onionbagblog

It’s strange when your different worlds collide. And so there I was on Sunday afternoon, chatting away with the lovely man from the Friends of Vauxhall Park at the annual SE11 Summer Fair, and it dawned on me that I was speaking with a lido early morning acquaintance. I didn’t recognise him with his clothes on.

This was the seventh Summer Fair to be staged at the delightful Vauxhall Park. It’s a small piece of land that is rightfully valued by the local community. The Friends group campaigns and celebrates the beauty of the park, raising both awareness and money on the summer solstice each year.

Elsewhere around Vauxhall Park and the bonkers brass band stole the show. A lustful rendition of Tainted Loved was given added value by the comedic dances of a well-known local character. Tired and emotional I think is the phrase I’m supposed to use.

The moving wheelie bin raised a smile, but then I’m used to wheelie bins on the move around these parts.

The Fair had political representation from my three local Councillors. The Oval ward is quite a rarity in Lambeth, returning three LibDems against the backdrop of a Labour run administration. I tried to keep my apolitical hat on, and the lovely LibDems very kindly agreed to a brief video catch up.

Off the record and they were just as engaging. We spoke all about… well, it was an off the record moment, and so I couldn’t possibly divulge. Winning Around Here, and out and about around here as well. Any politician who walks it like they talk it deserves some credit.

The park itself was blooming for the summer solstice. It really is quite a charming part of my little patch in South London. It can’t boast the natural beauty of Brockwell Park, but the upkeep of and dedication of the Friends’ group certainly makes up for this.

The Lavender Garden is the (part) inspiration behind my own contemporary urban courtyard, and the recent conversion of the junkie toilets to a quite thriving local cafe shows you just how far a lot of local love can go.

Many thanks to Ivan from the Friends’ of Vauxhall Park, and Councillor Andrew Sawden for agreeing to be filmed. I didn’t seek consent from the bonkers bloke dancing to the brass band version of Tainted Love, but he seemed happy enough anyway with my flip in his face.

Full flick set over here.

A chance encounter with a fellow rider at le velo this morning and I realised that I was rolling out in the company of cycling greatness. It doesn’t take world-record feats to accomplish such a description. Cycling is judged in relative terms, not absolute. Meeting personal goals makes for cycling greatness.

And so I was thrilled when my track companion, Paul, agreed to record a brief podcast detailing his own rise to cycling greatness over the past few weeks. Cycling from Land’s End to John O’Groats makes Paul something of a cycling God.

His achievement is all the more impressive when you learn that Paul’s le jog was undertaken on an unsupported ride. Planning was all carried out online, and the trip itself was simply a case of cycling, youth hostels and friendship - a very British sense of organisation for a very British ride.

The preparation seemed simpler than the actual ride. I’ve been wanting to undertake my own epic trip for sometime now, but the planning has always put me off. Maybe I have got my priorities the wrong way round?

Cycling greatness can be achieved. There’s a God within us all, waiting to be unleashed whilst sitting on a cycling seat. Sadly I didn’t find my personal act of greatness at le velo on Saturday, but I did find Paul.

Chapeau!

I’m failing to get excited about Bike Week. But then I’m not exactly the target audience. On a local level and Lambeth Cyclists seem to been spreading the two wheel word. The Brixton bicycling breakfasts have been a huge success, offering croissants and coffee to any passing bicyclist along the Brixton Road.

I felt a fraud stopping for the free morning brunch earlier in the week, talking about bikes and making the most of the continental start to my South London morning.

But thanks, anyway.

Nope, what really rattles my chain about Bike Week is the forced attempt to focus on bicycles for just one week of the year. What next once all the well-intentioned pedal posturing is over? Go back to being a Bus Stop Johnny?

You may as well organise a National Breathing, Living or Existential Existence Week - bicycling is what I do, nothing more, nothing less. I don’t need a national call to arms to encourage me to ‘celebrate’ a part of my life that is key to my own personal identity.

I much prefer the findings from The Bike Show’s No Bike Week experiment. Seasoned London cyclists lived a strict No Bike lifestyle for seven days, forcing them to consider how central a bicycle is to their everyday routine. I considered taking part, but then realised that London life really is all about the bike for me.

