Fancy working for this landmark Clapham building? Well, you can if you can volunteer two days a week to be an administrator for Clapham Library as it transforms into a community arts centre and moves to the new building on Clapham High Street. Read on for the full job description.

The Old Clapham Library Trust needs a volunteer to help them develop an exciting project, transforming Clapham Library on Clapham Common Northside into an active new arts and culture venue for all of Lambeth to enjoy once the new library opens on Clapham High Street in 2011. You would be joining the group at a good time as they are starting to develop serious plans and preparing to consult with local residents. The trust team is a small, dedicated and lively group who get things done but also have fun along the way. They would greatly value having voluntary administrative support to help make their vision a reality.

Clapham Library Volunteer Administrator – PDF

Position: Administrator.
Terms: Voluntary
Responsible to: Chair of Old Clapham Library Trust.
Location: Work from home, with meetings at other locations.
Times/Hours: 2 days – flexible hours.
Interviews: Mid-September

Vote for your favourite bar, pub, restaurant, shop, events and people in the Clapham Awards 2009! Over the last month you’ve been nominating in your hundreds and one thing’s pretty obvious: with 19 pubs and bars nominated, Clappers like to drink! Vote now to decide who will win the coveted “Best of…” in each category and will receive a Love Clapham certificate to prove it. Read on to complete the form. Voting closes on 1st September 2009.

Fantastic news in Love Clapham’s opinion, Lambeth Council is proposing the permanent closure of Windmill Drive on Clapham Common to traffic (the road that cuts across the common next to the Windmill Pub). We’ve nearly been mown down numerous times crossing this road and, highlighted by the above picture of the childrens playground, this is hardly ideal for a park that attracts thousands of families with children. Keep reading and tell us what you think.

According to the South London Press “The council has sent 4,000 questionaires to residents in the area asking for their views as part of a public consultation, which ends on August 10.” If you have a view, even a positive one, you are encouraged to email gbull@lambeth.gov.uk to ask for an opinion questionnaire.

You can view the full proposal, with good artistic drawings, by viewing the full plans (PDF) by the Council on their website. The plans specify that the main purpose of this proposal is to:

1. Stop ‘rat running’ traffic, its environmental impact and risks to park users.
2. Reconnect existing footways and cycle paths currently severed by the road.
3. Extend and rejoin the two areas of parkland while improving aesthetics.

However, the Friends of Clapham Common, a committee that helps safeguard the public interests of Clapham Common, seem to have some reservations. Specifically, Peter Burke-Murphy, the chairman of the group says:

A section of the road alongside the storage/recycling dump will be dug up and returned to the Common leaving a path for cyclists and pedestrians only. Approximately half of Windmill Drive lies in the Borough of Wandsworth and this part will not be affected, apparently because there has been no consultation between the boroughs!

Paved turning areas will need to be formed at both ends of this closure encroaching into the Common thus minimizing any gain of green space and 12 parking spaces will be lost close to the children’s playground. Your Committee is waiting for further details before making a recommendation but at the present time I have strong reservations.

In my opinion it is a half hearted measure which does not link the adjacent sections of the Common as envisaged by the Master Plan and does nothing to tidy up the dump which is an eyesore or address the problems created around Tom’s Cafe. When we last took a poll of members’ views there was no clear majority for or against so if you have a strong view you can respond to the public consultation details of which will be on our website.

What is the correct answer here? Closing the road sounds great to us, but do the plans not fully meet the needs as stated by the Friends of Clapham Common? Please share your views or help enlighten us with more information in the comments below.

Windmill Drive location

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Address: Aquum, 68-70 Clapham High street, London, SW4 7UL
Phone: 02076272726
Opening times: Mon – Thurs 11am – 2am, Fri – Sun 11am – 4am

About Aquum

Catering for up to 340 guests this luxurious venue really does offer something for everyone, be it strutting your stuff in the large main bar, getting down to the beat on the basement floor, getting close and personal in the VIP mezzanine or simply watching the world go by on the sun drenched terrace (heaters and covers on standby!)

