Mark

Why would we want another East Dulwich Community Centre?

Blimey 'danniele', to call yourself "scum" and to get feelings of isolation from the community by merely walking past this shop is terrible, I do hope your head doctor manages to rid you of these issues at your next session. Noone is isolating you, you're isolating yourself by thinking like that. There's some good bargain clothes shops in Peckham and good old TKMAXX is a short trip away on the 37 in Clapham Junction. Anyway, back onto the topic I went into Petals today and it's really nice, I also discovered a couple of business I hadn't noticed before on Melboune Grove including an interesting looking cafe.

I'm afraid I can't be there as I'm out of town, but I'll be there in spirit and I'm sure it'll be a good night. I hope the love flows freely (but not too freely if batdog's there) and if you do make it to Surma remember to try the Taba Cheers! Mark

sorry Nic, struggling a bit with this one. I'll have another go when I get more time

and another excuse for the Snorky, our resident Victor Meldrew, to place a snide remark about how change in the world is wrong.

In another evening of glamour and glitz never seen in East Dulwich, Surma Restaurant gratefully received their award for being voted the Best Indian Restaurant in East Dulwich 2006 by you, the registered users of the East Dulwich Forum (see the poll here). The award was presented by Angela Burgess of SE22 Magazine to Surma's manager Mr Muzahid Ali who has been the manager of Surma for the entire 31 years that it has been in East Dulwich. 31 years! Blimey! Surma's customers have included a plethora of celebrities over the years including Stephen Frost (chap from the Carling Black Label ads with the big eyebrows) and celeb chef Ainsley Harriot. An ecstatic Mr Ali said that the most popular dish is the Chicken Tikka Masala, and when asked what would he recommend to East Dulwich Forum users he replied "the Taba, it's Chicken or lamb cooked with fresh ginger, garlic and ground spices in a medium sauce". Delicious. (Sorry James, we forgot to ask about vegetarian dishes). Angela Burgess of SE22 Magazine presents the award to Surma's manager Mr Muzahid Ali Congratulations Surma Restaurant, officially the Best Indian Restaurant in East Dulwich Surma Restaurant 42 Lordship Lane East Dulwich SE22 8HJ Tel:020 8693 1779

indeed it did. However I did drop Steve at Lordship Lane.co.uk and other local publishers an email offering help and potential partnerships. Anyway whilst I was writing my cocky comment above I received a pleasant personal message from spookstudio so I take it all back

I think there may be a forum in the area already but I may be wrong. Perhaps you could contact the creators of this site and see if there's any partnership opportunities, they seem to have a pretty good idea on how to do things...

Snorky, that's about 12 bans and one pub issue and one dog issue. Fair play. Let's say you became the Prime Minister of East Dulwich what would you bring in? (and please don't say a ban on something)

There's a match report on this site over here http://onionbagblog.blogspot.com/2007/01/crap-match-report-story-filed-by_22.html there's even a video of parts of the match.

If you hear how long the gym and pool are going to be closed for please post it on here. Yesterday I tried calling numerous times to see what the inspection revealed and how long these council facilities will be closed for and I couldn't get through. I expect the staff were unable to answer the phone because they were so busy using this opportunity to clean up the machines, mend the headset units, tune in the TVs properly, repair the lockers, clean up the changing units and scrub the algae off the pool side. You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. Added 09:30 They're waiting for the structural engineers to come and look at the roof, some of the glass panels going down the length of the gym came in so they need to check if anymore are damaged. They're in the hands of council workmen who are looking at it with the priority it deserves.

ahh, I see, so instead of clicking on 'Last Post' you click on the person's name which takes you to that person's profile rather than the last post. Why not train yourself to click on the last post link correctly? ;-) I know what you mean, I do it myself. What I may do it remove the link to their profile on that page, then there won't be an profile link to click on (option one). This may be best because a) I doubt if many people want to see profiles directly from that page and b) it's a heck lot easier for me to do. Option two would be, as you suggested, have a link to view the person's last post (or even their last x posts) on their profile but that would be trickier but a nice feature. I'll look into option two but I shall implement option one soon and let me know if you like it cheers Mark

As a first timer to a Hamlet's game I enjoyed it, there was some good football going on out there although as all_star says it was very stop/start with the physios and their magic sponges getting a good run around. It's surprisingly quiet in the stands but I guess as Chris Dickson* wasn't playing the crowd was a bit nervous. It's definitely kid friendly and as Jamma says above wrap up warm, but there is the option of watching from inside the bar area. Oh yeah, who are the group of guys who hang out behind the opposition's goal, are they the Hamlet's Firm? The next home game is Saturday 10th February against Hastings United, I'll be there again and I'm going to try and round up a few more troops. Mark *http://farm1.static.flickr.com/137/360734235_bb1211a1af_t.jpg

