plimsoul

my job is freelance and in the arts so never had the cash for the childcare to cover full time work again but now that the kids are easier to deal with (read by that older, 3 and a half) i am lucky and my husband can make up the days that the child minder doesn't have them. i'm part time and i don't feel that outside quite fixed hours i would have the time to start a business or go back to work on the types of projects that demand working hours that go on into the evening. without financial help from my parents my salary wouldn't cover the childcare costs either. having just got a huge commission at the studio i shall probably be working 4 days a week which will be the most since the boys were born. so either you can consider me lucky as i have spent a lot of the early years with my children or you can consider me unlucky due to the nature of freelance careers not really working with being a mum.

my experience of an excellent london comp when i was a child was that the top sets passed 100% near enough and then the classes below didn't. they tended to achieve national standards. you cannot expect a school in inner london to achieve in the same way as a kent comp as the type of children attending will come from a less diverse economic/social background. essentially the principle as i have understood it all my life in london is that if your child is super, super, super bright then they will gain something from going to a private school. however, if your child is quite good, average good, all round achiever good but no nobel prize winner then they will achieve similar results whether attending a private school or comp with streaming. i am not about to run away from the area, i firmly believe in the state education system and hope to be sending my children to one of the many great state schools available in this area.

p.s. there is a video card problem that is listed on apple as one that they will fix for free as it has been accepted as a manufacturing problem with a whole batch of them. can't remember the exact dates but it covers the last few years. i know this is unrelated but incase anyone else was suffering from eratic problems that weren't making sense: it could be your video card collapsing. all this said, i still think apple make the nicest, best looking and user friendly computers in the world.

for anyone else suffering from such problems that didn't buy their product from john lewis you can actually claim that you are entitled to replacement goods. it is a little known fact that certain purchases such as computers washing machines etc... that cost a lot are considered above just having to work for one year. i found this out due to my brother in law experiencing massive problems with a lap top that was jut 13 months old. he got advice from the government agency that deals with consumer rights and he finally got his lap top replaced for free. essentially the consumer rights idea is that if you lay out that kind of cash the product should last a lot longer than just 12 months. as for rescuing material on a dead hard drive, sadly the silence of non replies explains it all. many moons ago i was an avid (editing kit) engineer and when a drive goes it goes. have you asked at micro anvika? what did the guy at the apple store tell you was the actual problem. i always thought that the icon with the '?' just meant it didn't know where the start up disc was, in the old days that was easy to fix...

goodness that's ridiculous, i'm always getting the chalk out in the summer with the kids as it cleans off. i think the saddest point is that it's great to hear that children are playing out on the street and instead of being encouraged they are told off for chalk pictures. i know that these guys do a great job and in general i like having them around so i'm not having a go at them just the on the spot decision that was taken-that is all.

si mangia at peckham rye end of forest hill and the new one on melbourne grove (see rave reviews) are the other 2. i think that they have missed the boat because just over a year ago it was a different story. sushi would be the direction to head in...

oh right, maybe my sleep doesn't serve me well. i could have sworn that since the snow thaw i noticed more trains before 7. one even rolling around in the middle of the night but that's depot bound!

there are some great stair cases in there, when you go from playground to playground (that's what you do with twins that want to climb everything) you come across some great architectural details that are lost. i was thinking that if they planted hedges along the fences it would soften the whole look of the blocks and look much greener. do the council have any funds for adding greenery to public spaces?

it's been going for ages, living by the train track i can tell you the first trains but then they blur into a rush hour mess! ouch, that was early, hope you were up for something fun...

boom boom, the sweet sound of summer ;) i was thinking a mini roundabout at bromar and ivanhoe intersection and another one by hoopers junction. then maybe make that little stretch of ivanhoe between the 2 one way and the same for the top road (name escapes me now) i do like all the work that they're doing on the estate, i have friends in there and the work done inside is good too.

hi neighbours! i thought that the derelict flats were owned by sainsburys and the council, part of the weird planning gain agreements when sainsburys moved in. my brother in law (who also lives on ivanhoe) said that he saw plans for the new block at the council and that they have been approved. i think the bombed out house was the one that is on the corner of the terrace and is now a 3 floor block on the end. my neighbours tell me that years ago they would go in and start fires in there for fun. when the council came by i just told them that the white boards surrounding the empty block were dangerous as drivers coming down bromar can't see what's coming. they listened and removed part of the white boards, but this didn't solve any of the problems. what does anybody think to the idea of some kind of traffic measures being put in to stop people bombing down the hill or through ivanhoe road? just a thought...

yawn

this is another excellent addition to this strip, it's all looking up between goose green and the train station. blackbird looks great in it's new location too.

lenk: great link. i am really into this with the guardian, it's reform all the way > http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/series/politics-and-reform

jimmy two times you hit the nail on the head there: where is this money coming from? which leads me to worry about the real concern: the fact that they could do really well at these european elections and getting support financially is just one sign that they're getting more and more people thinking that it's ok to support the BNP.

there are english asparagus today....

i'd be happy if they're as good as pizza express (i hope that this doesn't start some pizza express rant) as for me it's not about wood fired but just decent toppings, nice atmos but not OTT prices and a good pizza oven.

no but sounds interesting, i wonder if it will be a dial up one or decent sit down and eat place?

yes, i think that my sister lives in the old betting shop! i would love to hear more, but you can tell me in a p.m. if you'd rather

santerne that's great local anecdotes. a neighbour of mine (i live right next to the bromar road junction with ivnahoe) told me about the last house on the terrace of old shops on ivanhoe and how it was called 'fire' house for ages as the kids would go set fire to it when they were bored. it's now been replaced... all the bomb hits you describe tally perfectly with the new builds that scatter that stretch around and down from the estate. funnily enough all the victorian housing stock is surviving well but the post war blocks are suffering or part destroyed...

"Is this how cut throat we have become - using the kids as proxy weapons to cement our own aspirational ambitions and to shit on others ?" why don't you tell us instead of pretending to ask a question? you seem to know everything ... i have a great image of parents throwing their kids shit at others. this could be a new trend down LL on a saturday morning.

185, vauxhall, victoria line.

no apparently it's relocating to a few shop fronts down. or so i heard...

i'd love to catch a look, is there a regular flight to look out for? having lived under a flight path all my life this question is less stupid than it sounds. you used to be able to set your watch to concord...back in the days, whole playgrounds of kids shouting concord and pointing up to the sky.

did she buy anything that will be a screaming expenses headline in the daily mail ... a good family dvd maybe? a bottle of medicinal brandy?