Designed with flexibility in mind (you can eat, drink, dance on every level) Aquum can also accommodate private and corporate groups looking for something more intimate by arranging whisky tastings, cocktail classes, spirit mixing and food and wine sampling to name a few.

Top brand spirits, fine wines and imported beers are also catered for, ensuring your favourite tipple is always on hand. And thanks to drinknowledgable bar managers and mixologists, Aquum by far offers the best cocktail selection this side of the river, with house specials such as the Fool’s Gold (created to a secret recipe), Classic Martini and Whisky Sour proving a hit with almost everyone who walks in.

May 2009 saw the arrival of a new chef who has worked wonders with the kitchen, and is fast helping to secure Aquum’s place on the map as a culinary delight by offering tasty treats including succulent Dim Sum, tender Thai Squid and a superb weekend brunch menu including a ‘cooked to perfection’ Sunday roast beef. What’s more, this Summer Aquum opened its doors to lucky midweek clients in the area, offering an outstanding £5.00 express menu, perfect for time-poor diners looking for high quality food in minimum time.

Bits n’ bobs of Clapham News fluttered into Love Clapham’s inbox today, so here’s a quick round-up. The Ben & Jerry’s Sundae on the Common festival marked the half-way point for Clapham’s 2009 festivals and reports called it “one of the best value for money festivals in the country” and an “extravaganza“, while some felt the rain dampened Sunday a little.

In less happy news, a 65 year old Clapham GP has been violently mugged for the sake of a watch – we hope he is ok now. Wandsworth Police have carried out what they have called a successful drugs raid in areas across the borough, including parts of Clapham. The raid sounds like a particularly clever and good operation to us, using inside knowledge from the community to identify people across the area.

The Sun is reporting on a shooting in Clapham that we assume is the same incident that we reported last week (we could be wrong, The Sun in its usual poor reporting style doesn’t give much detail). Finally, we can report that we’re not sorry about the irrelevant donkey picture above from the Clapham Fayre a few weeks ago, we’ve been wanting to use it for ages!

Address: Big Squid, UNIT 2F Clapham North Arts Centre, 26-32 Voltaire Road, Clapham SW4 6DH
Phone: 020 7627 0700
Mobile: 07950 252 548
Email: info@bigsquid.co.uk

Big Squid organises dive travel throughout the UK and abroad and has an active dive club that meets at the Bread and Roses pub on Clapham Manor street on the first Tuesday of the month ( free to join ). They have regular Sunday evening pool nights at Clapham Leisure Centre on Sunday evenings at 19.30-21.30.

Favourite new Clapham shop alert! MilkInIt is a cute little frozen yoghurt shop that’s just opened opposite Clapham Common tube on the Starbucks / Iceland side. Not only are the ladies that run the place incredibly friendly, the yoghurt is amazing too. Which is a good thing given that’s their primary product. Toppings of fresh fruit through to cake and chocolate make these healthy treats incredibly delicious.

What’s your idea of heaven? Part of LoveClapham’s idea of heaven includes endless supplies of ice cream. Thanks to Ben & Jerry’s Sundae on the Common festival this Saturday and Sunday, we’re going to have heaven on earth… on Clapham Common to be specific. Not only are the Human League (the blinkin’ Human League!!) and the Super Furry Animals performing at the festival, there will be non-stop supplies of ice cream too. But that’s not all that’s going on in Clapham this weekend, keep reading for your chance to win a £500 bar tab for The Loft. Enter quickly ‘cos LoveClapham’s got our eye on THAT prize!

Not only are those fiesty people at The Loft offering 50% off meals during the week, 2-4-1 on selected cocktails, now they’re throwing £500 at you. Literally throwing wads of cash in your FACE! Well… maybe not. But they are offering The Loft customers the chance to get their sexy paws on that £500 bar tab we mentioned. Visit The Loft’s website for all the details to help you on your way to an amazing night out in Clapham.

