Got 18,000 Problems...

So I met all of my fellow leaseholding neighbours in our community hall last night. It was interesting to note that they all looked like slightly older versions of me. Scruffy, middle class nerds and minor variations on that theme. Some had children - although why anyone would bring their toddler to a leaseholder's meeting in a community hall beats me, and I think the toddlers were pretty confused about it too. Unfortunately I was meeting these people for the first time under calamitous circumstances - Hackney Homes (who are the building's freeholders) are proposing massive upgrade work to our properties and it's going to cost each leaseholder in the range of £18,000. That covers new windows, an extractor fan and what appears to be a huge and extortionately expensive amount of weatherproof paint. Hackney Homes, like most council-run organisations I've encountered, are unbearable to deal with. Naturally, the meeting descended into chaos. None of these nerds have any money. HH advised us to put our objections in writing. So today I wrote a letter just to let them know that, in all fairness, I don't have £18,000. I'm eagerly awaiting their response.

In other news, my new jewellery rack arrived from the States (above), ludicrously cheap from Etsy. I'll probably have to pawn all my plastic and electroplated jewels anyway in order to pay for this extractor fan. I might ask Hackney Homes to install one made of solid gold. THEN maybe it'll be worth it.

The Neighbourhood

I love Hackney. It has a high crime rate, a high unemployment rate and parts of it looks like a shit heap but the things that attach stigma to a place are often the things that help to bolster its authenticity. I couldn't help but feel a swell of pride when the Tesco delivery man refused to get into my lift because my building was 'too ghetto'. I guess that means I'm 'ghetto'. I am totally cool with that. Here are some of the awesome things within ten minute's walk of my East End ghetto.


This is the view from my balcony. Not exactly green fields and rolling hills but if you appreciate the urban sprawl, and I do, it's a constantly changing and always fascinating landscape. It's also good for spying on people.


This cafe serves amazing French toast but they only have ONE bottle of maple syrup which can cause friction between the clientele.


There are a lot of Turkish restaurants in Hackney but this one is my favourite, mostly because it's about 30 seconds from my house. They don't sell proper Turkish tea but they do bring you Turkish Delight with your bill, which no one except me ever wants to eat.


Have you been worrying about Richard Blackwood? Good news, he's still alive and at the Hackney Empire basically every weekend (and sometimes weekdays too). Not such a fall from grace - I saw Wynton Marsalis play here last summer.



I know this probably doesn't count as it hasn't technically finished being built yet, but I can't WAIT for the Hackney Picturehouse to open. 4 screens! 3 bars! No more schlepping to the Aubin or the Rio, both of which are too pretentious to sell pick n mix, which is secretly the only reason I even go to the cinema!


This place may not look like much, and it actually looks far worse when the shutters are open, but they will do a fine job of shaping and polishing your nails for a mere £6. Just not on a Sunday.


I'm guessing 'Casa De Carnes' means 'house of meat', which sounds tantalising - unfortunately this is just a really cheap good quality Brazilian butcher shop which is actually made of bricks.


I felt a disproportionate amount of pride when London Starnight Supermarket and Video was mentioned in the Guardian - it's where I go when I want bean curd candy or to source ridiculous ingredients when I decide, ill advisedly, to open up the Ottolenghi cookbook and try again.


I admit I've never been in here and you can probably see why - it's the most terrifying looking 'shop' I've ever seen in my life and, I'm leaping to conclusions here, definitely a front for some kind of Mafia/Yakuza/secret poker game HQ.


Shonky sign aside, Green Papaya is widely thought of as the best Vietnamese restaurant in East London. It's impossible to get a table at the weekend without booking, and when you've finished your meal they'll helpfully, pushily bring your bill without you asking for it. They also bring After Eights with your bill, so that's OK with me.



I haven't traveled much but I'm willing to put it out there, as a totally objective fact, that the E5 Bakehouse (under one of the railway arches next to London Fields station) sells the most delicious bread in the Western world.


London Fields was looking very beautifully Autumnal this morning. The best
lido weather may be behind us but there's still plenty to do around here if you know where to look and you stay away from dark alleyways and shady characters.

