that risks can be disproportionately weighted against some groups e.g. cyclists and pedestrians. but let's leave pedestrians out of this cyclist-focused thread... so wouldn't you agree that a rule-breaking blue car driver doesn't run quite the same personal danger of being squashed as a rule-breaking cyclist? hence my question - it's simply not logical to put oneself in a situation when the risk is so great and the reward so small. so - why does that make you feel so personally slighted? and what's all that stuff about road tax? how and why does that follow?

Loz, your M25 analogy is hilarious, but it is true that cyclist deaths (and the rather larger number of pedestrian deaths) are mostly caused by 4-wheel traffic so I've got another question - every day I watch from the bus while (some) cyclists take the most absurd risks in traffic. This being traffic, the risks will be shared to some extent by everyone around them, in the same way that a car with bad brakes is a threat to everyone else on the road. as exdulwicher points out, some of this is about bad cycling infrastructure. But quite a lot of it is not. so why do they do it? is it just for the sake of shaving a few minutes off their journey? or is something else going on?

rahrahrah Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Oh come on. I see cars jump red lights to, but to > suggest it's because of cyclists is really jumping > the shark. perhaps so (but I think you mean 'jumping to conclusions' - shark-jumping is something else entirely) but the basic problem is the mindset that, when in a car, behaves like a selfish arse, and when on a bike, continues to do so. special pleading, e.g. for cold wet cyclists, just doesn't cut it. of course there are pedestrian arses too e.g. wandering along with earphones in, getting in the way of well-behaved cars and bikes. but that, Best Beloved, is another thread.

traffic rules in America or on the Continent are not more sensible than UK ones - in France and Belgium they still use priorite a droite while acknowledging that it's archaic and dangerous; in the US they eschew roundabouts in favour of the totally bonkers four-way stop > if it's the middle of the night, cold and pouring with rain, a cyclist may feel it's ok to keep going if there is no traffic about is that really ok? what about the pedestrian crossing the road in the same weather who has to additionally keep an eye out for hurtling cyclists? in conditions of poor visibility (or at any other time even) all that anyone can hope for is that EVERYONE is obeying the same set of rules of the road cyclists benefit from being able to switch between being road traffic and pedestrians; if they're on the road, they obey the same rules as other road traffic; if they're on the pavement they get off and wheel their bike. simples, yes? btw, i don't drive - i walk or use public transport - so accusations of anti-cyclist hypocrisy don't wash with me

> reasons - saving time, pointless lights, some > belief of morale (sic) high ground, and general > immaturity. you couldn't have put the anti-cycling case better...

agree with everything you say, exdulwicher - thank you and goodnight!

a US 'cup' can be defined for nutritional purposes as 240ml, but that's a retro-fitted definition to what started out as a rough and ready indication of relative volumes within a recipe. as any cook kno, all recipes are about relative proportions, and generous margins of error are permitted i don't think anyone has felt the need to codify the size of a 'handful' or a 'tablespoonful', other popular measures in recipes (but see this link http://www.accuracyproject.org/measurements.html) , although I have recently seen nutritionist-type guidance about what constitutes a 'portion' (as in '5 portions a day) ETA useful link for measurement purists

"all gay people, all Jewish people" - again a spurious analogy noone was born with a bike attached - it's a conscious choice to ride a bike as much as it's a conscious choice to be a socially responsible cyclist (or citizen, for that matter) doesn't get around the real issue that with other forms of transport, there are well-defined rules and a shared understanding of what they are. if every cyclist readily acknowledged that they as a road-user have responsibilities to other road-users, then fine. until then, there is a problem IMHO.

this is the Forum after all, and Alice can approach the issue any way she likes BB, it's not sensible to compare the (rare) realisation of a risk (pedestrian killed by lorry while crossing irresponsibly) with the much more frequent near-misses that well-behaved pedestrians have with cyclists behaving irresponsibly. I first posted on this thread to point out that although a lot of thought and money's been spent on cyclists, as well as huge patience among other road-users in places like the Elephant, (some) cyclists still insist on flouting the rules. a general point - as a pedestrian, i can easily see an approaching car or lorry and make a decent judgement of whether it is safe to cross. But with cyclists, their speed is out of all proportion to their visual impact on the street scape - they zip along like neutrinos - tiny mass and huge speed. So that they're near invisible until they're on top of you. That's scary for a pedestrian. and what's also scary is the reluctance to stop at crossings. So very often crossed at a green light or a pelican crossing and had to jump out of the way of cyclists who don't think that THEY need to stop. i've got no problem with cycling - it's about some cyclists. how about all you cyclists out there do a bit of policing of your own kind instead of chuntering on about how fast and easily you can zip home compared to us pedestrian snails?

