life! life! writing and money

I know, I know! Those two things don’t normally go together. (Although I have recently acquired a hardback copy of Couples, the book that catapulted John Updike into millionairedom. I wish I could do that thing.)

So… I’ve just re-entered the real world, so it should get a bit less patchy around here. Starting with blog posts and so on.

By the way, the home I’ve spent this week dismantling was not my own home – thank god – a distinction I should make for the benefit of those who might be kindly tempted to send me good wishes – but that of my Esteemed Other, a highly cultured gentleman with too many possessions and an addiction to south London. Had it been mine, on top of everything else, I would now be writing to you from safely inside a loony bin.

We did it! He’s out of that house. I am now half-dead but flushed (and slightly puffy in the ankle and finger departments) with triumph. And I got to ride all the way to Arundel (aka the storage unit),  and back again, in the front of the moving van. It would have been a huge thrill, say, 100 years ago when I was a kid! The moving guys were friends of friends and very jolly and funny, so it was quite nice. And Baroque Mansions is now full of stuff. Furniture, dishes, pictures, Useful Objects, useless objects, and things I’ve promised to fix. All with the dust of south-of-the-river on them. The Brockley Annexe is now closed. A new life awaits, and the new annexe, when it opens, will be splendiferous (and also south of the river).

I’m hoping the Fairy Dust of Change will settle on me, too, and result in a glorious new income, and possibly fame and glory too, though I’ll settle for paying the bills. This week I must attack the whole project of my immediate future with renewed vigour and conviction. There are job ads to go through, book proposals to write, Arts Council grants to apply for, poetry workshops to publicise, financial messes to disentangle, and a few things in hand that need to be buckled down and done for people, and if you are one of those people, please don’t worry.

I have to keep it all straight in my head.

Let’s see. The new manuscript is almost ready to send to Salt. Readers may have heard that there is a new regime underway at Salt Publishing: Chris H-E will leave editorial and take over sales and marketing, which I think will be a magnificent use of his entrepreneurial talents. Editing will be in the hands of new commissioning editor Roddy Lumsden, which was a surprise announcement last weekend (but we in Baroque Mansions know Roddy very well so he is not the surprise), and, like anything new, will no doubt take a bit to develop a definite shape. But the book’s about done. The title is Egg Printing Explained.

In the meantime, my poem The Base MACIAN has just been published in this new e-zine. Yay!

I have an urgent book review to write, too. And an essay for a Penned in the Margins anthology. And lots of other things, if I thought I could commit the time to commit to them… and that’s before the other tiny detail of having ideas.* The final (for now) Lemon Monkey reading is next Saturday.

The aged aunt is also underway, having had a visit from her real nieces for the past two weeks (she was Old Mother Baroque’s flatmate in New York City, back in Mad Men days).  Before they fly away on Tuesday, and while I am applying for jobs, drafting book proposals, corresponding with the tax office, working up courage to open my bank statement and trying to figure out where all the furniture is going to fit, we will make a plan. It will involve housecleaning and meal plans, and so on.

Private, no doubt. Did you know that in Hounslow an elderly person has to pay £15 an hour for home help? Did you know that meals on wheels charges the elderly person £4 a meal? That’s a fat lot of use when the person in question is living on out-of-date half-price ready meals. I’m not sure how we’ll persuade her to spend £30 a week on something she seems to think she can only afford £5 for. But somehow, I’m sure, we’ll work something out. Everything will be under control.

The Urban Warrior, ex of this address, is moving into a new shared house next week. It’s in the air. I’m worrying about his money, too, as he used his student loan to pay the deposit. (What was he supposed to do?)

Well, it’s the election. Will it make a difference, or will it just make everything even worse?? More on that later. But in the meantime… check out Moore4Hackney.

Now: my morning Nurofen & coffee, and a to-do list from Hell. (A paraphrase from EA Markham: “I believe in hell, of course, since my neighbours come from there…”)

* ‘Poems are not made of ideas, they’re made of words.’ Stephane Mallarmé. But essays are made of ideas.

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