New Additions

I've been in the flat for three months now and I still feel like I'm living inside a trophy wife. It can be intimidating. I imagine a trophy wife requires the same amount of frantic maintenance - gifting, grooming, gratuitous amounts of quality time. I realised recently that if I don't stop spoiling this lump of concrete I'll probably end up destitute and homeless, albeit surrounded by beautiful things. And though the irony of that situation would not be lost on me, I have no desire to become the protagonist in the Aesop's Fable of my own life. So, I must say thank you to the summer sales and to generous friends with good taste.

This tray was bought for me by my sister on a recent trip to New York, from a crockery store called Fishs Eddy. The stuff they sell is always beautiful but at the moment they have a range featuring the art of Charley Harper (one of my all time favourites). The rest of it can be found here and I want it all. I'm seriously thinking of becoming someone's beard just so as I can make a Fishs Eddy wedding list.


My friend Helen, who's beautiful graphic design work can be found here, sent these two gorgeous posters to me from Germany after I admired them on her website.


This fellow looks after my plastic jewellery and foreign coins.

I saw this throw in Urban Outfitters and pep talked myself out of buying it because I had literally nowhere to put it and it clashes with everything. The next time I saw it it was heavily discounted and I couldn't resist the serendipity. At the moment it's helping my dull council flat radiator to bum me out a little less.


I got this print super cheap on Ebay - the original design is by another of my favourites, Miss Van. A great thing about having your own place is that you can put titties anywhere you want. There are several other renderings around the flat, perhaps that's another blog post for another time. Having said that...

There's also this amazing mug - another Fishs Eddy gift, from someone else who went to New York and knows exactly what I want before I even know myself. Given I'm about to sit down with my titty mug and drink tea for the balance of the evening, it would hardly be appropriate to say I'm living fast. But if I do die young at least I'll leave behind a beautiful collection of stuff.

Living Alone

'You're your own boss you can do as you please
Open a window and let in a breeze
You sit down to dinner, yeah, you cooked your own
You light a candle, you're living alone.' - Loudon Wainwright III

Despite appearances, my determination to buy my own place was not primarily so that I could fancy it up with clocks and cushions and oversized lamps. I'm pleased that the textiles and colour scheme accurately reflect the inside of my soul but those things are not my greatest self indulgence. My greatest self indulgence has been living alone. I have wanted to live alone for a long time. I've lived in 8 different flats/houses/hovels since I moved here 7 years ago. I have had some wonderful homes and shared them with some fascinating people. Some were dickheads. Some have become close friends. Most I look back on with great fondness, with appreciation and retrospective wisdom. But living by myself has always been my holy grail - perhaps in the same way that others fantastise about travel, I fantasised about being home alone.

Sometimes it's so great it's almost overwhelming. I talk to myself constantly. I sometimes eat my dinner in the bath. I relish opening the fridge and being the master of all I survey. I would happily spend days here without ever leaving, but I'm worried I'm unlearning a lot of my co-habitation skills which I may well need again at some stage in the very distant future. What if I meet someone who one day wants to move in? I can barely stomach the idea of my books being mixed up with someone else's, let alone foreign hair in the plughole. That person would have to be extraordinarily wonderful, and also incredibly tolerant and kind. In a sad, selfish way I'm almost hoping that person doesn't exist.

Anniversary

Sunday was my one month anniversary in the flat. In some ways I can't believe it's been a whole month - in others ways I feel like I've been here forever. A bit like any love affair I suppose. And I can attest - it's love. Right now I'm sitting on my sofa in a kaftan, scented candle burning, pot of cinnamon tea at my side. My sofa has wide arms which are perfect for balancing every necessity within easy reach. Phone, laptop, various components of the Sunday Times. I realise that several cats would seem like a natural addition but unfortunately I'm allergic. I do now own about six too many cushions though which are filling the void as well as completing the picture of eccentricity. My calendar has been cleared. I intend to spend every night this week this way, surrounded by cushions, newspaper supplements and tea. In years to come we may grow tired of eachother, this sofa and I, but it's difficult to imagine. This may be a death knell for my modest social life.

I continue to primp and spoil the place, and I can't seem to stop picking up little pictures everywhere despite the fact that they usually clash with the ones I already have. I got these Lucienne postcards on sale at Heals and put them in a frame I bought for someone else by accident (long story)



And this lamp, which I actually ordered in March and only received last week, is as tall as an average man (about the closest thing to anything man like that I foresee spending extended periods of time here).

