Part IA, Part UP

No, she doesn't own the flat...she's friends with the owner (whom I've never met).

I think part of the issue is that officially I'm a lodger rather than a tenant.

We'll see...if this turns into just a stopgap while I find a more ideal flat, fine, I just wish finding a more ideal flat weren't likely to take forever.

Sorry EN!  Sounds almost like changing one evil landlord for a domineering flatmate.  Fingers crossed you find something better in the month!!

We offered our 8 yr old son the option to stay up until 8pm when bedtime is normally 7pm. He cannot play or watch tv or play with his DS, he can only read.

IA: We had a major temper tantrum from him and he said he didn't want to read and I told him he could go to bed.

UP: He read a whole story of Horrid Henry and loved it and when I told him it was 8pm, he came in a hugged me and told me he loved it and said I was a ''good mom.'' 

Hopefully we can keep this up and help him learn to love books more. Now I'm off to find more Horrid Henry books!

Argh...got home to find my amazon boxes gone (which I wouldn't mind if I were still aiming them for recycling, but now that I may have wanted them to move stuff again...sigh). Also my blanket (which was on my desk chair at my desk, so not at all associated with anything of hers) re-folded. And my bin emptied (which if it were in the "doing this so you don't have to" sense, fine, but I think it's in the "I don't want you to use this" sense, which is not cool).

So...IA: Being treated like a 5yo by my flatmate. My main concern is that generally there's a "settling in" period with new people when you're on your best behaviour...so if this is her best, I really don't want to see what else is in store.

UP: Had a nice evening with dinner & a movie out.

Argh...got home to find my amazon boxes gone (which I wouldn't mind if I were still aiming them for recycling, but now that I may have wanted them to move stuff again...sigh). Also my blanket (which was on my desk chair at my desk, so not at all associated with anything of hers) re-folded. And my bin emptied (which if it were in the "doing this so you don't have to" sense, fine, but I think it's in the "I don't want you to use this" sense, which is not cool).

Were these things in your room?  I can't see how her coming into your room & rearranging your stuff can be on.  Do you have any way of shutting & locking the door to where your stuff is?

Were these things in your room?  I can't see how her coming into your room & rearranging your stuff can be on.  Do you have any way of shutting & locking the door to where your stuff is?

No, all of these things were in the kitchen. In a related note...

UP: The cleaner came today...so perhaps she's responsible for the boxes, toothbrush/toothpaste moving, and blanket re-folding.

IA: Flatmate wants the cleaner to come every week, rather than every other week, because "she feels it isn't clean" otherwise, and wants me to pitch in on the cost. Fine, in concept, but not what I agreed to originally. So, I'll have to think that over. And really, I still think I want to move out sooner rather than later, even if the cleaner was responsible for the latest transgressions.

IA:
We lost our internet connection yesterday afternoon...after 2 hours and doing everything I knew to get it back I broke down and phoned AOL at the cost of 5p/minute and spend 30 minutes going through each step with the tech (all that I had already done) only for him to say 'it's your line that runs from the master phone socket to the filter. Unplug that line and plug the filter directly into the master socket & that will solve your problem. If not call us back.' UH ok...so I had to hang up because disconnecting that line would cut off the phone that I was calling on.

So I did that and well guess what!, it didn't solve ANYTHING!...so another phone call to AOL at 5p/minute to be walked through all the steps I had done with the previous guy (both with really thick Indian accents it was difficult for me to understand) He finally says...'well, I have to send you to level 2 as I'm not sure what the problem is. But its quite a queue and you are going to have a considerable wait. So if you don't want to wait then we can have someone call you back in a couple of weeks'...NO! Thank you I'll wait...all of 4 minutes, turns out.

UP:

The next guy was really helpful and I could understand his Scottish accent much better!  , he determined that it was not anything on our end and that the network was having issues in our area, he assigned an engineer and said it may be a few hours but we'll get it sorted out for you & it was back up and running this morning. 

He finally says...'well, I have to send you to level 2 as I'm not sure what the problem is. But its quite a queue and you are going to have a considerable wait. So if you don't want to wait then we can have someone call you back in a couple of weeks'...NO! Thank you I'll wait...all of 4 minutes, turns out.

Call you back in a couple of weeks?! Honestly? What would ever take so long that they wouldn't be able to call you right back? That service sounds horrid! Glad your problem was sorted, though!

UP: Saw a flat tonight with nice people who were cool with animals. Room's quite large, flat's decent-looking. It's a 20min train ride from work, which is perfect.

IA: The two guys who I'd live with smoke. Also, the shower's broken (won't maintain steady water temp) and apparently agency/landlord are wrangling over who gets to pay for it. Both red flags.

Ah, well. I have 13 other flats (so far) that I'm interested in, including 4 others in my "top picks". Hopefully 1+ of them will fit the bill.

UP: Getting new cabinets and floor coverings in the flat sooner than expected

IA: I now have to move every bit of everything out of the kitchen and hallways and into the spare bedroom, tonight.  And I have a fair wack of stuff on the floor- mainly shelving that holds all my spare kitchen gadgets.  
And I have to clear the counterspace, etc as well.  And the cupboards underneath the sink and next to the oven. Yeah, fun.   

IA: Shoveling out our bedroom

UP:  I got the motivation I thought I was lacking and we now have a clean bedroom to sleep in tonight!  YAY!

IA: After a great week on the diet, yesterday was a naughty day! Stupid beer!

UP: I'm back on the bandwagon today. I'm not beating myself up too much over the one day. I should have still lost 2lbs when I weigh myself tomorrow.

UP: We got new carpet in the living room and lino in the kitchen! The new carpet is lovely and new which leads to...

IA: I'm going to be very bummed when my pukey cat christens the floor.    I'm also going to have to keep my husband from walking in here with his dirty running shoes.

IA: Dan is meeting up with a friend he met online here, who used to be my best friend and now intensely hates me now. And he's doing it alone, it's not that I don't trust him, I don't trust her. And she's making it a point of Facebook to try and get more days off with him when he's coming here to see me (she is seeing him 2 days, and I don't think it's my fault that she never took the initiative to see him before this). It's really just making me more upset on top of all the other stuff that's going on in my life.

UP: DANIEL IS GOING TO BE HERE IN 9 DAYS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I can't wait to give him a hug.

IA: Blacks decided as a "security check" to cancel my order completely. No reason why, no alternative method to get the items, just "sorry for the inconvenience". WTF?

UP: Found similar stuff on amazon for (slightly) less money. I know Amazon likes me/will ship to me/will accept my money in exchange for goods.