On Sunday, don’t forget to get jiggy at Gigalum for their 3rd birthday. With an amazingly successful three years under their belts, they have reason to offer free food and drinks to anyone that turns up at 3pm on Sunday to celebrate.

I’m all for local press (obviously!) and for using it to hold local organisations to account when necessary, but I’ve always seen local newspapers posted through your door as nuisance junk mail rather than a helpful resource. Nevertheless, today I picked the one stuck in my letter box out and read the first page. The lead story opened with the words “Tight fisted Wandsworth Council…” and later went on to use one resident’s quote that included a blanked out swear word.

The point of the article may have been valid, but the way it was written was bizarre. It wasn’t even a comedy article, although I did read halfway through hoping for the punchline. It was all too reminiscent of the Daily Mail or The Sun shock tactics. With The Guardian already foreseeing the end of the local newspaper, what are your thoughts on them? Do you read them? How can they improve to secure their future?

In this frank interview, Steve Reed the Leader of Lambeth Council, talks about new community developments, solving local youth crime, charity bike rides, where our money is spent and helps us to understand local politics. Did you know there’s been a 2 year Council Tax freeze? If you didn’t, you do now. It is essential reading for anyone that lives in Clapham or the wider Lambeth borough.

LoveClapham is becoming a frequent visitor of Lambeth Council HQ in Brixton Townhall. We last visited to interview the current Mayor of Lambeth and this time, waiting in reception, not only did we notice the same carpet our parents used to have, we also noticed the building was abuzz with activity as people were getting help with housing and other issues.

We may have been hours away from seeing Lady Gaga at Brixton Academy, but actually our interview with Steve Reed was all the more interesting because the topics directly touch our lives every day. For instance, after the below interview, Steve told us about plans for a highly likely third extension to the Northern Line from Kennington to Battersea. He then explained that extending the Victoria line beyond Brixton was physically possible, but totally impractical because the line is overcrowded in Central London.

Who knew?! We certainly didn’t and that’s why LoveClapham is becoming marginally obsessed with talking to our local Council. All the answers to questions we’ve had for years were given to us in less than 30 minutes. Kudos to Steve and his team for their openness. It’s certainly making us appreciate Lambeth Council’s efforts that little bit more than we did already.

Steve, first things first, you recently cycled from London to Brighton for charity – was it painful?!

Steve Reed

It was a lot better than I thought it would be. I was slightly set-up to do this by Christopher [the current Mayor of Lambeth] who got me after I’d had a few drinks, asked if I wanted to do it and I said “yes”. The next day he’d press released it! So I had very little option.

I did it for the British Heart Foundation and I was a bit worried that I’d need their services because I haven’t cycled for that long for many years, although I used to cycle a lot when I was younger. It was actually fantastic.

I bought a pair of padded shorts to stop the chaffing but I didn’t get any side effects the next day, I just thought the whole thing was fantastically enjoyable. There were stops along the way, there were some country lanes en route with little villages and then there were places for coffee and cakes to wait for other people to catch-up. I’d definitely do it again.

Secondly, and some would say more importantly, what do you do as Leader of Lambeth Council?

[laughs] That’s such a hard question because it’s so varied, not one day feels like another. The Council runs over 600 different services, it has a budget of around £1.3 billion and 8,000 employees. We do have a Chief Executive who runs it and manages it. I suppose the key to my job as Leader of the Council, is to work with my Council colleagues to set the priorities and strategies that we want the Council to achieve and then make sure it delivers them. We get the priorities and strategies from the public, the residents who vote in elections.

Big job! Can you give some examples of things you’ve done?

Labour was elected in 2006, taking over from a Tory / Lib Dem coalition and on the manifesto that had a number of priorities in it. Among them was tackling crime, improving life chances for young people and then tackling poverty to make the borough fairer – they were three of the priorities. We pursued those and put resources into tackling them, but things change.

