Other Peoples' Houses

I should be quite the expert at moving house, all things considered.

I have done it 7 times in the past twelve years, with an average of one move every 13 months. So you would have thought I'd have got the hang of it by now.

This is sadly not the case, despite my ability to segue seamlessly into White Van Man behaviour the second I've finished loading and handed the keys over. Mind you, The Husband doesn't like that sort of thing, so we hire people now...

It's been very tedious - I've been colour coding the local A-Z according to school catchment areas, making viewing appointments and graciously explaining to estate agents that 'a good-sized family home - it must be child-safe, but I don't care how minging the decor is.' does not mean 'Please show me every tiny cubby hole on your books that's been cheaply done over by someone with a tragic fondness for property porn and overblown hopes of a huge profit. You dirty, thieving bastards.

Other people's houses are fascinating. Apart from the voyeuristic pleasure of having a peep behind someone else's curtains, I always come away feeling greatly relieved that other people do not necessarily have cleaner, tidier houses, an innate feel for exquisite interior design, more expensive furniture, well-kept gardens and lifestyles straight out of the glossy pages of Good Housekeeping magazine. It makes me feel quite adequate, which is always A Good Thing.

Other people's houses can also be very odd. Why, for example, would Mr & Mrs H at number 54 choose to have an en-suite shower room and king-sized bed taking up so much space in their tiny master bedroom that they need to keep their wardrobes in the next room? And what's with Mr & Mrs P at nunber 45 - don't they know that if you smoke a pipe and allow your cats to spray your furniture liberally with Eau de Tom, you should at least consider trying to disguise the smell on viewing days?

From the other side of the fence, I would also like to apologise to Mrs ? at number 42 - my little boy had just had a very long and boring morning looking around number 44, and he never normally does that in the street.

And so it begins. Wish me luck - this project is going to be taking up a lot of my time in the coming weeks, and my attempts to be light-hearted and amusing about it here will be my lifeline to sanity. The last move saw me hiding in the hole where the fridge used to be, rocking backwards and forwards with my head between my knees, as the spotty teenaged removal men bounced my piano down the stairs. It still hasn't recovered.

Perhaps this solution might be the best bet, although if our local removal firms can't manage a small, upright piano, I don't fancy our chances of getting away with it...

Courtesy of boeke&maverickapollo @ flickr