In Remembrance of Paul Spackman

I used to work with Paul at JPMorgan when I was a fresh faced graduate. He moved to New York a couple of years ago and we met for a few beers while I was recently working there.

Paul lived life to the full and would always have stories of scrapes that he got himself into that would have you roaring with laughter. My favourite two stories involve a wheel chair and a rat. The last time I saw Paul he had managed to leave the US without his visa and I had to bring it to the UK for him so that he could get home again.

Tragically Paul drowned in the Harriman Reservoir in Vermont three weeks ago. Last night a few of us got together at one of Paul's favourite old haunts, the Match Bar, to drink one of his favourites the Hong Kong Phooey. It was an evening full of memories, laughs and hangovers the next day.

A new bridge for London?

I was stopped on my way home from work today by a pleasant young lady from Sustrans who was telling my all about a new pedestrian / cycle bridge that they are hoping to build between Canary Wharf and Rotherhithe.

I think this will be excellent. There are lots of people who work in Canary Wharf and live in Canada Water. Even though it is a stones throw across the Thames they have no other option but to get the Jubilee line.

Most evenings I miss the lifts in the Greenwich foot tunnel and have to walk up and down the stairs. With the bridge I could cycle home avoiding the stairs or a detour via Tower Bridge.

Apparently it was supposed to be an Olympic legacy project completed by 2012, although the young lady from Sustrans told me that it probably won't be finished until 2013.

Restaurant Review: Kaya House

I was hoping to try the newly opened Siagon Blue on Tuesday night, however, unfortunately it was closed. Nearby Meze Mangal was full, so we headed down to Kaya House in Deptford.

A number of friends have recommended Kaya House as serving authentic Malaysian cuisine so I was keen to try it for myself. We were met by the cheerful Ambrose who brings a personal service and atmosphere to the small restaurant without being over powering.

The menu has an 6 different set menus (including two vegetarian), a number of Malaysian specialities as well as the more common dishes you expect to find in every Chinese restaurant. We opted to share one of the meat and vegetarian set menus. The ever friendly Ambrose told us that we could substitute in a dish from the a la carte menu if we wanted to add a favourite not featured on the set menu.

On reflection I'm not sure how Malaysian some of the dishes we had were! We had spring rolls, sesame prawn toast, peking duck, stir fried vegetable, sweet and sour chicken, stir fried prawns, fried aubergine and some asparagus. Quite a range of dishes I am sure you will agree! Throw in a couple beers for around £17.50 a head and I don't think you can argue with the value either.

First eBay puchase

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about my car troubles. Essentially someone drove into the back of my car while it was parked. I decided it wasn't economical to get the dents and scratches removed from the boot, but did want to get the light fixed.

I've been dithering about the best / most economical way of doing this. Over the weekend I decided to give eBay a go. I've always been a little bit sceptical about ebay. The first ever blog I read was this one, about a someone who sold a broken laptop on ebay for £375. A person my friend Blue Eyes was unlucky enough to have a brush with.

Thankfully everything worked smoothly. The replacement light arrived within two days and I have just fitted it. If I'm honest it was quite easy, but I still feel proud of my engineering prowess!

Birthday Celebrations Part II

Mum and dad's 60th birthday celebrations continued as Ruth and I decided to take them away for the weekend.

A few years ago we were into the habit of going to Le Petit Blanc in Oxford to celebrate birthdays. We were going to revive this tradition until we read a review of the Elephant in Pangbourne by Paddy Birt, in one of my favourite Saturday paper columns, Room Service.

Paddy Birt reviews the hotel far more eloquently than I can. But suffice to say I agree that the hotel has a stylish tea plantation feel. The food in the restaurant was good, classic food cooked well at sensible prices.



My starter was a ducks egg served with black pudding, crispy bacon and baby spinach. After dinner Ruth and I left mum and dad to stay the night.



Ruth and I came back on Sunday morning to pick mum and dad up. Before we headed home we went for a walk down by the Thames.

60th Birthday Party!

Back in August 1948 my mum and dad were born within 5 days of each other at opposite ends of the country. On Saturday they had a garden party with one of our neighbours who is also 60 this year. There were 90 friends and family enjoying the afternoon, and even a few light showers couldn't dampen the celebrations.

Mum is enjoying her retirement, but dad isn't embracing his bus pass with quite as much enthusiasm.

