A design for life: Can I Help You? 5
Welcome at last to the latest Can I Help You – not actually sure it is the fifth, but let’s call it that – in which I tackle a range of readers’ questions (emotional, practical or somewhere in between) without fear and without qualifications. The ‘mailbag’ for this feature, as people on TV used to say in the days of proper letters, was tremendous and I have had to split it into two. The second episode will be soon, probably Friday.
I have cut down or otherwise edited some ’letters’ a little bit, but hopefully it all makes sense.
You can – indeed should – add your own advice to mine by using the Comments section. Some people have already done this, quite a lot in fact, on the original blog. Well worth a read for a much more comprehensive treatment of all the problems than I could manage on my own.
One piece of admin: the person who wrote a Comment but it disappeared for some reason, please repost it. I think you were called Soo.
Here we go. (Puts glasses on and pulls first letter out of sack.)
-I think I may be addicted to crisps (sounds like a joke, but it’s not!) How would one cut down on eating them?
Hmm. A friend of mine has a similar problem with chocolate. He more or less pathologically can’t stop eating it. The root of the problem is that he can’t stop BUYING it, every time he’s in a food shop or garage or basically anywhere. And once you’ve got it, you’re going to eat it. The hero of Ian McEwan’s novel ‘Solar’ also has a crisp-buying compulsion and, again, finds it impossible to resist eating a packet of crisps once it’s in his hands. I would say that it’s all about preventing yourself getting hold of crisps in the first place. Try not to acknowledge that they’re on sale, when you’re in the shops. If there’s a substitute food you can use, the way smokers use nicotine patches, maybe try always buying one of those and eating it as you go round the shop. In fact a good tip is to do food shopping when you’re not hungry, i.e. when you’ve recently eaten. You’ll be less likely to snack on things like crisps. I hope this helps a bit.
-What would your suggestions be on the subject of rather untidy flatmates/course mates? Actually. If I could rephrase that: Disgustingly dirty, minging flatmates. How would you broach the subject with them, without endangering your friendship/professional relationship?
This comes up surprisingly often in Can I Help You. Some people are just not very considerate when it comes to not leaving a house filthy for other occupants. And for ‘house’ you can also read ‘office, toilet, public park, and world’.
I think this is a situation where you just have to come out and say something, because to give them the benefit of the doubt, they MIGHT not realise they are messy bastards. I’ve lived with or near people who didn’t seem to register the squalor of their own behaviour, and on the flipside, Emily quite often accuses me of not being able to spot mess, even though I think I’m quite tidy. And probably Emily in turn would fail to come up to someone’s standard, maybe those women who do How Clean Is Your House?
So, easier said than done, but tell the buggers. It’s the sort of thing where leaving notes doesn’t do the trick, in my experience – you look petty somehow, and it’s also easy to ignore. Whereas a proper face-to-face chat: you’ll see at least a short-term improvement. You said elsewhere in your Comment that you’d already tried this in the past and it didn’t really get through to them, but I think you’re going to have to keep banging on about it. If it still doesn’t work, come back and we’ll make a more drastic plan.
-You talk about Kit a lot (obviously) in your blog in general. It sometimes occurs to me that by the time this daily blog and TYSIC have come to a conclusion, Kit will be coming to the end of primary school. If he gets as much of a mention then as he does now, it’d sort of feel like we know quite a bit about him and the first ten years of his life. He’d know, quite possibly, literally nothing about any of us. Does this ever occur to you, too/do you find it slightly weird?
This is a good question. The short answer is, yes, it IS a bit of a weird thought, and that’s why I don’t talk very much about the family on this blog, and I also try to avoid going into details in interviews and so on. My hope is that he’ll grow up feeling like his life is pretty normal, and by the time he realises I’m a comedian/writer and may have documented some parts of his life to a bunch of strangers, he’ll be old enough not to resent it. Although I don’t know how old that would be. 40? I’m going to tell him I’m an on-call doctor, I think, or a house burglar. That should hold him for a bit.
***STAR LETTER***
-I’ve got a very boring middle-age / middle-class problem that I’m struggling to solve. My partner Richard and I bought a house in the country about 3 years ago – Richard lives there all the time, but I go home only at weekends and rent a small flat in London during the week. Richard runs his own business, but it doesn’t bring in a lot of money at the moment, so I pay 99% of the mortgage, bills…etc.
