tomskip

I can't imagine why you would walk past a very good primary school to go to another one further afield. Make your life easier if you can! It only gets more difficult and more complicated as your children get older.

Is it on Lordship Lane outside Foxton's? (trying to decipher picture)

If the dog who crapped under the table didn't belong to the women in the cafe, I'm not sure what you expected them to do? Clean up after a stranger's dog?

Don't like 'em

Free range eggs are so cheap that I do think only the desperate or ignorant would buy battery eggs now. Infact all food is inexpensive as a proportion of salary now compared to say, 30 to 60 years ago. And before everyone starts I know that is nowhere near offset by housing/childcare/stagnated wages costs! I would just like a decent alternative to M&S on Lordship Lane. M&S is fine if you want to treat yourself to a ready meal but not great if you prefer to cook from scratch. The shop is overcrowded and frustrating with a disproportionate amount of junk food and everything packaged in plastic to the nth degree. I agree with the pp who said that if Co Op are sinking slowly without a fight then that's a shame. They could properly up their game and have plenty of custom from those of us who aren't completely hoodwinked by M&S.

Really not a fan of M&S food and I hate that tiny new shop with a passion, so I try to remain loyal to the Co Op when doing my local food shopping. But, seriously, are they running that shop down with a view to closing, or what? The temperature in there has been arctic for weeks! Today I went in at 5pm and it wasn't specially busy. There were no trollies whatsoever and none of those slightly larger baskets you can wheel around. Dead flowers in a bucket just by the door. Dead chilli plants for sale on the shelf. Most shelves half empty. It looked like a store in serious decline but then it often has from time to time over the years. Does anyone know how they are affected by the arrival of M&S?

Sue Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > tomskip Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > It will be a significant loss to Lordship Lane > if > > it goes, but I can't see how any independent > > bookshops stay open these days. > > > Well there are quite a few independent bookshops > staying open round here! > > Apart from Chener, there is Rye Books in Upland > Road, the bookshop in Bellenden Road, one in > Dulwich Village, one in Crystal Palace. That's > just off the top of my head. > > ETA: And four of those are within easy walking > distance of my house. Yes, and one in West Dulwich too. I am surprised they can all stay open, given Amazon et al. Something like 50% of independent bookshops have closed in the past 10 years.

I find the tap water in London tastes absolutely fine. Where my inlaws are, in rural Suffolk, their tap water tastes vaguely of bleach! Yuck.

It will be a significant loss to Lordship Lane if it goes, but I can't see how any independent bookshops stay open these days.

We should have a stickied thread in here about school admissions if at all possible. The same questions come up every year. Clearly people aren't getting the information they need from their primary schools or from the secondary school prospectuses.

Am very curious. What do you eat if you can't cook?

Sorry but groooooooooooooooooo

Poor Mary couldn't face it!

Yes, Sydenham School is in the borough of Lewisham and The Elm Green School is in Lambeth. You can apply for places at schools outside your home borough but since most schools admit on distance (or catchment) you are unlikely to get a place at a school in a different borough unless you live right on the border. My daughter goes to Sydenham School but we live quite a distance from you, much closer to the Lewisham border. Having said all that, you might have some luck with Elm Green School in Lambeth. You are not too far away where you live.

I don't think the catchment for Sydenham School extends to Red Post Hill these days.

Its not a monkey puzzle. It's some kind of weeping cypress, there's one outside the library too.

National Rail website just isn't clear. A group of 16 year olds of my acquaintance want to travel by train out of London (although with the journey beginning in London) this week. The National Rail website seems to suggest they should pay adult fares, or buy a 16-25 year olds railcard for ?30 to get discounted train fares for the year. It's questionable whether buying that card for ?30 would be worth it - not many of them are likely to travel by rail outside of London many times in the next year. Are these the only two options? These young people are still in full time education and use Zip cards to get around on the bus.

I do wonder how much more gruesome is it to sleep in a homeless shelter than to sleep rough, but am lucky in that I haven't had to experience either. If people don't want a room in a shelter, then fair play. There are folk who live on the street who really do not want to be helped. Give them plenty of offers but if those are constantly turned down then let them be, I say. Behaving aggressively or in a threatening manner to passers by is a separate issue.

We have been having trouble (yet again) in the past few days but are quite a long way from you (top of Upland Road). We're back online again but when they did their remote diagnostic thing, they saw something that warranted sending an engineer - who is coming next week.

If the charity shops in ED don't want them, there is an Oxfam bookshop in Herne Hill. There are second hand book sellers at Haynes Lane Market in Crystal Palace, who might be willing to give you a small donation for them. Or you could put them outside your house on a dry day and see if any of your neighbours or passing pedestrians might take a few. I find this is a good way of passing on unwanted books.

We paid ?1500 for our hall, stairwells and landings plus 4 upstairs doors in our medium sized terrace back in 2007. So ?2000 now seems ok to me, just perhaps a tiny bit on the steep side? The most helpful figure you could have in that quote is what they are going to charge per decorator per day.

Yes, I think I'm saying why do our town centre commercial rents have to be so high that independents cannot survive in them? It seems to work ok in other European countries. Can't comment on the US or other places as haven't visited enough. The UK is notorious for it's dull High Streets. I've lived in Brixton, Dalston and ED pre-gentrification. Wondering where to go next!

I find it frustrating that shopping and eating out in the UK is so dominated by chains. I guess it must be to do with high High Street rents but going in to central London and finding two Pret a Manger and two Starbucks (just for example) within a couple of minute's walk of each other makes me feel a bit meh. It feels so different in France/Spain/Greece/Germany/Italy and I don't understand why it has to be different here.

Or top end of Friern/Barry Road? It's annoying me from quite a distance, am feeling for the neighbours!

I remain loyal to the fabulous Greetings.