The manifesto was written in 2005, the election was 2006 and now we’re in 2009. Apart from anything else, there’s been the biggest global recession in a century, so there are other things we have to tackle now. Such as big increases in demand for public services because people can’t afford to go private or they’ve lost their jobs, people who need help with their incomes – jobs in particular, keeping jobs, getting back into work, it’s much more important.

What’s being done about youth crime in the area?

When we were elected we already knew things had to be done to improve youth services and tackle youth crime, but straight away we had a spate of homicides and killings with teenagers being shot, and Lambeth was in the middle of the problem. So we had to take action.

The options were to point to the Government and police and say “it’s your problem”, or work with our community to find a solution. The tougher thing would be to work with the community, but we did it. Working for a year to understand what had caused the problem, we came up with the country’s first comprehensive local strategy, how to deliver the strategy and how to tackle the problem.

It was very wide ranging, fully involving the Council’s partners and the community. It was actually the country’s first comprehensive local programme for tackling violent youth crime, cutting the number of homicides by 50% in one year and giving us a 13% reduction in youth crime over the last 12 months. It’s made quite a big impact. Knowing the issues that residents care about is key, making sure the council is prioritising them and then pushing resources and talent in the right direction to make that change happen.

Steve has worked with the community to make positive, long-term changes to protecting the community

What else did you have to change?

Like any organisation, getting the money right is key and when we were elected we had millions of pounds of overspend with nothing in the bank. For an organisation with the budget we have, it was catastrophic. We have managed to deliver £35 million in efficiency savings in the last three years and took the reserves to the level that our financial auditor advised so that we have a financial safety net.

This has allowed us to do things like the two year Council Tax freeze to help people through the recession without cutting any frontline services – many other Councils have frozen tax but cut services – but we’ve not only protected services, we were able to have the freeze and invest in new services at the same time. We’ve got a lot of money going into new services, such as lunch clubs for pensioners to tackle isolation, one of the great fears older people have, as well as spending more on youth services and improving roads and pavements.

Speaking of Council Tax, each month we pay it, and you’ve explained where some of it goes, but what does the rest go toward?

People often think that Council Tax pays for everything the Council does, and it doesn’t. It’s about a fifth of our total revenue, the other four fifths come from other places and the vast majority of that comes from the Government as a direct grant to the Council. Usually, it’s ring fenced for specific things such as schools.

The single biggest element is education with 92 schools in Lambeth, which adds up to an awful lot of kids that need to be educated and an awful lot of teachers whose pay needs to be in their bank account every month. The rest of it goes to different services like housing, keeping the streets clean, collecting waste, running the parks and libraries, and community safety where council services back up the police.

Housing is  a very big area for Lambeth. We spend just short of £2 million a week improving Council housing because one third of people in the borough live in council-owned homes. The quality of where they live in some cases is dire. 10,000 of our homes had no heating, aren’t weather proof, have rotting windows and we have to put a lot of money into improving that.

We want to make sure everyone lives in a decent, well kept area. For instance in the last two years all of the lampposts have been replaced with new ones that are brighter, keeping the streets better lit at night helps people feel safer.

We’ve doubled the amount of money that goes into fixing roads and pavements, so people may have noticed that many road surfaces are better than they were – although I know there’s still a lot more to do. There’s a safety element to that too, we don’t want people to get hurt after falling over thanks to uneven pavements. A lot of council money also goes on pensions because we have a lot of former staff who are entitled to their pensions.

As a result of all of these initiatives you’ve become the fastest improving Council in the country…

Well, when you’re at the bottom the only way is up! Nevertheless the administration has helped make the improvements which is gratifying and shows that we must be doing something right.

It’s very easy when you talk about how fast the council’s improving to come across as complacent, but we’re not. I’m a resident of Lambeth and so is every Councillor. We know the things that are wrong and there are big areas that need to be improved further. However, the fact we’ve got so much of it going in the right direction has given the whole organisation confidence that it can be a high performing Council and that’s what we want Lambeth to be.

Before this interview you mentioned that your background is in publishing, how did you end up working for Lambeth Council?