It was all going very well, and it did feel as though I was going on holiday every weekend. But… I am now sick of living away from home, and want us to move closer to London so that I can commute daily. Richard is self-employed and can work anywhere, whereas I have a specialised job and have to work in London…
I have raised the issue of moving, without really explaining why, but Richard really doesn’t want to move… Part of me thinks I should just say “I pay for everything, and I want to move so we are moving”, but that would be unfair… I know Richard would move if he knew how unhappy it was making me – so basically either I make him unhappy, or I stay unhappy… I appreciate that, as problems go, this is not a bad one to have. I am a very lucky man indeed.
It gives me a lot of satisfaction that a fairly wide range of people (both in terms of age and background) read this blog and indeed like me in general. So I’m not only going to welcome this ‘middle-aged question’ but reward it with the – meaningless but honourable – Star Letter accolade.
Firstly, I like to think this is not a simple question of making Richard unhappy or making yourself unhappy (as that’s rather a bleak outlook). Finding a solution that makes YOU feel better will have a positive knock-on effect on Richard’s general wellbeing. So let’s go for that.
To my mind – and this may be a rather traditionalist point of view – if it’s you paying the mortgage virtually on your own, ultimately it should be you that has a greater say in the question of where you live. I reckon Richard would also concede this, even if it’s not the way he’d ideally like things to be. The financial pressure is on you and until such time as Richard’s business yields more money, it always will be. So I think you should have the final say on where you live in order to make that money, if there does have to be a ‘final say’. I think you have to tell Richard that you’re sick of this weird shuttling back and forth. Otherwise your discontent will gradually curdle into resentment and your present way of life will become difficult to sustain. That’s putting it rather starkly but that’s about the size of it.
Remember no move is permanent; you can head back to London and then quite conceivably back to the country within two years if Richard makes more money, or you do, or other circumstances change. But yes, as the bread-winner, I think you should decide where the oven is (as it were). I realise this is something of a simplification, but hey, this whole feature is based on simplifications. Hope that helps a bit.
Dear Mark,
-Why did you make your book so large that it doesn’t fit on my book shelf vertically? It is a very unusual size…
Yes, peculiar isn’t it. This picture confirms scientists’ thesis that the book is bigger than a human’s head. http://twitpic.com/2nv64s
It’s because it’s what is called a ‘trade paperback’, which is a sort of fusion of hardback and paperback. It combines the, er, bigness of the hardback with the not-costing-£17-ness of a paperback, and it’s an increasingly popular format for authors like me who are not going to sell millions of copies in hardback the way Dan Brown would, or that chap who writes about the girl with this tattoo and that habit of kicking a nest and so on. Sorry for the disruption to all your shelves.
-Not so much a question, but I need reassuring that spending four years at university isn’t actually as long as it sounds and I won’t come out a 21 year old crone with no skills and lucky to be working reception at a marketing firm.
Firstly, when addressing people considerably older than yourself, I’d advise against using phrases like ’21-year-old crone’, you lucky, young, life-in-front-of-you bastard. Hehe.
As Megan and others have said, a four-year uni course is absolutely not a time-span to be intimidated by, because (a) you will still only be BLOODY TWENTY-ONE but also (b) you’ll find university doesn’t delay the start of your real life, but actually shapes it. If it was a case of treading water for four years while you picked up your qualification, then maybe you should be wary of wasting time, but nobody’s uni career is like that. It’s an important, valuable stage of your life, like any other. Enjoy and embrace it.
-I’m starting university in four weeks. How do I talk to people without seeming like I’m completely strange/mentally unhinged?
-Any advice for a shy fresher?
No query ever on Can I Help You? has brought such a wealth of excellent and heartfelt advice from our readership. This shows firstly that everyone here is great, and secondly, more specifically, that it’s a very common experience indeed to fear being a fresher, be repelled by a lot of the forced activities that are meant to encourage you to ‘bond’ with the others, and get the sinking feeling after about four weeks that you are destined to spend your career/life on a different wavelength from everyone.
