Scarlett O'Susi

Yes, I'm looking for a house to buy again. Let's not go into the whys and wherefores, ok?

Things you don't want to hear:

- "The vendor's in". Oh good. Music to my ears - I'd like nothing more than pretending to the owner I a) love their house and b) am seriously considering putting in an offer. I should be in line for an Academy Award for the soliloquy I put in on 'Reasons why lilac chipboard is the ideal decoration for a bedroom'.

Things you don't want to happen

- Walk into a kichen, vaguely think it looks similar to a previous property you saw, walk into the living room, realise you have seen it before, walk into the bedroom and be able to predict the lilac chipboard before you walk in.

- For *anyone* to see you get out of a Foxtons mini cooper.

Things you wish would happen

- A week of no travel, no weddings, no plans and no life, so you could just devote it to trawling internets, estate agents and muswell hill.

I've got Wednesday off to look at three more properties, and after that, I actually think I've seen everything currently on the market. Eek.

It's not really talking money if it's air miles, right? And budgets? It can't really be money if you've put it into an excel spreadsheet (man, I love me a good spreadsheet. And powerpoint. I <3 powerpoint).

Having had a minor breakdown a couple of days ago about the injustice of life, because, YES, the pinnacle of inhumanity is not letting me buy a house in Crouch End, FYI, it may have actually turned out to be  blessing. It made me consider what was important to me about moving out, and what I was willing to postpone. It turns out, as much as I'd like to own a house, the most important thing to me is having my own things around me (TV, Wii, bed, rammikins) and living by myself. And, because I'm a girl of the wimpy variety, I want to be somewhere central, that's pretty much on the night bus route. So, it makes sense for me to get all this and rent. Particularly when the alternative is buying a new build somewhere near the Scottish border and commuting.

Crouch end (if you're a fish)

This is all wonderful, and I can afford something pretty good on my budget. Obviously I'll save nothing (seriously zeronaddanotathing) but you can't spend it when you're dead, right? RIGHT? (Can you? Tell me now if you can. I don't want to be the only person with empty pockets in the graveyard. *Embarrassing*). AND. And I can spend the money I've saved on a 42-inch HD telly, a really comfy sofa bed, Habitat plates, champagne and martini glasses. When I live by myself I'll drink orange squash out of martini glasses. For real.

So, that's house stuff sorted.

Next up, holidays.

Thanks to some well placed press trips and my new discovery: Air Miles, I'm going to have a whole heap to spend, and 14 days of holiday to use up. I had a quick i.e. really really long, and involving calculators, look on the BA website, and they've given me this list:

Tirana   Algiers   Sofia   Varna   Larnaca   Paphos   Helsinki   Athens   Thessaloniki   Tel Aviv   Tripoli   Malta   Bucharest   Moscow   St Petersburg   Tunis   Antalya   Istanbul   Izmir Metropolitan   Kiev 

Now, I can admit here, where we'll all friends, that I only know where 12 of those are for definite, and three more I can guess. Five of them I'd have to throw a dart at a map. However, none of them look shit. In fact, they all look pretty wonderful.

Particularly the Russian ones.

I used to be obsessed with Russia, and read loads of books about the Revolution. Ideally, I'd like to get the Starlight Express (I was going to delete this, and then I thought it had better be preserved for posterity that my first point of reference for express trains was a musical based on roller skates) Orient Express from China to St Petersberg over the course of a few weeks. Or, should I grab my Air Miles with both hands and go and visit one city now? 

Actually, scratch that. A murder would suck.

Or, should I go somewhere gloriously hot and lie about on a towel? 

Or, should I save them up and use them to go somewhere after CES? I could go to back Montreal, I could back go to New York, I could visit family in Canada... North America would almost literally be my oyster. 

These are *so* more my kind of problems.

Oh, and also, there was one of Those Notes left on the living room table this morning. When I live by myself, I won't be leaving myself any of Those Notes.

