SimonM

>>In my humble opinion, give me Green & Blacks, Lindt, anything Belgian, or even Charbonnel et Walker. Hey, maybe even some of those are fairtrade for all I know, although probably not.<< Oh well if we are now talking serious chocolate Easter Eggs then look no further than Hotel Chocolat...admittedly expensive on the face of it, but incredibly think and scrumptious and, who knows, may even be fairtrade too...

>>If anyone would like to see An Inconvenient Truth, I very much recommend the Prince Charles cinema.<<< Alternatively, the DVD is now widely available for as little as ?6 if you shop around a bit

Have a look at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/essex/3715120.stm

I too have used Ken's, ever since Keith on Northcross Road retired.....

>> Yes, I spend a fortune in there, and end up with random rubbish like a tiny bunch of coriander, some dishwasher tablets and kitchen paper with picture of Pooh the bear on it. << Dear oh dear. Why do you think God invented "Ocado"?! Sainsbury's has a much better range of bread-making flour and also sells "Illy" coffee beans - to which I am hopelessly addicted - so I still go there regularly, but other than that....

>>Has Coriander only got one "r" in it?:D

>>Hell no!! Where will I get my guitar picks from now?<< Well they have moved back to the original premisies on Upland Road

>>Might be worth mentioning, that the forum is getting new users all the time, and they probably can't be arsed reading ever thread (I know I wouldn't), so there's bound to be some repitition! You could always just NOT READ IT<< A fair point. Perhaps the Lord High Administrator could consider a FAQ/New Readers Start HERE section whoch would be (a) read only and (b) cover things like Indian reastaurants, Sunday lunches, motor fuel retailers and credit cards, chains & The Joy of Starbucks, M & S coming/not coming to ED etc etc..?

>>I can see it now - Sainsbury's replacement: flourescent strip lighting, white plastic seats, and enormous slabs of dried up lasagne.<< That is certainly a pretty accurate description of Sainsbury's cafes I have visited in the long distant past. However I do wonder if perhaps the Sainsburys PTB have not learnt a trick or two since then and taken on board what people expect nowadays from a coffee shop? We shall see... In the meantime the old Music Shop site across the road from "Cafe Rude" in West Dulwch is vacant so perhaps you should point this out to the Starbucks Mothership? :))

>>Any one wearing crocs this spring?<< Wouldn't that be taking "snappy dressing" too far, or have I misunderstood?

Here is "Tracy Barlow"!

>>>don't you mean America Fererra?<<< Ummm.....oddly enough...no! ;-)

he's now in "Ugly Betty" - maybe he could entice Salma Hayek here instead of Harold Bishop? >:D

>>Father Time has been most cruel to that man. And the copious amounts of smack were a bad idea. Raddled.<< Well up to a point ; he still looks in better nick than Brian Jones....B)

>>and Tracy Barlow from corrie orrie looking lovley on Northcross Road<< Are you quite sure this was Kate Ford? Was she being pelted with rotten samosas and vegan rice cakes and hissed at by the passers-by? :))

I am given to understand that, if you want to prevent Foxtons selling that desirable empty property next door to you, all you need do is leave a bucket of urine on the lawn...

Nah....this is just wishful thinking on the part of the developers. It's a terrible site for a Starbucks - too far away from the real shops of LL itself, never mind that they already have one in Sainsbury's.

I suggest, with enormous tact and diffidence, that it is almost never a good idea to criticise the standard of anyone's written english in a medium such as this, no how diplomatically one couches one's own language! :)) - the only possible exception being where you do know the person concerned in "real life" (whatever that may be)

>>The Queen doesn't sound Northern, and it's the queen's English,<< But that's because she's practically German :))

Fireman's Alley runs between Lordship Lane and the South Circular, yes. It's between the BT place (automated telephone exchange??) and blocks of flats. I believe there was actually a fire station where the telephone exchange now is once upon a time. I think the gates all open/close in sequence at roughly the same times of day but cannot say this for certain.

P.S. Lots of useful info/history etc also at http://www.dulwichparkfriends.org.uk/

You might like to invest in "Dulwich Park: A park for the people for ever", by Liz Johnson - which I imagine a certain seedy-looking but joyfully non-chain SE22 bookshop may still have. Or if not there, 1 of the village shops. It was bitterly cold in the park yesterday - only a few hardy souls at the kids playground and a solitary yellow Dulwih Recumbents trike. Amazingly one flurorescent pink rhododenfron is in flower though! And they were sweeping the loose pebbles off the paths at last! SimonM (who uses the Fireman's Alley gate!)

>>>Legs & Co - that's right!:D

>>Someone once told me she was in Pans People - was that true?<< I am quite sure she was not! SimonM (devoted PP fan way back then)

A message by A Lady in the "buggy etiquette" section elsewhere reminded me of an old Frankie Howard joke. He described a visit to a supermarket where he encountered a woman in a mild state of undress - to wit, blouse unbuttoned and one breast exposed. He subtly hissed a message to the lady, to the effect that "one was hanging out, dear", whereupon she glanced down and sighed "Bollocks...have I gone and left the baby on the bus again?!"