Firstly, to summarise and echo the advice of others:
-Do NOT assume that the people you meet in the first couple of weeks are representative of the whole university. It gets easier and easier and easier to narrow it down to people like yourself. The first weeks are a lottery. You will soon filter it down.
-If you don’t like the look of a particular fresher event, e.g. pyjama pub crawls, big gang outings led by confident mouthy people, DON’T go along and DON’T have any regrets about it either. As several people have said, there’ll be loads of other freshers in the same position. It’s just harder to find them than it is to find noisy confident people. But find them you will.
-Do not be afraid to admit you’re slightly lonely/homesick/weirded out. I ‘bonded’ with one of my best friends at Cambridge about three weeks in when we were walking through town and he suddenly said ‘I’m really not enjoying this, to be honest’. It was the first non-positive sentiment I’d heard in three weeks. We’re still mates.
-Also, on the subject of my own experience, I met both my future wife (Em) and future best man (Key) AND a handful of other future close friends in my final few months of my final year at uni. The longer you’re there, the more you have your own niche, the easier things will get. Don’t attach too much importance to the start of your time at uni – either socially, academically, or in any way at all. Three/four/however many years is a long long time. Take it easy.
It will be all right.
-I’ve got this nail that sticks out of my bed. About once a week I cut myself getting out of bed. It’s not too bad, I bleed a little but it does wake me up in the morning. My bed’s against the wall so I can’t use the other side for disembarking. The main bit of the nail is actually inside the frame, so it would be a bit of a hassle to remove it, and I’d need to find some tools. I’ve tried stuff like covering it with blu-tack, but then a situation arises in which I need blu-tack and it ends up bare again. So, is it worth removing the nail, or should I just leave it there?
This made me laugh out loud. I’m afraid that covering up the nail is an example of short-term thinking. You’re going to have to remove it. It may be ‘a bit of hassle’ but it seems a false economy to save that hassle, when the upshot is cutting yourself once a week for the rest of your life. I strongly urge you to get that nail out and to report back to us when you have done it, so we can all stop worrying about it.
-How does one go about getting over the whole ‘grass is greener’ thing? I am terrible for it – I am totally convinced that everyone’s life is better than my own (even though I am aware that mine is, in many ways, pretty lucky). I have sabotaged a few good things in my life because I seem unable to accept and enjoy what I am given. I’m getting rather sick of it. Thanks!
It’s pretty much universal to think that other people have it better. I’m always doing it, and my life is, objectively, pretty sweet. I reckon 90 percent of people suffer from the idea the grass is greener in at least one other person’s garden. Perhaps one thing that might help is reminding yourself that undoubtedly, there is someone looking at YOU thinking ‘I wouldn’t mind that life’. We’re all aware we’re quite lucky and should be grateful for what we’ve got blah blah blah, but if you try to visualise a specific person being jealous of you, that might make it easier.
I think the impulse to feel others have it better is something you should maybe accept, rather than fight against. I don’t mean going around believing it’s true that they DO have it better; just be aware that the feeling is going to be there, and incorporate it rather than trying to suppress it.
Learning to accept what you have is one of the trickiest skills in life. If you master it, it’s pretty much no exaggeration to say you will die happy. So, you know. Worth investing some time in it. And if it’s any consolation, the human tendency to aspire to something better, and visualise seemingly more attractive scenarios, is one of the things that drives any successful life. If you NEVER thought the grass was greener, and were absolutely content with everything all the time, your general motivation would dry up and I think that would be quite perversely exhausting and empty. So, feeling there are better things out there is healthy, in its own way. Just don’t beat yourself up for not always being able to reach them immediately. At times I do sound like a genuine self-help guru when I’m doing this. Not sure if that’s good or not.
-I’m going to a wedding next weekend in Nottingham on my own. The only other person I know there is the groom, I’ve only met his wife-to-be once and she was on a cross-trainer thingy. He’s sat with me his band mates so we should all have similar tastes in music so I think I’ll cope with the ceremony and the meal ok. It’s the evening do that panics me somewhat. I am quite chatty but with people I know, I’m useless at just starting conversations with strangers. So how do I survive this without spending most of the time hiding in the toilets waiting to go to my hotel?
