Rosie111

In terms of...

If getting trains around you have to validate your tickets on the little orange machines on platforms. No one really tells you about it, and if you don't do it you get a 100 euro fine. And in the more rural places trains sometimes (in the week we were there it happened three times) don't turn up so try and travel early rather than later in the day if doing a long-ish journey in case you need a plan B. our holiday was actually quite horrible, we went for a friend's wedding and made a week of it. All other guests had a lovely time as they all hired cars and went wherever they wanted when they wanted to. We did it all by public transport so spent most of our time carrying our bags around, waiting for buses and trains then sitting on buses and trains. If doing it by public transport, don't try and do a new place each day as it's really stressful! Though the fact that it rained the whole time we were there probably doesn't help. Hope you have better luck and a lovely holiday!

'moving forward' and 'part of a wider conversation'. Eugh.

I'm also weight up the pros/cons of pre-planning advice (though not with Southwark). Is there really any point in pre-planning advice? Doesn't it just slow the process down and cost more?

"killed by Battersea Dog's home" isn't really fair. They would never chose to kill a dog if they didn't have to, they only exist so that they can help animals. It's unfortunate that there's such a high volume of people who get rid of pets with little regard, and ending up at Battersea, for however long a time, is usually more humane than staying out on the streets with no food or warmth. Battersea would probably keep them forever if they could, but that would mean not being able to take in new dogs as there wouldn't be room. The poor little puppy's state of affairs isn't Battersea's fault, and if she ends up being put down, that wouldn't be their fault either, rather the fault of the person who bred from its parents, and the people who didn't care enough to keep her or find her a loving home.

Healer, I absoultely agree. I've often seen pigeons with the hair around their legs, can't imagine it would ever come off. If the RSPCA do get back to you do let us know, it would be interesting to see if they're able to do something about it. The mess outside those shops is always quite horrific, and the tumbleweeds of hair aren't nice. Would be great if they were encouraged to clean up their shopfronts, it's not the nicest thing to be greeted by when you get off the train.

On two separate occassions of buying vegetables in the FH Co-op I've found maggots in them. An quite often when buying bags or punnets of fruit the ones hidden at the bottom are mouldy.

Thanks Tor, in that case I will leave stuff out. And if anyone knows there the carboot will be, please share x

Thanks Cate, I think I will do that. I only got suspicious because the note said Ginger Bread rather than "Gingerbread" which is such a small discrepancy but usually charities spell their own names correctly! And if they are having a carboot then I want to know where and when - love nothing better than a good carboot! x

A lady was knocking on doors this evening asking for donations of any old junk for a Ginger Bread car boot sale. Didn't think anything of it til she was asking what time I and my neighbours usually get home, so they know what time to come and collect stuff from us next week. Remembered recent thread on here about bogus charity collections so googled Ginger Bread and couldn't find anything (there's a charity called Gingerbread but can't see that this is the kind of thing they'd do to fundraise??). And the note she left with me and was posting through doors doesn't have logo/website/charity number on it. Any clues? This really could be genuinely nice people doing a nice thing - but slightly freaking out that I might have advertised when would be a good time to burgle my house.

^haha!

A sushi place and decent charity shops.