Bed in the sky, Nerd Fighters, and Snowy Balls

I am surrounded by the chaos of an environment that no longer fits. Conversations with God lies spine-breakingly open on the table, on top of the newest copy of Word Magazine. The Argos catalogue is opened to the video camera page, while my mug of milky tea rapidly cools beside it.

I have 21 more days in this flat. The new flat into which I will be moving in Edinburgh calls to me like a the golden arches beckon to American arteries. Or, more serenely, like freshly washed sheets call to the pigeon flying through the clear blue sky directly above the clothesline. No, wait. That, too contained undertones of ick. Hmmm. Lets just say I feel magnetically drawn to the new flat.

Living alone is slowly starting to feel less weird, but it will improve greatly once I am in a space that is jut mine, chosen by me for its blue furniture and red walls and bed in the sky. Yes, this flat contains the all-glorious cupboard bed. I will have to climb a ladder to get into bed, and if I should wake up with a start, I will slam my forehead into the ceiling. This possibility fills me with a giddiness that I cannot explain. I have great plans for glow-in-the-dark star stickers with which I will create the constellations of Sophia. A giant apple perhaps, or a cluster of creamy desserts, topped with cherries.

The area of Edinburgh to which I will be moving is called Gorgie. I shall be living a bottle’s throw from the Hearts Football Club ground. So on Saturday afternoons I’ll be able to sit in my window with my cup of tea and watch the masses of supporters march down the street, chanting and singing and punching their enemies in their faces. It will be like a puppet show of sorts, every time the same theme but with different episodes.

The best part is that I will be so close to the Italian deli, the Polish grocery store and the African/Caribbean grocery place. Come on over and we shall control the seas over a meal of salmon and calypso sauce.

The walk to work will take about 40 minutes each way, but I’m hoping the daily treks will help my health and improve my emotional being, thereby reducing the amount of time where I just don’t feel capable of getting out of bed. Some days I swear I could sleep for Britain.

Living alone as a budding eccentric contains countless entertaining moments.

For example, the most horrifying moment of today was when I dropped my vibrator on the floor. My female friends who know me well (you precious wee clutch of goddesses) will understand my utter dread when, in the space of two seconds, I imagined the possibility of having broken my vibrator, meaning that I would have to make the trip into Edinburgh and lumber all the way down Prince’s Street to Ann Summers to buy a new one from a pert 20-year old with the mental capacity of slowly melting frozen concentrated apple juice. (Slowly melting frozen concentrated orange juice is something completely different - there’s substance and goo and stick and it’s really fun to sample because it makes your cheeks suck in. Slowly melting frozen concentrated apple juice just looks like pillar of semi-transparent shards, which makes you think that all the trapped sweetness is somehow dangerous).

The most thrilling moment of the day was finding an uneaten tiny tub of GÜ Pudding. It waits for me in the fridge. Oops, now it’s gone.

The most gratifying moment was throwing out a moulding bit of sheep’s milk cheese that was languishing in my fridge. It was the first time I had purchased that kind of cheese and I didn’t like it, so I just left in there, poorly covered, to punish the cheese for being so unpalatable.

I would also like to report that I have christened the keyboard of my new laptop with chocolate. Of course I have no memory of the actual moment of chocolate transference, but when I found it later, just above the left-hand shift key, I felt a lurch of emotional gratitude, of completion. I then licked my finger and wiped it off. Now Stephen Fry is once again pristine. Yes, my laptop is named after Stephen Fry. For those of you who do not know who Stephen Fry is, shame on you.

Other new discoveries:

The Internet. Let me explain. Now that I have Stephen Fry, and also wireless hookup, I am able to watch videos and loads of cool stuff that I couldn’t before. Like YouTube. Is this the best thing ever? I think so. At first I loved watching the videos of people who record themselves dancing, badly. Especially when they are young Americans taking themselves very seriously. But there are also some fantastic videos of people singing and also there is the all-glorious Brotherhood 2.0, wherein brothers Hank and John Green are communicating through daily video blogs for an entire year. They are nearing the end of their sojourn, but they have developed an impressive following of “Nerd Fighters” and have also begun the long road to decreasing “Worldsuck.” They are wonderful and make me howl with laughter. My favourite so far when John completes the challenge “Eat Five Sheets Of Toilet Paper While Discussing The Political Situation In Nepal.” (October 26).

My aims over the coming weeks and months - to chill out and be less mean to myself. To cook something involving mostly onions, since I just found a bag of onions in my crisper. To try and have fun, to seek out things that will make me laugh, to write, to take up Osho dancing meditation and to just let myself unfold slowly. I would also like to once again take up my old tendency for questionnaire creation. Moe will remember those. Ridiculous questionnaires are a circle of entertainment in which I wish to indulge.

So, to close: You are caught in a vicious storm. What do you sing while constructing a shelter out of branches and a crumpled copy of Rolling Stone?

S-

Ps- Nerd Fighters Rule!

pps- Marks and Spencer have released their new line of Christmas chocolates called "Snowy Balls." Does anyone want some? I can send. They're organic...