This is quite similar to the fresher question, but you had me at ‘I’ve only met her once and she was on a cross-trainer’.
I don’t want to sound like some kind of, er, alcoholic, but assuming you are not a teetotaller, you will find drinking a huge help in this situation. This may seem to contradict my advice about not getting repeatedly hammered in Freshers’ Week but I never said drinking wasn’t a good idea as a social lubricant. It’s absolutely invaluable. It’s just you have to be in control of it, rather than having it forced on you. At a wedding – unlike in some fresher-type situations – you should be able to get in control of it. If you’re anything like me, you will find it considerably easier to talk to strangers after, say, two glasses of wine, especially if they’ve also had two glasses. You might be alarmed that you’re sounding like a bit of a twat when your inhibitions are lifted, but chances are you’re not, and also, you will never see most of these people again. Make the most of the short-term-ness of your acquaintance. Nothing to lose socially, Go for it.
And last one for now, seems an appropriate note to end on:
-My girlfriend thinks it’s rude of me to always check Mark’s blog at about quarter to midnight every night, even though we may be in a nightclub (a nice one) dancing, or eating dinner, or something else similar. She clearly doesn’t understand the sadness I will feel on the blogless day.
A more honourable addiction than crisps, at least from my point of view. I like the phrase ‘the blogless day’ and will be using it to namecheck this ghastly possibility in future.
I’ve tried to minimise the number of nail-biting late-night entries recently, but occasionally there will still be one, and yes, relationships are going to be put under strain. Make no mistake, if you keep following this blog for ten years, other aspects of your life will be ruined. But, hey. Choices.
…that literally is all I’ve got time for, but as I mentioned, I’ll return to what I like to call the Difficulty Desk towards the end of this week. And now, thanks to Australian time, I’m going to astound UK readers by posting this in the first hour of the day. No anxious waiting this time! Am I good to you?
Posted by squoozles on October 8, 2010
Did we ever get the 2nd part? Think I may have missed it due to lameness.
Posted by Sam on September 23, 2010
Question:
How do you compere a comedy evening? I’ve done some stand-up, I’m not running the Universities comedy society (Look for Portsmouth HeavyHands on Facebook, come watch us perform if you’re in Portsmouth, if not its probably not worth the travel) and as such I shall be compereing (compering?) our evenings. Do you write it like stand-up? How much material should I do? And any other hints or tips you may have.
Ta.
Posted by Aislinn on September 14, 2010
A proper comment, if I may.
Crisps. I used to snack a lot late at night before going to bed. I read an article on how to stop this once and only ever remembered two points from the article. One was to paint your nails, to distract you from the fact there is possible food nearby. This may or may not be applicable, due to boy/girl issues (there is no name by the question; I am not sure) and the fact that you can’t really paint your nails whilst walking round a shop, say.
The second one is to clean your teeth regularly, or keep gum on you all the time. Having fresh breath makes you less likely to snack, as you like, well, the fresh-breathness of it all, I suppose. And if you’re chewing gum, you’d be hard-pressed to eat crisps at the same time.
Blog checking: I do this. If it’s socially unacceptable/I’m around people I don’t know too well or have met for the first time, I do it anyway. Or just sit around thinking about nothing else and getting a bit paranoid. The positive of this (in case anyone hadn’t noticed already) is that there’s a lovely little online community of Mark Watson Blog Readers. (I nearly used the word Blogular. Is that a legitimate internet word that has been made up already/does it sound a bit silly?)
Posted by AmyH on September 14, 2010
Ooh, ambassador with this extra-long blog you are really spoiling us… Just kidding, you’re much better than Ferrero Rocher (and last considerably longer as well).
You’re absolutely right about Freshers’ week, and about the crisps as well – you have to cut off the supply by not buying! And as a former crisps addict, I recommend nuts as an alternative. I like unsalted cashews best, but you can always wean off more slowly by going for dry-roasted first.
Elin – (delayed response) I was very interested in your photography project, and went to have a look at the pictures, they are lovely! Not sure if this will help you, but my ideas would be perhaps you could write a fictional memoir/ diary entry for the buildings about their lives – or a more real-life social commentary about how the lives of the people that lived in the buildings would have been shaped by the buildings themselves… Although what Chris P said sounds good!