Bike Week comes under the organising banner of the Department for Transport. Maybe this is the root of my reservations. Bikes are not about the practicalities of getting from A-B. Bicycling is a pleasure first, a practicality second.

Once you reduce your bicycling efforts to a crude, logistical rat run, you become sucked into the commuter hell that leaves so many Londoners unhappy. Take a different turn at that nasty main junction, explore the local area and find a far more pleasant route off the main patch. This is when bicycling becomes a lifestyle, and not a campaign organised by a soulless government department.

Working with both local and national government can produce genuine benefits for bicyclists, but like the sex and the State mass debate, politicians at all levels are best kept away from meddling in the personal lives of the individual.

National Bike Week reminds me of the forced humour of Comic Relief. The more you are forced to focus your efforts, then that joke isn’t funny anymore.

It’s not all about the bike, but it’s about you and how you find pleasure in one of the purest inventions known to humanity.

Chapeau!

And so to launch the new onionbagblog, what finer way than for the first post to offer an exclusive interview with the first citizen of the Borough of Lambeth? Not the first in an Adam & Eve sense, but the first as in Lambeth’s meet ‘n greet (and ever smiling) Mr Mayor.

Councillor Wellbelove Mr Mayor is leading the way in online engagement with the electorate. He blogs, tweets, and after our five-minute session spent in Mr Mayor’s parlour, I doubt it will be too long before he starts podcasting as well.

Why does any of this matter? Communication is a two way process. It takes two to tango, something that Mr Mayor is all too aware of. He answers all tweets, and takes great pride in explaining his civic responsibilities through his blog.

My audioboo catch up with Mr Mayor was no great coup; I simply set him a tweet pitching for the podcast, and then within the hour, the meeting was confirmed. This is open, online democracy in action, right here in Lambeth.

The podcast itself is no audio masterpiece of BBC production values. It’s a snapshot for the moment, hopefully explaining to a wider online audience about the role of the Mayor within the Borough.

We overran slightly towards the end; having briefed Mr Mayor about the need for punchy, concise answers when recording with audioboo, I of course rambled on and on and on with my Q’s. That’s what an audioboo five minutes of fame sitting in the Mayor’s Parlour (ooh!) does to a man.

Civic responsibilities, electoral procedure, social media, lovely Lambeth and meeting the Queen - it’s a lot to cram into a five minute audioboo piece.

It was pleasing then to find Mr Mayor equally charming off the record, where we exchanged ideas about reporting the news agenda within the Borough and how BIG (or even small-ish) media just don’t get social media. Plus don’t forget that @mayoroflambeth is also being followed on Twitter by another elected local politician over in California.

I wish Mr Mayor the best of luck over the remainder of his year in office. I was unaware of the civic duty of a Mayor before our meeting. I was equally oblivious to the fact that Mr Mayor also holds down a day job and balances his endless meet ‘n greet work with his 9-5-holiday time.

It’s easy to kick politicians, and when they deserve it, I’m first in line. How refreshing then to meet an everyday guy who is passionate about Lambeth and not afraid to do the whole modern interweb thing to put his message across.

We’ve come a long way since the days of dear old Alf Roberts.

Here, here.

Plus: Mr Mayor’s blog, and loveclapham. Cheesy grins ahoy. Apparently jeans are just about acceptable in the Mayor’s parlour.

Welcome to obb v2.0 - knobber!

So yeah, I’ve migrated m’blog over to WordPress. About time too. I really couldn’t be bothered to import all the old Blogger posts over. They’re still out there, cluttering up the outer edges of the modern interweb. It’s probably the best place for them to remain.

It served a purpose, but I felt increasingly constrained by the lack of Blogger functionality. Plus I cringe whenever I read back some of the older posts. Time and t’modern interweb wait for no blogger.

I’ve not felt much blog love of late. I’ve been busy rolling out a couple of new school websites, meaning any spare time was best spent well away from the Mac. This explains my absence of any activity over there in recent weeks.

But now I’m back, with big plans and a minimalist WordPress theme that almost makes you crave for online colouring crayons. Everything is black and white in the obb world.

Onwards…