Anniversary

Home

It's only been a few weeks but it's already hosted a flatpack party and seen a whole lot of nudity (all mine). This is my flat. I guess buying a place is probably a bit like going into labour - you forget about the all the pain and sweating and abandonment of dignity when you finally get to see what you've gone through it all for. That is, crossing the threshold and taking off all your clothes. Enjoy the photos.

















And this is where I'm headed for the rest of the evening:

The Final Hurdle

No fun pictures, no tales of retail ecstasy, this has been the most stressful fucking week of my entire life - and it's only Tuesday. Exchange, which I now know has something to do with the mortgage, was supposed to happen on Wednesday. It still hasn't happened, and tomorrow that makes it a week late. I have been asked several times if I would be comfortable moving the completion date to Friday instead of Thursday. No, I have insisted again and again, Friday is no good for me, because on Friday I will be in Somerset drunk driving a dodgem car at ATP Festival. The vendor has begrudgingly agreed to allow exchange and completion to happen simultaneously on Thursday - but his solicitor still hasn't confirmed that this will be taking place. I received an email from my solicitor this morning asking for a fee in excess of 2k over what we had agreed. On vigilant inspection of the bill I realised she had included stamp duty, which is not applicable as I'm a first time buyer. This was amended but only after many infuriating attempts to reach her by phone. I still don't know if I'm moving on Thursday. I'm on the edge of the edge. I have a migraine. Ironically, I'm very much looking forward to the dentist tomorrow as she's promised me a generous dose of Valium. Who knew this thing could be so stressful.

Barley Sugar Honeycomb Chair

I'm pretty sure my mum is worried I'm going to die a spinster. I wonder how she'd feel if she knew I was in love with this inanimate piece of plastic.

Also got a thing for this adorable cushion. That's my kind of managé.

Ikea Bank Holiday Jaunt

So yesterday we ventured courageously up to Ikea Edmonton in this, my friend Pob's veterinary ambulance. Unfortunately it doesn't have a siren, but there was a lot of whooping and squealing coming from inside as our excitement about our trip escalated and we tried, not always successfully, to follow the vehicle's extremely fickle satnav. Some people hate Ikea. I love it, and having a a whole ambulance to to fill with stuff was all the incentive I needed to buy rather more superfluous kitchen items than I should have done. Many many glass jars were placed in the trolley, many different kinds of tupperware, a jug, some ice-cube trays and a colourful set of knives which look the part but probably aren't very sharp (a bit like the sucker who might purchase such an item). One of my star buys was this cushion, which I've seen and admired in a few friend's houses.


I'm completing on the flat on the 12th of May, going to the dentist the day before and a music festival the day after. The timing is not ideal but I can't wait to get in there and start decorating. I'm picturing grey. I'm picturing orange. This is another recent purchase.


Just some Ikea fabric I loved stretched over a canvas bought from this place. Need to work out how best to arrange my jars and knives around it.

A Great Relief

Yesterday I finally got the good word from my solicitor that she received whatever bullshit piece of paper she's been waiting on, and I'm on the home stretch. For a while there it looked as though I might have been left homeless for several weeks. I wasn't so worried about myself (it's pretty warm out there at the moment) but what about all my precious things? I own a lot of things and they're all very precious. Now my hyper-enthusiasm has been renewed and my trawling of furniture stores, online and otherwise, has recommenced. Today I had a mosey around this place, which sells beautiful vintage furniture, so much better and cheaper than the kind you'd find in Habitat or Heals. Who is Heals for, by the way? Celebrities? Those are the only people I can think of who'd drop 2k on a rug. Incidentally Arch 389 is very close to this bakery which sells crazy good artisan bread cooked by hot scruffy men.

Now I can relax and look forward to my bank holiday trip to Ikea, even though in the back of my mind I know it's going to be hell on earth, especially if those roll-y shoes for children are still all the rage. Post Ikea update to follow.

