A moving account 3

Before

When everything is quite impossible, with too many things left to do and not enough time or bubblewrap left, and a nasty little fear is gnawing at your vitals that a flying freehold spanner has just been jammed in the works, what you need is:

a) your cheerful hairdresser coming round first thing to sort out your grey roots and   unmanageable hair while making you laugh;

b) lovely friends coming a long way to visit (arriving too early - my hair was still being dried, but no matter) and - oh heaven! - bringing lunch with them. Anne has posted pictures on her blog; we interrupted our double helpings of lemon meringue pie to take poor Tosca - by tumbril - to the hated grooming parlour;

After

c) several calls from estate agents and solicitors to say, in varying tones of over-optimism and over-doom-ladenness (as per the nature of their jobs), that the flying freehold will be sorted but that my move on Monday is not being jeopardised;

d) a slow walk through the Dene, under dripping trees, breathing the lovely damp, woody scents after so much rain, not caring about my carefully-dried hair turning back into kinks;

e) and returning home to find the loveliest email from my vendor, assuring me that all will be well, all will be sorted out (by her), and adding "Don't worry about the flying wotsit - who cares, eh - it will get sorted one way or the other".

The only thing that could have made things even better was to find that the packing elves had been in while I was out walking, and had finished the awful, tedious, soul-destroying task of gathering together all those little fiddly things that are impossible to pack logically. But the slackers hadn't called, and now I must do it myself.

Soon, we can all relax.

6 days to go......