Posted by Chris H on September 14, 2010
Wow – Star Letter!! I am honoured. Thanks for the advice. I took your point that no move is permanent as a starting point for a “talk” with Richard last night. It was good to get it out in the open – no decisions have been made, but at least we’re talking about it, and it looks likely that we will move or at least downsize. So, if anyone fancies a trip to Woodbridge, best to put your name forward now…
It is 15 years since I was a fresher, and reading the comments here has brought back the cold fear of the first few hours/days. I found it difficult for the first week, and then things gradually fell into place. By Christmas, I was sorry to be going home. My advice is don’t put pressure on yourself to have the perfect freshers’ week – it takes time to get to know people and for them to get to know you.
Posted by SamJJ on September 14, 2010
Sound advice Mr Watson as per usual!
Just wanted to say I finally got round to sponsoring your run efforts and that Eleven is a cracking read!!
I read most of it in the car on the way to my Mum’s in Wales and finished it the next day while the baby had an unusually long nap.
Getting through it quickly was a double win. I really wanted to know what happened in the story and it left me the rest of the week to catch up on sleep whenever I could hand G over to the grandparents
Posted by Mariam on September 14, 2010
…this was really good! I’m not as surprised as that comment made me sound, actually, but I enjoyed reading this. I really related to the Fresher’s question (I start university in Wales at the beginning of October and I’m quite nervous), but all of them were answered brilliantly.
Posted by Ally on September 14, 2010
I’m not really any good at giving advice but since I’m a fresher (though we don’t call it that here so it sounds weirds typing it
) I thought I’d add to the multitude of advice. I’ve had some problems finding people at Uni who enjoy similar things to me and I find it hard talking to people who I have nothing in common with. But I managed to find a couple of brilliant people who I get along with really well, so I’m sure you will too!
Posted by Wife on September 13, 2010
PS don’t you have to qualify to be an agony aunt? Can anyone do it? Someone might sue you for giving bad advice. Or divorce you.
Posted by Wife on September 13, 2010
Hello. I would like to say that I am hugely offended by your assertion that the person who makes the money should have control over where the family live. A family is a unit comprised of extremely complex mutual benefit, and in a marriage each contributes to family life. You earn significantly more money than me, but under no circumstances would I consider it appropriate for you to decide, regardless of my opinion, to uproot me and our baby to wherever you chose. I am currently raising your son and I consider my opinion and more importantly my input into our marriage as of equal importance to yours. You could go, because you earned the money and thought you were the boss, but at the expense of your marriage and family life.
I would text you this but I am publicly offended and wanted to flag up the contradiction in your advice. If that’s genuinely how you feel we ought to have a chat!
Yours, wife x
Posted by heatherooo on September 13, 2010
This morning, I had a weird notion that I should check the blog before going off to uni, cos I had a feeling it would have been updated. And surprised as I was, there was a lovely wee blog, addressing all these queries in a very lovely manner. Including my own (which was the one about “disgustingly dirty, minging flatmates”, by the way). I have taken your suggestions on board and will further attempt to address the situation. However, as you’ve also suggested, if that doesn’t work, I will more than happily come back for a more drastic plan.
I’m very much loving this idea in general. How lovely of you to offer to give solutions to people’s worries and general annoyances, despite how busy you must be. It’s very kind of you to be so lovely.
Posted by lisan66 on September 13, 2010
I like the last question! Whenever I’m in my friend’s house, or she’s here (about three times a week) I insist on checking it. She finds it strange, but kind of just goes ‘Oh the bloggy thingy’ whenever I check it
Posted by Carl on September 13, 2010
Great advice as ever. Although, I feel somewhat ashamed of my crisp addiction now that it’s been labelled somewhat unhonourable.
To those going to Uni: It’s easy for me to say, but just embrace it. Embrace the freedom, adventure, new and varied experiences and cultures you’ll meet. Things may get tough. But they’ll also be wonderful times. Times you’ll never forget.
The most exciting thing for me is that you are given the chance to grow in to who or what you want to be.
