Wrong? Right? Which?

Mr Trendy Specs the estate agent called round yesterday to take a picture of the shower room, in order to update the details concerning my house. He began by stating "So you've lost a bedroom!" in a somewhat critical tone, but after he saw the new room, and heard how almost every viewer last year had asked if there was just the one bathroom in the house, he changed his tune.

He thinks that the house sale can only be enhanced by this new addition, despite the loss of a bedroom, and that the price should remain as it was. Jolly good! I'd had no idea which way this would go, and had worried a little about having made a mistake.

He was optimistic that a sale would happen this year - well, he has to sound optimistic, doesn't he - and took my slightly critical feedback about last year's service on the chin. We agreed that a new stair carpet would also help - recent months of heavy traffic hasn't helped the old one, and I swear that it's now more cat hair than carpet fibre, despite the strenuous effort that Margery puts in every week with the hoover. Lottie is a one-cat resistance movement.

So that's the next job for me - finding a carpet that will take the daily wear and tear, cat and dog trampling, claw-sharpening, hair-shedding, and look good for at least the time it takes to sell. I shall have to take the old carpet up myself - a chore to be feared, given what I know will be revealed: the 'understains' as the old detergent ads used to call them, in this case years of little donations from a series of ancient or protesting cats. I couldn't inflict this job on anyone else.

My house: The Never-Ending Story.