I’ve always been interested in politics, I just wasn’t very active. I’ve been working for the Labour party since the Tories were still in Government and originally when I moved to Lambeth I was living in Clapham. I moved to Brixton, because I couldn’t afford Clapham, to buy a flat up on Brixton Hill.

I got involved in the General Election in 1997 when Tony Blair was first elected and I was asked to be the election organiser for the area. That went very well and after winning the election, some people said there were vacancies on the Council and asked if I was interested in standing. I’d always thought the Council was rubbish, which it was, and my only experience of it had been pretty negative on the whole. It sounded like an interesting thing to do, I didn’t fully understand what it involved but I liked the idea of representing people and campaigning to make life better. I stood for the Labour Party in Brixton Hill, got elected, and it all went from there.

Like most Councillors, when I was first elected I had a fulltime job, so I had to fit my council duties in the weekend and evenings. Labour lost the election in 2002 having won it in 1998, and I was elected leader of the opposition. That meant putting a strategy together to hold the Tory – Lib Dem administration to account and getting people to understand what had gone wrong. I wanted my party to engage with the community anymore, we’d become too disengaged, so we wanted to get people to reconnect , get some new blood in there, some new people with strong community backgrounds.

In my view, the Tory-Lib Dem council went wrong by putting Council Tax up by nearly 40%, there was a £3 million fraud scandal that was the single biggest housing fraud scandal in British history. There were a lot of things for us to hold them to account for!  We won the election again in 2006 and as the Labour leader, I became leader of this Council. Once that happened it was clear I couldn’t keep my other job going at the same time.  Getting to run your local council is not an opportunity that comes along often in your life. So, I gave up publishing to focus on this and, although there are still big challenges, it’s gone pretty well… but we’ll see next year in the elections whether people agree with me or not!

Ok, handing over to LoveClapham readers. Lots of people want to know what’s happening with the leisure centre on Clapham High Street…

That’s a really interesting one because one of the things we did when we came in was to change the plans that the Council had. They wanted to knock down the existing leisure centre and build a new one on Clapham High Street but they weren’t guaranteeing a pool. In fact, they were going to sell off certain assets like the leisure centre and the library in Clapham to recycle the money into other parts of the borough.

Whereas our proposition was to rebuild the leisure centre with a pool and then ring fence all of Clapham’s assets so that anything that is sold off the money would stay in Clapham. This allowed us to keep the library which will be used as a community art centre. We’re rebuilding the leisure centre on Clapham Manor Street rather than on Clapham High Street and the old Mary Seacole House – the old ugly office block – is going to become a library amongst other things. It will also have a health centre and a public performance space with the possibility to have theatre in Clapham for the first time in decades.

The funky designs for the new Clapham One library

After we put all of those plans together, we identified a partner developer called Cathedral, and then the recession hit! A lot of  the planned  development was funded by Council money but also we were going to build some flats on Clapham High Street and above the leisure centre. Those were going to be sold, with the money being used to help pay for the new public facilities. With the credit crunch and the housing market freeze, suddenly no one’s buying homes because no one can get a mortgage and that’s a big problem because it’s cut the money we need to pay for the new developments.

There’s a new Government body called the Homes and Community Agency. I’m on the board of it in London and it has several billion to spend, it’s there to rescue schemes like this one in Clapham.  The Agency has now agreed a grant that will buy the homes that were meant to be sold. They will be rented out at a level slightly below the market rent, but higher than Council rents would be, until the market recovers. Then, as people move out, we’ll sell them on the open market and we can pay back the money.  The good thing is it means the Future Clapham proposals will go ahead.

I’m really pleased that people in Clapham can look forward to a new community leisure centre with a new pool, a community art centre and that fantastic new library that looks a bit like the Guggenheim in New York! It’s good news for Clapham.

Agreed. It will be fantastic…

What I’d like to do is knock down that hideous tower block as soon as possible so people can see that something’s going to happen! I can imagine many people saying we’ve been talking about it for ages, but people want to see it happen.