If it means anything to you all going to Uni, I’d trade it all on for one more week there. x
Posted by soo on September 13, 2010
Erm, yeah, so here’s the embarrassing thing… my missing comment from before kind of reappeared all by itself… Tra la… I’m blaming my droid for not displaying properly. Sometimes I really miss the REAL internet
In short, my question was about being a big fatty and getting body confidence – but was a bit more upbeat than that!
Posted by ChrisP on September 13, 2010
Whoever has the problem with the nail, it’s probs best to leave it, nails are used in bed construction for a reason. But don’t loose sleep over it (boom boom!). I think I’ll leave the jokes to Mark now.
Also, Someones experiences mirror mine very closely too. I’ve already moaned about how much I hate cheap vod and crappy nightclubs but DON’T go the opposite way and become a recluse. Once everybody else has made friends and social circles it’s very tricky to just join in a few weeks later. Just have fun your way and get involved somewhere.
I will let the lovely lady know she has a mention on the blog, maybe she’ll like that. Maybe.
It does fascinate me how many people couples have met over here in Cambridge. Must be something about it.
Posted by Lydia on September 13, 2010
“for a shy fresher” is kind of an interesting to say five times fast.
I love your advice, Mark. I know it sounds stupid, but thanks for being so nice. I really look forward to your blogs.
Posted by Laurs on September 13, 2010
I am concerned about the nail… i’ve all sorts of worst case scenario type things going through my head! Would banging it in further to the frame with a big hammer not work?
And for those freshers, my advice is just talk to people where ever you are. I met one of my best friends by asking for directions to the canteen and the other two by being on a quiz team next to them. My team were full of teetotallers who were playing for the booby prize of a bottle of squash, these other random people next to us thought we were insane. a chance comment led to me defecting to their teams and making two of the best friends I could ask for.
I’ve met a lot of good friends through random meetings but I decided to just embrace the whole experience, after all it’s only one week, do what you want, when you want, with who you want!
Posted by Rhian on September 13, 2010
This isn’t really very specific advice, but it might help a bit with some of those Fresher Week scenarios where you feel you really must have a good time and are missing out if you don’t go and do such and such. It’s probably something that everyone knows already, but it’s only just dawned on me in the last year or two. I work in a reasonably sociable place, and am lucky to actually like quite a few my colleagues, indeed, some of them are even friends. Fairly regularly we go out to the pub and what not. There was a time when I felt I absolutely must go and would be missing out if I didn’t, but in more recent times I it has dawned on me that whilst I probably would enjoy myself, and usually do, if I’m not in the mood, or can’t go it is absolutely fine, there will be more opportunities in the future, I’m not missing out. This has taken quite a shift in the way I think about going out.
As for Fresher’s advice: a) I would definately back up the the joining a society or club thing. It’s where I met my husband-if-we-were-married-but-we’re-not (never sure what to call him, not very comfortable with either partner or boyfriend). In fact most of the people I stay in touch with were through clubs rather than my course/first year living situation. b) Earplugs.
To the nail person, there are few situations that can’t be improved with a bit of duct tape.
Posted by Someone on September 13, 2010
You know, Mark, I don’t want to sound ungrateful but this post being up so early, I tried to read it before work, and it being so long, this made me late. I accept your apologies in advance.
I of course joke; I love any assistance in procastination. I just had to leave the last two ‘letters’ til after work in the end, and this, of course, is all entirely pointless information.
The only thing I might be able to help with here would be Freshers’ advice, purely because, like many, I once was one.
When I went to uni, I took a positive attitude because I never had a shedload of friends at school/college, or at least none I really liked, so I was keen to be bold (which is entirely unlike me, for the most part) and start out ‘fresh’! Soo basically I tried really hard in that week to talk to everyone and have a laugh. Unfortunately the uni where I ended up was probably not the best place for me as it was full of stuck-up rich kids who wouldn’t give you the time of day if you weren’t wearing Jack Wills, or whatever they’re called. Pyjamas. But the point is! I still found some really good friends! They were in the minority at my particular campus, but there are always people out there who share your interests/just want to have a laugh, so just be who you are, don’t try and fit in if that’s not… who you are, and you will have a brilliant time.