So, I've finally achieved one of my life aims. Actually, it wasn't on The List, but it should have been. I've finally made it to Starbucks to work on my working from home day. So far, my thoughts go like this:

• If you call your child Anoushka, yes, she is going to run round screaming and insisting you watch her dance. This is not her fault.
• The WiFi here is priceeeeeey. How do people who are always working on their laptops from Starbucks finance this habit? Are they actually part-time baristas? 
• Actually, this is a remarkable antidote to any remaining broodiness from visiting Barnaby Boy Wonder. 
• Most overused phrase: "Dylan, NO".
• Making the help yourself counter at the front the same height as the average 2 year old is going to breed a generation of shoplifters by the looks of things.
• Just think, when I move to Crouch End I'll be able to pass judgement on other people's children every day!
• Someone just said 'spend a penny' and she was talking to another grown-up. I must introduce her to my godmother.
  
• There's a lot of pressure when you've only got one hour of internet time. Everything must count (except this. This obviously doesn't count... I so should not be spending my time doing this). 

I hate writing about things that I can't do, things that I've failed at or things that are impossible. In fact, I tend not to document these things at all, and if I do, it's normally from a 'yeah, so that happened, but now I'm totally ok and can laugh again' position.

I can't laugh about this yet.

There was much excitement this week when I was told I'd been approved for some complicated loan/mortgage thing for first time buyers. There were some caveats to this, such as the fact that it had to be a new development, but anyone who's walked round North London recently would be under the impression that there's plenty of them out there, so that shouldn't be a problem.

(At this point, I really wish Vox had a 'Read more' facility, since I have a feeling this is going to be a long ranty one).

In fact, it was fine, since in my preferred area (Muswell Hill - so many lovely restaurants, cafes and bus routes) there was a development going up. Now, it wasn't ideal - I'm really not keen on that minimilist shitty laminate flooring from IKEA look, but I'd already come up with a list of reasons it was actually a good thing.

I went to go and see it today. I won't be buying there.

In no particular order, it a) was a 20 minute walk from Muswell Hill, b) was down a dark private road I would never walk down at 3am after getting the night bus (which would drop me 20 minutes away), c) the sales lady was a bitch. No room for negtiation? Have you heard of the words 'credit crunch'? Do you think there's anyone else stupid enough to buy a house when property prices are plumetting? 'Zacly.

So, then I looked online, and it turns out, there are NO two bedroom places for my budget, unless I want to live in what will be the Olympic Village (at the moment, it's mudplanes, so no. I don't want to live there). There aren't even any one bedroom places.

If you'll allow me a 15 year old temper tantrum, it's not fair. And it sucks. And you're not my real mother anyway.

Seriously, to offer this financial aid which I actually have no way of taking advantage of is ridiculous. I haven't been born into a family where there's a house deposit sitting there waiting for me. None of my relatives are terribly forthcoming about lending me the money or dying (I joke, I joke. My grandmother is *constantly* talking about dying). I'm single, so I can't rely on a combined income, or someone else's dead relatives. None of this is my fault (except possibly the last one.

I'm desperate to move out. I just want to come in to my own space at night, safe in the knowledge if I'm in a bad mood I don't have to answer to 20 Questions Housemate, or be faced with a student-esque kitchen, when I left a 'If not clean, at least tidy' kitchen.

And I want to decorate. I want white walls in my bedroom with some big fancy Matthew Williamson wallpaper behind my bed. I want a dusky olive green living room where I can hang my gilt framed stag picture. I want loads of cushions on my sofa, and I want my sheepskin rug on the floor. I just want something that's mine, that I can live in for as long as I see fit, not as long as the landlord doesn't hike up the rent or decide to sell.

Stupid stupid London. Stupid stupid property prices. Stupid stupid not having the foresight to try to find men working in finance attractive.  

Yesterday, was a Very Good Day. After a couple of Really Bad Days, due to nothing more than complete mind-numbing boredom, overly warm weather and a stereotypical dose of hormones, yesterday was so good it
a) made me question whether there was some higher power who deigns the days Good or Bad on a whim
b) made me worry that something very awful would happen to balance it out.
Luckily, we're not living in Greek Mythology, so neither of these things transpired.