Otta Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Totally genuine question here. Why if the body > needs to be buried in order to keep its > integrity, is it then okay for that to be time > limited? Surely it either needs to be buried in > one piece or it doesn't? I just don't understand > it. neither do I and I'm not even trying to understand it because I suspect there's no logic to it if it's about taking a perfectly decent bit of wooded green space and turning it into a graveyard because the pious are worried about disturbing the long-dead in existing graveyards, then that just doesn't compute - other pious folk have no qualms about digging up their dead and repackaging them to fit the available space; it's done even in the best churches e.g. Westminster Abbey or am I missing some element of religious orthodoxy here?

in places like Greece, Italy, Spain, where they believe strongly in the need to preserve the physical integrity of the body after death i.e. bury not cremate, it's quite customary to lease a burial plot for a fixed period of time. When this time is up, the bones are disinterred and re-buried more compactly - hence the catacombs and the ossuaries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ossuary you see in many European cemeteries - so they can manage with a limited amount of burial space. It's only in England it seems that it's your bit of green and pleasant land for ever and ever, or at least until they build a car-park on top of you

After the lengthy shenanigans at the Elephant to give cyclists their very own space, I was bit bemused last night to see a cyclist in full Lycra barrelling along on the pavement, right next to the cycle lane. Does anyone wonder why the rest of us hate cyclists? It may be just one bad apple but since most of them are masked by their helmets and Lycra, with no number plates or other ID, no one can tell which one it is.

measuring in cups - so long as the same cup is used throughout - is no problem at all, and preferable to having to weigh everything out. if the recipe is properly written (and tested!) to ensure internal consistency, the size of the cup doesn't matter at all I note that a lot of the responders say 'buy this' and 'buy that' - good to see the level of disposable income in Dulwich has kept up! but how sustainable is that? and exactly HOW precise do ingredient measurement need to be? will one's cakes really suffer if you're +/- 10gm out? re. "cupful of chopped walnuts" v. "cupful of walnuts, chopped" - that's a poorly written recipe if it confuses the two, not your own fault if you can't distinguish between the two

Franklin's farm shop have them

the cultural norms argument is so off the mark - Penguin is usually a reasoned and reasonable commentator that i am truly surprised at his post in any culture, a grown man hitting a child is considered unacceptable, whether it happens in Glasgow or Ghana or Gloucester. what might vary is whether people consider it their business to intervene. I note that the OP comments that none of the people passing intervened to help the child. Does that imply that this man's behaviour is an ED cultural norm? I do hope this man and child have been identified and the social services have been involved.

Jeremy Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Alan Medic Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > The Man in the High Castle is currently a > I have the book... yes its a good read but it's > not really my idea of sci-fi. no? the author and his readership agreed it was SF, to the extent that it won the Hugo - it's a classic alternative universe novel but you're right that it's not "sci-fi"!

it depends on what his bag is - the ones recommended are all good and i read and enjoyed them when they were still new and fresh, but they do not really work when re-read by an older and presumably more demanding reader of the newer writers, Iain M Banks is very good, and I highly recommend China Mieville the new William Gibson (The Peripheral) is also a great return to form what about George RR Martin i.e. the Game of Thrones guy! and another good newer writer is Paolo Bacigalupi if he likes cyberpunk/hardboiled, then Walter Jon Williams or Richard Morgan and if he's into hard SF, then try someone like Alastair Reynolds or Kim Stanley Robinson or Stephen Baxter

i'm local too and I haven't complained! neither has anyone else in this household i'd have thought that the mirror was valuable for precisely the reason EDmummy mentions

True, and it does create its own congestion, with people queuing for their morning latte or wandering into the oncoming commuter hordes carrying their cups of dangerously hot liquid! I use the Thameslink service for its convenience - if I manage to squeeze onto a train at PRye or DH, i can get to the Elephant in 5-10 minutes. I could of course take a bus for the same journey, but that means that I'd have to spend 30-40 minutes travelling instead. How many of the commuter hordes, like me, are shaving minutes off their commute by crowding into DH station? I bet there'd be many fewer if Camberwell and the Walworth Road were less congested with white vans, builders' lorries, school drop-offs and slow cyclists in the bus lanes!