Also one thing I wish I’d done more of now that I’m out of uni is societies and clubs. Make the most of their abundance and variety – sommat for everyone and all, cheap for the most part and will give you a lot of interesting opportunities to fill your 3 years, rather than just sitting in your room eating crisps, which is also an option, especially for addicts. I feel for you, fellow potato-snack chum. You will all be fine.
Posted by Steph on September 13, 2010
Thanks for answering the question about your unusual book. My shelf isn’t too disrupted, it just means that you can’t go next to my copy of Hitchhiker’s Guide but horizontally across the complete works of Jane Austen. No big deal
I’m going to be a fresher in two weeks’ time! I hope my flatmates who I’m sharing a kitchen with aren’t “Disgustingly dirty, minging”!
Finally, I really hope that nail gets removed fast.
Posted by Tom Beasley on September 13, 2010
You must spend ages sifting through all of these and coming up with advice! It’s genuinely very impressive.
Posted by Georgie on September 13, 2010
Was lovely to see you at the book launch tonight! Wish I had more time to read these blogs… As it is I can only come on here every few days! Hopefully uni will be less crazy shortly, though. This is what I get for doing a science degree with 25 contact hours a week!
Fantastic advice as usual, and I look forward to seeing you on Sunday x
Posted by Rachael on September 13, 2010
I agree with the freshers advice, if you know you will hate whatever event is going on you will probably regret it more if you go and have a dreadful time than if you just stuck to your guns and said no.
Posted by Misha on September 13, 2010
I was surprised to find this, so surprised infact that i’ve just read it still all soggy and wrapped in a towel from the shower. (yes, I do check it at intervals throughout the day, just incase)
Excellent freshers advice, i’m moving out the day after tomorrow, so now reaching the point of panic where a full blown migraine/mental breakdown is only really a matter of time.
Oh and I should also note for other paniced freshers, there’s more good advice on the forum:
http://www.markwatsonfans.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=239&start=60
Posted by Aislinn on September 13, 2010
A quick comment before I go to work (yes, I shall be posting a much more long-winded one later if that’s okay, please and thank-you) to say I am genuinely quite worried about the nail/bed person. Please get rid of the nail.
Posted by Madeleine on September 13, 2010
Ha! I was of course being sarcastic with the “crone” comment. You are completely right, I am actually VERY excited about university, thanks for reminding me!
To the people with messy housemates – I am very untidy (not squalid, I just kind of let things fall about) and usually I genuinely can’t see the mess, don’t know what I’m doing. If it’s the case for your people, then they should have no resentment if you point out their mess nicely. If they’re doing out of disrespect of your space, then that’s a whole other problem and probably will be very hard to fix.
Posted by Tibbs on September 13, 2010
I definitely recommend against leaving notes for flatmates or tenants or the like; a few years back my friends and I rented out my friend’s mother’s house for a month, and I’m still annoyed at that woman for the amount of notes she left us. It’s always so much harder to convey your tone in a note; it makes it easier for people to take offense.
Posted by Rachel Winter on September 13, 2010
How lovely that you met both Emily and Tim Key at uni. What a talented year that was, not to mention just totally nice people.
Posted by MusicalLottie on September 13, 2010
Goodness me, for the first time in many, many weeks I’m up and on the internet gone midnight (GMT) – and you post a Very Early blog instead of a Very Late one. I think the world just turned itself upside-down …
(When typing that it dawned on me that you are, literally, upside-down compared to us. There was no appalling semi-pun intended.)
Um, the only advice I can give to any of the above is to the person with the nail dilemna: REMOVE THE NAIL! Otherwise you *will* be cutting yourself for the rest of your life.
Mark, I must say that I like it when people in the public eye are cautious about how much of their family life is made known; it shows consideration and respect
Posted by Kathryn on September 13, 2010
You are very good to those of us crazy enough to still be awake at ten to one on a sunday night. Or, technically, monday morning.
Thank you for the freshers advice (Mark and everyone else who commented on the other blog). I went to an early freshers event last week and it really helped to meet some of the people going to my college and doing my course. Hopefully none of the people I met thought I was mental. Or at least, the guy I’m sharing a kitchen with seems equally mental, so we should get on fine.
Posted by Rachel/Pandora on September 13, 2010
You are good to us, yes.
I will attempt to offer my (limited) advice when I am more awake…