Dracula’s Bermondsey link
Locals settling into BBC’s new adaptation of Dracula may not know that there is a Southwark link in Bram Stoker’s original source material.
In the book, the Count has six boxes of spooky Transvylanian earth deposited in Bermondsey. “There were … six which he deposited at Jamaica Lane, Bermondsey.
“The whole place was thick with dust. The floor was inches deep. The walls were heavy with dust,” the novel reads.
Jamaica Lane is intended to be Jamaica Road, the long road which stretches from close to the Shard to the Rotherhithe roundabout.
Bishop Nandos
Have you, like me, ever wondered how long it would take the Diocesan Bishops of the Church of England to walk from their cathedrals to a Nando's if they were peckish? Wonder no more. pic.twitter.com/Wtb6MIXaku
— Fergus Butler-Gallie (@_F_B_G_) January 6, 2020
A curate in the Church of England has come up with a novel way of making the Church more relevant to young people.
He has plotted how far away each bishop is from their nearest Nando’s.
For each of the Church’s Disosean Cathedrals, Fergus Butler-Gallie has charted how long it would take the area’s bishop to stroll to the nearest Nando chain.
(He explains: “It assumes a median episcopal walking speed, convocation dress only.”)
But we spy a flaw with the methodology. The graph has Southwark’s bishop taking a leisurely ten minutes to pick up a chicken order walking from Southwark Cathedral.
But it’s a five minute walk at most from Southwark Cathedral to the popular restaurant on nearby Clink Street.
If the Bishop happens to be heading that way, our order is a half chicken, extra hot.
AWS goes AWOL
Now that Southwark and Lambeth AM Florence Eshalomi has become an MP, Labour’s nominations for the vacancy are underway.
(The deadline was January 5, despite some correspondence inviting members to stand apparently being sent out after this.)
However, this time around there’s a difference. In 2016, the selection process was an all-woman shortlist (AWS).
Four years on, it’s open to men, too.
It’s a move that’s prompted head-scratching among Labour types, given the departing incumbent is a woman.
What the Dickens is a weekly off-beat column inside the Southwark News every Thursday. Send stories to editor@southwarknews.co.uk