MrBen

"Lemmy" is a fantastic film. Not least to enjoy the brummie Brit in America culture clash. Also not a book is: Anvil,The Story of Anvil A hilarious and touching account of a briefly great metal band looking to relive past glories.

Was going to post under What's ED reading? but figured this subgenre was worthy of it's own thread. I've often hugely enjoyed a book about those whose music I like (but don't actually love) and vice versa, with some notable disappointments. I enjoyed Hacienda - How not to run a club by Peter Hook more for the nostalgia/historical nature and how a band basically funded a giant pill fueled party for 15 years within a spectacularly badly run business (Factory). I didn't enjoy Slash's biography. Should have been good given the mans stature but I just found it downright boring!

I think you're adding 2+ 2 to make 6 there e-dealer

But if you can't then try Stumblin Slims run by the dudes involved with the equally brilliant Blues Kitchen in Camden.

:)-D

What about calling it "The Jah Lush" ? Named after one of the area's most impressive rock n roll drinkers, happy hour would start at 4.30pm ;-)

Do it. I'm a regular visitor to Collioure which is a beautiful and still relatively unspoiled Cotes Vermeille town on the coast south of Perpignan. Ryanair started flying there in 2002 which was handy but this year the Irishman is running summer flights only. So my route is now train: Eurostar to Lille then the newly extended TGV straight to Perpignan. And as of last year it's extended onto Barcelona. Total journey time (to Perpignan) door to door is about 8 hours from Kings Cross which is only slightly longer than the travel to Stansted, wait + flying time + cab in total. I'd recommend it! Trains are just way more civilised....I can work/sleep/read better and anything to avoid airports. Another tip - I found the food on the Eurostar really good. Thankfully the French are in charge of the catering. The catch is you have to travel in Leisure Select class (basically off loading Business Class seats they haven't sold). If you book in advance and are travelling on an off peak day you can pick these up for not much more than Economy. And you get served at your seat and a glass of champagne to start. They even served claret with some steak and a crisp salad last time. Better than a plastic sachet of vodka, scratchcards and a ?2 kit kat.

Harp! It looks like they'll contract out the lease to a "creative landlord". They'll have to be to make that back st location work. There might be some traces of bohemian East Dulwich....but Brighton this ain't. They will need to be able to gauge the local crowd well to turn it round and make it commercially viable. And, with apologies to you 15 regulars out there, more of the same isn't going to do the job.

Time to plan some holidays for the year ahead. Still in the DINK stage (and enjoying it) so it's an open book. I get twitchy and plain bored on beach holidays (Scot's + sun don't mix) and so the current shortlist is: - Istanbul for a long weekend - A return New Orleans for some bourbon, smokes and second lining at Jazzfest in April (via New York for a few days). - Italy in the summer (I'm thinking a villa perhaps? or a classy seafront hotel somewhere) So...any tips for the above options? And where are you all going this year? Your inspired advice would, as ever, be much appreciated....

My turn was in 2005 at Optimax on Shaftes avenue. I did a fair bit of research beforehand on various forums to get consensus on surgeons track records etc. Cost ?1200. Painless operation - the worst bit is the smell of your eyeball burning but it passes. Then... a miraculous sensation as I realised I could see what girls looked like properly from the top deck of a 185.

Hmmm....a bunch of good natured, knitted folkies and the ageing, coked up builders with a chip on their shoulder doesn't sound like a great mix does it? I used to go there a fair bit on Sundays by myself as it was good for a pint and papers. It had to be a tabloid though or they'd mistake you for an undercover copper. I liked the back lounge best as the front was a bit hit and miss - sometimes friendly, other times downright lairy. Now the Mag is closer to home and I reckon they've done a pretty fine job there of catering to different groups at once, perhaps because of the space. It can be like a creche at times but you'll still find hardened drinkers at the bar and some decent live music and food. As for the CPT - you never know until it happens but it will need more than some art on the wall to attract a decent crowd and I'll wager that for every one of the regulars who'll miss it, there are 4 others who would try it out if its offering was improved. It doesn't need to transcend to the Third Place - all it needs is a decent juke box, decent beers and a small kitchen for some simple food.

Think of it as having a neutral state. It's neither "good" nor "bad". Twitter is just a channel or medium by which to get lots of small nuggets of relevant info to lots of people quickly. Relevant in the sense you can choose what you want to receive. What's interesting in these still early days is how badly most businesses, and often people, use it (like most social media). They're on it because they feel they have to be rather than working out what they want to achieve. There's also little in the way of decent filtering of individual feeds so it's all or nothing.

For the record...I've got two wrangler shirts from my cow chasing days in Calgary. But I only wear them when I go fly fishing.

I happened to pass Meat Liqour last night. Biting wind and a long queue outside of 80 odd identikit, bearded, tablecloth- wearing, twitter users wired into their HTC's and blue toothing Bob Dylan bootlegs to each other. The early adopting hipster wave...soon to move on once the place gets into the Ace Nights Out in London section of the Easyjet in-flight magazine.

It's officially the most helpful cat thread ever. Snorky...you are often in our thoughts.

As the boss, I plan to wear a tighter than expected elf costume in the office on Monday to try to kick things off - good idea?

Has anyone else noticed a distinctly late start to proceedings this year? Lordship Lane shops and bars were noticably quieter on Friday /Saturday than they should have been, takings down, less people about than this time last year...our annual City work bash (for clients too) was 65% last years turnout...but... looking at our bar tab they actually drank MORE. I saw an early outrider santa hat at lunch in the last week of November, but only this week have proceedings felt festive.

Hipsters: Creative, independent of mind, off-beat, edgy.....so why do they all look the same?!

On the strength of your post, tfwsoll, it's now on my christmas list!

Possibly the two greatest male singers of the last 50 years. Hearing Sam Cooke in that kind of live set up gives me goose bumps - it is sublime. Both gone way too early....

I would advise: - Get three quotes ?2.2k sounds a little steep unless scaffolding etc is needed..even so.. - A friendly chat with the neighbour first and to gauge how happy they are to pay costs etc if they agree get this in writing. - If they are also happy to do the work you could (in theory) just go ahead and do the repairs, split 50/50 - If (as is usually the case) they don't care/are poorer than you/think its your issue then it gets tougher and The Party Wall Act is your friend -it was invented to make this process easier but it can start to get very expensive so tread with caution.

London is dotted all over with similar monuments to 2006 era property greed. The promise that you too can live a luxury lifestyle in a new build. With a girl in a bikini drinking fresh coffee on the balcony. Except it overlooks the Walworth Road and the plants on the terrace are already browning from the exhaust fumes. The developers only have themselves to blame.

Liked him in Time Team better than Blackadder.

Aah-rooooooooooh!

The two word contribution from *Bob* on the Dr Gupta thread.