Do you publish your expenses?

[laughs] Yes! They’re online. Mine get published in the local paper every year and in the last ten years I’ve claimed one train journey to Manchester for a conference. Councillor expenses aren’t like MP expenses. I haven’t claimed any duck houses or anything like that.  We’re completely open and always have been.

OK, you’re in the clear! In terms of how different Councils operate, such as for cross border territories, how does it work?

Lambeth is like a long, thin slice of London and actually the borders cut through some natural communities. Clapham gets it a bit, because the border goes through Clapham Common, but it’s actually more pronounced in areas like Herne Hill and Camberwell where it goes through the middle of town centres.

We work with Councils on the other side and the residents of affected areas to try and address the needs of people on both sides of the border. It’s important because for education, we don’t educate everyone’s children in Lambeth. For people near the edge who have a school over the border they like, that’s where they want their child to go.

There are ways to cooperate, for instance if people in Wandsworth want to come and use Clapham’s leisure facilities, there’s nothing to stop them doing that. We have a reciprocal deal with Clapham Common and Tooting Common which are both divided by the border. We manage the whole of Clapham Common including the Wandsworth bit, and Wandsworth manage Tooting Common including the Lambeth bit, so it works both ways.

Clapham Manor Primary School was reported to be over budget, are you able to comment on that?

I don’t know the details, but I know that ever since I was first elected Clapham Manor has wanted to extend into the car park next door. There was a local campaign for all of that time, fighting for the Council to buy that land for the school. It’s a wonderful school, loads of people want to send their kids there but it was getting cramped. The seller had the power in the negotiations, so we paid quite a lot of money for it, but I think it was worth it to allow the school to expand.

Clapham Manor Primary School's new wing

Christopher Wellbelove asks…

He sent one in?! [laughs]

Yep! He asks if he can be Mayor of Lambeth forever and wonders how you feel that his office is better than yours?

[laughs] I’ve told him that before he can ask that, he has to win his seat on the Council again next year! And as to him having a better office than mine, I think the right answer is that it’s about what comes out of the office, not what it looks like!

Huge thanks to Steve Reed for his time and for such a frank and informative interview. It’s great to hear from the Council directly about all of these topics and even better to find that everyone is so approachable. There are certainly exciting things for Clapham residents to look forward to in the near future.

Find out more about Lambeth Council on their website and be sure to check out Steve’s own website.

This Sunday is Gigalum’s 3rd birthday and to celebrate they’ll be holding a party from 3pm with the after party at Inigo taking you all the way through to 2am. DJ’s playing include Lee Ford, Scott Lummes, Andy P and Steve Butcher. With free drinks and food at 3pm and ‘Gigalum punch’ only £3, we’d advise you now to book Monday morning off! Gigalum’s had enormous success since it first opened and is always rammed, fully living up to its own statement of “busiest bar in Clapham”. Cheers to Gigalum for making that Clapham South corner so amazing!

The London Paper is reporting that two men were shot on Wandsworth Road in Clapham. The website says a 25 year old man “was treated for his injuries at a nearby hospital. Some time later, another man arrived at a south London hospital with gunshot wounds. Both men are in a stable condition and their injuries are not thought to be life threatening.” If you have any info, call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111. UPDATE: @ursulafuchs corrected us to say the shooting happened on Monday night.

There was I, perusing my @loveclapham Twitter account when ding-dong in comes this doozy of a link detailing the winners and losers of the Vegetable Figure competition at the Lambeth Country Show 2009. It’s always a brilliant event (the overall show too…) with hilarious consequences. LoveClapham’s personal favourite is the above Cauli-Sheep. It’s got such a nice smile. Check out the other entries including a King Edward Potato of Pop, Michael Jackson carving by the West End Whingers. The Mayor and Mayoress of Lambeth are fast becoming the area’s most amazing personalities. If you don’t believe me, check out the Mayor of Lambeth’s photo and video report from the show. If you’ve ever seen a Mayor that can rival the ‘on miniature train shot’, we dare you to get in touch.