I was hesitant to write about them, because believe it or not, I was worried what people would think. Was it ok to be so happy? Was this going to look like I was showing off? What if I wrote three lines of how grateful I was to every one line of 'yay'.

Without going into specifics (this isn't that kind of blog) this is what the past few months have done to me, which really sucks. I'm pulling myself out, but it's really fucking hard.

So, onward, to why yesterday was so wonderful (before I forget and start hating the world because it's a bit humid).

• First up, I got loads of green eye shadow to try out, courtesy of KissAndMakeUp. It's the little things like this that make a day good.
• Oh, no, actually, first up I got to work early so went and got a coffee and sat in the sun at the British Museum. It was such a lovely temperature, such a lovely coffee and made me appreciate living in London. Also, it was fun to think of the tourist photos I'd be immortalised in as 'the girl sitting on the steps at the British Museum'.
  
• Then (I've only just begun) I got the enormous navy blue Egyptian cotton bath sheet I ordered from eBay. This baby is enormous, and I can't wait to have a shower and wrap myself in it. I *heart* big bath sheets.
• THEN (this is a good one) I got offered a press trip for two weeks time to China and Japan. There's lots of exciting bits, but my most exciting bits are the biz class BA flights (I'm a sucker for free wine and lots of films) and the chance to stay at the hotel from Lost in Translation.  OhmygodIstillcan'tbelieveI'mgoing.
• Did I mention I was offered a trip to Japan. Oh, yeah, sorry.
  
• And then, something else happened, which could mean I'm one step closer to buying a house. No more on that, because as unsupersititious as I am, I can't bear to risk jinxing that one. 
• Then then then, there were photos taken for ASOS magazine, there was wine and reminising in old haunts, there was the realisation that the world was not against me... All good stuff. 

Today? Well, today there was the comedown. But really? Life's not that bad. In fact sometimes? It's pretty fucking great.

La la la. I can't do any work because Moveable Type is down, and has been all day. La la fucking la.

God, this is so infuriating. I can practically feel the readers drip away, leaving us with a sub-icicle. At 10am, faced with the prospect of not being able to write anything, there was somewhat of a celebratory feeling. Now? Now I'm ready to kill someone. Today I've found Hello Kitty chopsticks, a beautiful MP3 player, a brand new sparkly search engine, and whilst these things mean nothing to other people, the prospect of having such Shiny Shiny gold and not actually being able to post it makes me want to cry. I'd hyperlink the site up there, but it doesn't deserve it today.

Wow. I've just turned this into one of those proper blogs, where you write about what you feel. And I'm not even drunk.

When one of the selling points is 'lights'.

Another thing on The List has been tenuously knocked off. I believe it's my right to decide the exact interpretation of my list, which is lucky really, otherwise I'd have no chance of completing it.
So, number 36: Be a muse.

Dedication

A dedication in an actual live book totally, totally counts. It couldn't count more, in fact. Admittedly, Katie might have something to say if I claimed to be Al's one and only muse, but I like to think that in dressing up as a mouse and embarrassing myself totally I went some way to helping him become a published author (again).

This is probably the best book I own now. You will all be receiving one for birthdays and Christmases.

If you can't wait til then, you should go and buy it for yourself here. In fact, fuck it - I probably won't get round to posting your present. I'd go and get it now just to be on the safe side.

The Curse of Mousebeard

Alex Milway

I've walked down a particular road three times this week and had cars in my general vicinity honk their horns in a really aggressive manner. I always look round, because it sounds like the kind of horn-use you'd get right before someone gets run over. And there never seems to be any reason for the horn.

So, it happened for the third time today, and I swear to god, this was my thought process.

"Huh, that's weird".
"Why does it keep happening on this road?"
"Why does it keep happening when I'm around?"
"Wouldn't it be weird if there was some underground movement to really freak me out"
"Like if a radio station is starting this campaign to get cars to blast their horn around 5'4'' women with dark hair. Or more specifically, me."
"Actually, it's quite localised. It's more likely to be an online campaign"

I need to go and do some charity work of something.