The Waiting Game

So, this is where it gets boring. The target exchange date (which I thought was rather ambitious in the first place but soon allowed myself to get over excited about) has come and gone and I'm still yet to exchange anything. I'm not even sure what the exchange entails or what it is I'm supposed to exchange, in exchange for what. I thought the whole thing was an exchange anyway, as in he gets money, I get a flat. It sounds like some kind of cryptic ceremony and it makes me think of bodily fluids. Speculation aside, what I do know is it's the thing that happens like 11 days before completion, and completion is when I get to go inhabit the place. My solicitor is being evasive and non-committal but still frustratingly nice so it's difficult to direct my impatience effectively. I want to pick up the phone and yell at someone, but there's no one I can think of calling who could actually help. God? I guess this is what God and talk radio are for. Anyway, in a beautifully poetic and serendipitous moment, walking around Putney in the sunshine this weekend I came across this lovely clock, which looks like it should be hanging on the wall of the lunchroom of some ultra grim factory in 1962. And I thought, that's the clock for me. At least if I have to wait indefinitely I'll have something nice to look at.

So Long, Rocking Chair

So I suppose I've made amends with the fact that this beauty will never be mine. She played a prominent role in my latest living room fantasy (the fantasy where everything in my living room is made of teak) but I guess that's the nature of Ebay - it's cut throat and it doesn't care about your sappy dreams. Saying that, my sister did give me some sage advice which made me hesitate in placing a bid - never buy a chair you haven't tried out first, because there's no way of telling whether it's comfortable until you actually put your butt on it. I suppose a sofa is different because even if it's desperately uncomfortable you can always lie down. That's certainly my preferred approach. I guess the whole spinster-in-a-rocking chair look is probably a little tired anyway. Got to find a new shtick, and a new fantasy chair.

My now habitual cruising of the internet for home decor means those intuitive Google banner ads offer a ceaseless conveyor belt of beautiful furniture that I probably want or think I might want, and certainly want to get a closer look at. It's like they know I've become a total bore and think it's funny to mock me. Being prone to suggestion and a compulsive new tab opener this basically means that anything I ever try to do online that doesn't involve looking at coffee tables is inevitably sidelined. For many, many hours. It was one of those banner ads that led me to these, however.



I ordered four to make allowances for the fact that I will definitely break three of them in the 35 years it takes me to repay my mortgage. I've got something to eat my meals-for-one off - it's a start.

Pre-emptive Ebaying

Now that the mortgage has been officially approved (although the literature the lender posted to me states in about six different ways how they could withdraw the offer, steal my stuff and spread nasty rumours about me all over town at any time if they get hormonal or are just feeling mean), it leaves me grasping for other things to focus my anxiety on. People have been telling me since I began this whole process that brokers are filthy liars, solicitors are lazy jerks, estate agents are moronic, vendors are insane, the place you're buying probably has a chronic bedbug infestation and a crack den in the attic which the blurb on the promo sheet fails to mention. The general consensus is that buying property is a giant, quenchless, nervous-breakdown-inducing money sponge and once you get your toes wet there's no hope of mercy or satisfaction until, months down the line, you finally manage to drag yourself wearily over the threshold.

Having said that, I decided to do it anyway. I fell in love with a flat which got the seal of approval from regular and property savvy friends. I went to see a broker for advice who's handsomeness proved a great distraction from the boring things coming out of his mouth. I was lucky enough to find a solicitor who had just finished a sale in the same block, who happens to be really lovely and, so far, not lazy or a jerk. Sometimes I feel like emailing her just to say hi. The estate agent is definitely a moron but it's fun when clichés come true now and then. Everything is going suspiciously well. The tension I've been cultivating needs a place to live too and right now that place is Ebay. You know what's stressful? Seeing furniture you like on Ebay when you don't have a flat to put it in yet. When something you like the look of is gone, it's gone, and shopping regret is on a par with food regret ('why didn't I eat that other piece of bacon?! I'm going to regret this for the rest of my life') in terms of how sad it makes me.

Just LOOK at this dining set, for example.

On the one hand, I want it so much it makes me want to cry. On the other hand, I don't live in my flat yet and couldn't really say if it's the right table for the space. On the other hand though, I want it. But on a third hand, I'm really very fickle and might hate it in a few days. I have already had to cancel an order for a ridiculously expensive coffee table which I bought on a Haribo high last week. Nobody warned me about this part.