My aunt made mum and dad a beautiful birthday cake. The lillies are made of intricate icing.

Rainbow over Brockley

There was a beautiful rainbow on my way home from London Bridge this evening. It was most striking over Canary Wharf, but I wasn't able to take a photo in time from the train.

Bike Service @ Cycle Team

I've had my new bike for about a year now and tinkered with it myself a couple of times, but decided that it was time for a proper service. I've never been totally satisfied with the expensive Evans Cycles in Canary Wharf. After a tip off on Brockley Central I decided to try Cycle Team on the Brockley Business Park / mini industrial estate.

A small but friendly outfit. I'm no expert judge in these matters, but the bike seems to be running well since the service. They gave the drive train and the whole bike a good clean, the gears are a lot smoother and I even got some free toe straps! It cost exactly what they said it would and called to discuss the new parts they needed to put on the bike.

They don't accept cards and you have to pay either by cash or cheque. To be perfect they would have slightly longer opening hours, but apart from that I have no complaints.

I'm all ready to take on the London to Brighton cycle track.

Greenwich Wheel

My sister took me on the Greenwich Wheel last weekend. Unlike it's bigger sister along the Thames which moves imperceptibly slowly, they load you into a ski lift and whiz you round four times. (I think it is only supposed to be three, but we got a bonus loop.)



You are in the trees for half of the ride, but from the top you get good views of Canary Wharf, Greenwich Park, the Royal Naval College, central Greenwich and over to the city.



It's a great attraction for Greenwich and I would encourage people to enjoy a loop before it disappears in September. Lit up at night you get some good views of the wheel itself from the Poplar Rowing Club.

Masons Bar, Ladywell

My soon to be flatmates, Mike and Claire, came to visit this weekend. In anticipation of their move they have bought a book of 1,001 things to do in London. A little to my surprise the stone circle in Hilly Fields is in the book. Above is a picture of Mike and I in the circle. The large shadow casting stones are on the eastern side of the sculpture and I think it would be most impressive at sunrise.

After the stone circle we went for lunch at Mason Bar in Ladywell. It has always looked appealing from the outside and I have heard good reviews so jumped at the opportunity to visit. Their menu is kept simple with three starters and five main courses (beef, lamb, chicken and pork roasts plus a vegetarian option). I had the pork roast, which was moist and tender. Mike had the lamb and Claire the beef. We all enjoyed our lunches and were too stuffed for desert.

The bill was very reasonable (thanks Mike for paying!) and they have a good selection of German, Belgian and English beers to accompany the food. Definitely pleased to have paid Masons a visit.

Car Troubles

While in America I left my car with my parents for safe keeping. I brought it back to London a couple of weeks ago to find someone occupying the allocated parking space that comes with my flat. Deciding that two wrongs didn't make a right I didn't pinch anyone elses space and parked on the road.

A couple of days later when I got back from work I realised that someone had hit the back of my car. Breaking the light and putting a dent and scratch in the boot. The person who did the damage didn't leave their details. I suspect that it might have been a bin lorry as the dent was so high up on the car.

I have been left doubly frustrated. If my space wasn't occupied then my car wouldn't have been on the road and in harms way. I am also annoyed that the person who did the damage drove off and didn't leave their contact details, meaning that I will be out of pocket when it isn't even my fault!

Blue Eyes has made a few posts recently on people taking personal responsibility for their actions and how this can lead to a better functioning society. I wish someone would have shown a bit more consideration in this case!

Telephone Woes

The increasingly slow download speeds from Virgin Broadband finally prompted me to move to another provider. On recommendation from my friend Blue Eyes I decided to give Be Broadband a try.

Be try to be very slick and only dispatch your modem two days before you are due to be connected, which I am sure would work very well if I wasn't out. I had to arrange redelivery which meant that I couldn't connect for three days. I was left bereft without being able to access the blog for a weekend.

When I finally received the modem I couldn't connect to the internet. A little bit of investigation discovered that when they had installed my broadband at the exchange my line had somehow crossed with someone else and my number had changed.

I've spent a frustrating week speaking to the faultlessly polite staff at BT trying to get them to sort my line out. It has proved surprisingly difficult and my problem was closed twice without being fixed. Only this morning after an engineer spent two hours in my flat looking at the problem was I reconnected.

A bit early to tell, but Be so far seems to be quite good. I have been downloading from the iPlayer and a few other sites and achieving good speeds.