Part One

Tonight is likely going to be the last night I will spend in my flat in Sutton. Part of me is really sad about that and I'll be writing about that tomorrow, likely whilst we're in the van driving back to Manchester and hoping to avoid the traffic, but part of me isn't actually all that sad, so today I am going to write about that, because I need to remind myself that leaving tomorrow is actually a good thing, even if it doesn't necessarily feel like it right at this moment. 

For the past few years, I've lived in a flat on the high street of a town called Sutton. It's a tower block opposite a park with a high street on the other side of the building. I wanted the flat across the corridor, which was slightly more expensive, but slightly bigger, had a bathtub and a space I could have turned into a reading nook and it overlooked the park. I got the smaller, cheaper flat with the shower and the view over the high street, but it does get good sunlight, even if the view of the car park is a bit rubbish. The building is nice enough, but I'm in the section which was designated for 'Affordable Housing' which is separated from the rest of the block because this is owned by a housing association. I'm on the Intermediate Market Rent scheme to save money for a deposit for my own place.

Being in this section of the building means you're not allowed to access the car park, the gym (even if you paid the same additional fee that the 'private' section pay) or the bin store where you can separate out recycling and our lift starts at Floor 1, but the entrance is on Lower Ground, so it's a hike up two floors worth of stairs every time you enter the building. I get that we rent flats in this building by choice, but it's 20% cheaper than the market value of the area (the point of IMR) and you don't realise how knackering it's going to be after a hard day at work, with all of your shopping bags, or even for things like getting a new freezer delivered, because everything has to go up and down that one flight of stairs... Previously, the owners of the 'private' side of the building have allowed some access to the lifts on the other side of the building, which go straight to reception, but even that is no longer permitted, because of accusations of damage being caused to the lifts by residents from this side of the building. Part of me would love to point out to them that if they can pinpoint that its residents from this side, they must know who it is and should penalise that person accordingly as opposed to everyone in this section of the building. It wouldn't even by so annoying if the guy wasn't in this side of the building, the car park didn't attach to this side of the building and the buildings weren't actually, oh wait! one building... This whole thing is tedious, annoying and pretty bogus because it's only affecting those on affordable housing schemes. There was a mum with twin toddlers who was threatened with a call to the police if she kept using the "other" lifts to get her kids and their stroller downstairs safely. 

That aside, this building is WARM. It's a big concrete structure so it absorbs heat and it can feel pretty stuffy and airless in here, but as I mentioned, I'm on the high street side of the building. Sutton hasn't really got any clubs anymore, but it has bars and those bars are busy and they get loud and then the people coming out of them get loud. Every. Night. Of. The. Week. I'm all for a good time, especially at the weekend, but I don't like listening to out of tune happy birthday on a Sunday night at midnight or the two in the morning calls of 'FOOTBOLLS COM-IN OMMM' as people drunkenly stagger to the bus stops at the opposite end of the high street after getting bladdered on a Tuesday night. I especially despise that the route between my building and the high street is down a relatively large street which hosts the disabled parking bays for the area, but which seems to offer enough privacy for, sorry, I can't call them gentlemen, blokes to relieve themselves up the wall so that it smells like a urinal in the morning. It's also occasionally a game of dodge the vomit pile and that's just more than I can bear in the morning. Again, all for a good time, but one where bodily fluids of any variety are not left publicly displayed is much more preferable. 

My least favourite thing about Sutton is the hill. I hate that hill. Given how much I loved San Francisco, you might expect that I would love that long and steep hill down the high street, especially because I'm most of the way up it, so getting to the train station each more is not as hideous as if I lived at the bottom of the hill, nor do I need to hike it every day, but the McDonald's, and the ASDA and the Sainsbury's are all at the bottom of the hill, and Morrisson's just doesn't stock everything. 

Actually, the above is only my second least favourite thing. My current least favourite thing is proximity to my ex-partner's parents' house and the fact that his mother and sister work in an office building close to here, so I've seen them a couple of times. I also ran into him a couple of times in the Morrisson's pre-March so being back here gives me an unwelcome sense of discomfort that he might pop up somewhere. It shouldn't make me uncomfortable, because this is my home and I know that, but at the same time, a bit of distance from it is welcome. 

There are probably plenty of other things I could moan about on here, like how my sofa drove me insane (but that's now gone!) and the window being as vast as it is in the living room made planning the room difficult, but my final moan is about the kitchen. I bake, I cook and I like to make things in batches and then freeze them. The kitchen is tiny. I stored caking things along the top of the wall units, in one of the few cupboards, on the breakfast bar and had another unit to pack them into as well, and it still was not enough. When I did the food shopping, I had to be careful not to buy too much or it might not fit in the fridge or the cupboard doors might not close properly. It drove me insane. The washer-dryer is built in where there should be a cupboard as is the fridge, so once you factor in pans, plates and all that, there wasn't a great amount of space left for anything else and I like having a decent supply of staple foods, so that made it quite tricky. 

I feel like that is enough moaning about the flat though. It's not been awful. It was the right price and it was close to work and it's been home for three years, so I have to be really glad of that, and I am, but now is a good time to be moving out.