LoveClapham’s July Spotify Playlist is available now ; probably the only playlist that starts with Michael Jackson and ends with Marilyn Manson, but don’t let that put you off. 20 songs that include the hottest new tracks from the hottest artists right now like La Roux, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Cascada and Florence + The Machine. This is the sound of Clapham* and it’s all for free! If you didn’t catch it, you can still listen to Love Clapham’s June Spotify Playlist too. (* Yes, that is Battersea in the picture… )

Newsflash people!! This Saturday and Sunday cows, chickens and sheep will trotting and clucking their way to Brockwell Park for the annual Lambeth Country Show. It’s an amazing event for all the family and essential for anyone with children brought up in the city – show them where their food comes from! With music, fluffy animals, owl displays, eagle displays, sheep displays and much much more, you’d be a City Fox of a fool to miss it. Visit the Lambeth Country Show website for all of the information, timings and attractions.

There I was the other day, waiting for the bus to Stockwell at Clapham North when something caught my eye. Bounding toward me through the grass of St Bede’s Centre for deaf people, like a two inch high antelope, was a rat. Yes. A rat. It took my quite by surprise. Looking about me, no one else waiting seemed to notice this rat, but sure enough, it was still there and heading my way.

My initial reaction was one of horror closely followed by terror and then fascination. The rat wasn’t prepping to attack me, it was shooting toward a piece of orange peel. It proceeded to grab this large chunk of orange peel – the size of its own body (it was a small rat) – in its mouth and it then began to drag it backwards across the pathway.

As I looked on, the rat backed across the pathway toward a hole in the wall. It climbed into the hole, dragged the massive bit of peel with it and then disappeared. I looked up in amazement to see that no one else at all had witnessed this amazing feat.

Later when I got to work, my friend Amy told me that orange peels actually kill rats. I felt sad for the little blighter, even if he was a mangy, flea infested, disease spreading rat. Strangely, during the following week I happened across two dead mice on pavements around the Clapham North area. I don’t say this to imply Clapham has a vermin infestation (although we probably do) but because I can’t help but think there is a connection.

Has anyone else waiting at the Clapham North bus stop seen the rat I like to call Citrus? If you have seen Citrus, let me know. To this day – admittedly it’s only been a short number of days since – I think of him. In his hole, nibbling that death laced snack and sharing it with his little furry friends.

On the 1st August Russian Standard Vodka will be paying a special trip to Revolution Bar on Clapham High Street with a group of Cossack dancers, “beautiful models” and all with a modern twist! If you attend, you’ll also get the chance to enter a competition to win a trip to Russia. The Russian Standard Vodka gang will be paying a trip to various bars in Clapham area in the near future. Also, DV8 is hosting it’s launch party at Revolution tomorrow evening (Thur 15th). There will be free drinks galore, so head on down there if you’re in the area.

Never have so few words been so spot on. DFS’ new London Underground advert at Clapham North.

Recession. What recession? A number of people have commented to Love Clapham on the rising prices of meals out across the Clapham area, with some restaurants almost doubling their prices since last year. We mentioned this on our Twitter account (@loveclapham) and had a couple of responses about discounts and offers. @g_rennie said, “not for lunch at Trinity!! An incredible bargain and exceptional food and service” while @loftclapham said “Not at the Loft. we are doing 50% off food everyday apart from Saturday.” Discounts are always fantastic, but what do you think about the increased cost of dining out around these parts?

Love Clapham HQ’s email has been abuzz with activity this week. HostelBookers, a company offering budget travel info and services has nabbed two tickets to the Get Loaded in the Park festival on Clapham Common, which they’re offering as a competition prize along with one night in a hostel for accommodation. Visit the HostelBookersBlog for all the info and to enter the competition. A speed dating event for graduates is taking place at the Alexandra Pub opposite Clapham Common tube tomorrow (Thur) night from 7pm, find out more and book on the Graduate Nation website.