It's nice when your new place reflects your personality. Or annoying...

Well, we've moved. It took us the entire weekend, as we had a lot of boxes, and we're still living in complete chaos, but we're in the lovely new flat. Well, I say lovely, but it currently has all sorts of oddness and craziness and kitschness going on. But I'm sure it will be very lovely very soon. I'm almost sure...

I arrived first, having collected the keys so that The Girl could move her stuff as soon as she arrived. And, well, you know how you can wander around a new place thinking non-essential things like "Ooh, I could put my bookcase there," but not register something more important like "Hang on, there's no furniture in this flat" for about twenty minutes? The flat came with some very ugly furniture, and we had negotiated for most of it to be taken away, but we asked them to leave two sofas and one bed, these being important items that we do not have. These had been removed. We are currently living and sleeping on The Girl's sofabed in the lounge. This has been mildly amusing so far, but we've been promised a bed and something to sit on, and if we don't get them soon then we're going to get really very pissed off.

The next amusement, having spent hours moving all The Girl's boxes with the 'help' of removal men who were going as slowly as possible as they were being paid by the hour, was to discover that the TV doesn't work here because aerial reception is so bad. We can't even get digital. Never mind, we say, there will be Telewest, since it's already all installed here. Except that The Girl needs a BT line to connect to the company who provide her with cheap international calls, and you can't get Telewest TV without getting their phone line. Never mind, we say, we'll find another way to sort out the international calls. I am about to ring Telewest. At least then I'll be able to watch Torchwood. It's amazing how much you can miss TV when you've been without it for a weekend.

We spent all of Saturday afternoon putting up The Girl's bookshelves, which occasionally collapsed, and throwing away entire mountains of bubble wrap. Then on Sunday we made two trips over to the Lovely Flat, where I was very kindly helped with moving all my boxes by R's T and Former Flatmate. Then we unpacked all Sunday afternoon. We had grand plans to find a local and get a drink when we'd finished, until we realised that we will probably be finished around January. So we gave up and went to bed. I shall come home at a reasonable hour and try to keep going. The Girl has a show for the next three weeks, therefore she can't be home until really late for the next couple of nights, so it's me and my boxes for a bit. I am compelled to straighten out all her haphazard rows of books, which will take me a while, so I'll keep busy.The flat is lovely, and a very decent size and in a fantastic location, but it's decorated (how do I put this?) to very individual tastes. Which are not my tastes. Everything is brass, including an enormous mirror over the mantlepiece that I am just going to smash up one of these days (they left this but not the sofa??) and the light fittings are little fake candles decorated with fake drips. We're getting the interior designer (aka Former Flatmate) over to tell us how we can make it all slightly less appalling. Till then, I am mostly trying not to look. Oh, and we also have our very own Phantom Dennis. He has been switching off the lights in the bathroom and hiding things that we need. I will have to leave him some sort of peace offering in the hope that he will start to like us and do more useful things instead.

I am very happy. :)