To save anyone else from psyching themselves for the gym and going there today (Sunday) don't bother because it's closed. On Thursday it suffered roof damage in the storm, tomorrow someone's coming out to look at it so they can't say how long it's closed for until after it's been looked at. There is Harris Academy gym over the on the other side of the rye that Fusion members can use, details here You can call the Dulwich Fusion on 020 8693 1833 to find out the latest, go for option 5 to speak to reception but be prepared to be told numerous times by the automated answer phone system that "your correspondent is unavailable"

the East Dulwich side of the rugby posts, on this map to the right of The Gardens

for those of you following this thread, there's a post here about a kick around on the Rye tomorrow

There's a few of us having a kick around on Peckham Rye tomorrow morning (Saturday) at aboout 10:30 (as long as it doesn't get washed out. If anyone fancies joining us please do, it's a friendly kick about so if you want to shake off some cobwebs and want some outdoor excercise come along. We'll be the one's huffing and puffing near the rugby posts. Then meet up agin later to go watch Dulwich Hamlet play (see this post) Mark

I've managed to persuade my neighbour, a Baggies man, to come along too. I feel it's going to be a good afternoon.

This is an elementary site my dear Huguenot. There's always the temptation of adding widgets to forums; avatars, users rankings, scoring people, number of posts etc. but I currently want to avoid these. I believe those options scare off people who don't use forums frequently or who aren't web savvy and I just want to keep it simple and quick and accessible for all. It's nice to know how many people are registered or who's online at that moment but add those to users' photos, their scores etc. they do make unnecessary database calls which slow a forum down. I do like SE5's simplicity too however, in fact I almost set this site up using the software they use (SMF) but it wasn't possible to turn many of its features off, I prefer Phorum which is 'simplistically raw' and I can add features onto it. And I think it's working. Yesterday was the busiest day ever with 400 visits which ain't bad considering I was originally expecting about 100 users a week. I would like to start advertising on the site (which will of course be subtle) so if you know any local companies who would benefit from a presence on this site please let me know. cheers Mark

As mentioned above, its a consideration that we looked into and having researched this for a previous job I know that the majority of people are used to reading down a page and expect replies to a message below that message. Having said that some do like to read the last/latest message first so I've put on the list of topics page e.g. here, under the heading Last Post it will typically say something like: Today, 03:06PM Last Post by mockney piers Last post is actually a link to the last post, I hope you find this a worthy compromise Mark

Nice one Kate. I like the fact Green & Blue doesn't smell of vomit like Threshers does

Thanks for clearing that up, I thought it may have been Chris Dickinson, Fifth-year graduate student in Psychology, Long Island University with an M.A. in Experimental Psychology also from Long Island Universityhttp://www.psychology.sunysb.edu/gzelinsky-/images/Chris_thumb.jpg. If you look at his picture and close your eyes an use some imagination there could be a similarity to the Chris Dickson http://farm1.static.flickr.com/137/360734235_bb1211a1af_t.jpgMaybe not.

I've never been to a Hamlet's game but wil be up for going this this Saturday for the first time. Could someone please give me, and any others who are reading this and want something worthwhile to do this saturday, an idiots guide... How much, place to meet before etc

Ah, the BNP leader's favourite journalist and writer for my most hated publication, The Mail *spits on floor in disgust*. No I am not him and don't like to be thought of him. I don't wish to offend and I hope I haven't, I was just slightly annoyed that I couldn't have a swim one night. I'm off my soap box now. Anyway, I have a new idea for East Dulwich in 2007. Flatten Dog Kennel estate and let's have... East Dulwich International Airport, imagine the convenience for getting to ones Alpine chalet in winter and meditteranean properties in summer.

The problem with the women only sessions is that there's one at prime-time on a Thursday evening. It's not an issue that it's women only, it could be leprechaun only or people who like to dress up as Jan Leeming only, the problem is that it's excluding me from swimming between 6.30pm and 9.30pm on Thursday because I'm not one of the "6.30pm to 9.30pm on a Thursday" gang. Why not make it 6.30pm to 8pm? Anyway, I was just making a point, it's just something that I would like to see, I may be a minority but at least I've made my point known. Anyway I'm not really bothered now as I'm going to start playing squash on Thursdays at Dulwich Hamlets squash courts, where I believe anyone can use their courts no matter what their sex or sexual orientaion.