I am trying to organize to send my books here. I don't know how many books I have, nor how much they weigh. I think it's in the order of hundreds (rather than tens or thousands). They take up about 6 metres of shelving, but that's a mix of all different sizes of books and all different sizes of shelves!

I have two options: I can ship them, which costs £300 for a maximum of 1 cubic metre with no restriction on weight, or I can post them, which costs about £100 per 30 kg with fairly generous restrictions on volume. It seems like the second option is better, but I just don't have a feel for how many books I can fit in to either 1 cubic metre or 30 kg. (The other advantage of the posting method is that if I can't fit all the books in one parcel, I can send two parcels, and the price just increases proportionately. With the shipping, if it's more than 1 cubic metre the price jumps right up.) I have driven myself crazy trying to ask Google how much books generally weigh; the words are too common to get anything meaningful.

So I'm going to ask LJ instead; there's got to be someone here who nows the answer to this, or knows where to look, or at least has a better feel for these spatial things than I do!

The other options are crazy ones involving basically bringing the books here myself. I can carry about 20 kg of books in my suitcase if I fly home and come back with them, which would cost in the order of £100 per trip plus masses of hassle. And I could do it repeatedly. Or, my parents have conceived an ambition to drive to Sweden. If I could pay for them to do this, which I think would cost in the order of £500, they could bring me an entire car full of books. Or thirdly, I could, you know, go and spend £300 on new books on Amazon and get them to deliver them in one huge parcel, but I don't think I would get very many books for that money.

So, what is the cheapest way to end this unbearable situation of being bookless?

Let's see. I've basically not been online at all since Monday. I've missed you guys!

( if you care what I've been up to )

Between 5 o'clock Friday evening, when I saw the parents off, and 9 o'clock, a whole series of stupid little things went wrong. With the cumulative stress of starting out in a new country and not getting enough sleep or enough to eat for a couple of weeks, I got everything out of proportion. I couldn't think of ways to deal with these minor problems and I was frustrated by all the little things here I don't know how to do here. Happily, I got a nice email from rysmiel, which was very cheering, and then I phoned pseudomonas who was wonderful and came up with lots of practical suggestions and distracted me with interesting conversation. I love my friends; thank you for being there.

The only one of the problems that is at all serious is that, having told me it was very important to buy a computer through the university purchasing scheme, the financial department have now turned round and said I can't do that after all. I don't at all mind buying my own computer; that's what I was intending to do anyway. But I would greatly have preferred to do it when I was back in England, where I know the system (and have the ability to buy things by mail order, which I don't here, either online or by phone). Now that I'm in a sensible mood I can see that the only consequence is minor hassle; it will be harder to find what I want, and I may end up paying slightly over the odds, but it's not at all impossible. Of course, it does mean that it will take me longer to get online than I was hoping, which is a pain. I'm annoyed with the department for messing me around, but on the plus side at least I can buy something which isn't Dell. Meh.

Oh, and I'm starting Swedish lessons on Tuesday. It's an intensive, Ulpan type course taught entirely in Swedish and with emphasis on getting speaking confidence. I think that will stand me in good stead to learn the language, and also make me feel less of an idiot because I'll be able to deal with simple small talk in shops and the like. Also, learning is good.

Now to catch up on at least some of the friends page for the week.

There are few things more annoying than having a social event I really, really wanted to go to, and failing to make it, not because of any external circumstances, but because of my own sheer ineptitude. Basically, I spent a large part of yesterday afternoon getting lost, and therefore failed to attend a BBQ with a bunch of "the international community" from work, people I really need to get to get know socially. Besides the fact that I'd promised I would attend; I hope people won't hold my non-appearance against me.

Getting lost was not bad luck, it was my fault for being stupid in several ways: firstly having no sense of direction in the first place, secondly for just writing down directions and not bothering to take my map with me, thirdly for being too bloody stubborn to admit I was lost until I'd already been wandering in the wrong direction for several hours, fourthly for being embarrassed about my inability to speak Swedish and therefore not asking for directions. So generally, I sucked quite a lot yesterday.

The other thing that happened was that I moved out of the basement and into the flat. So the morning was spent shlepping and assembling furniture, with a lot of very kind help from my landlord (who also fed me lunch). And today was spent first acquiring cleaning things and then using them.

It occurs to me that this is a lot like starting college, in several ways. ( Why? )

It will take some time and some effort and some money (the latter I don't really have just now) before the place is as I like it. But on the whole, it's good to have my own place. Yes.

I'm in Sweden. I can't get into the place I'm staying until my kind hosts have finished work, which means I can't get rid of my huge heavy bag. This makes it extremely tempting to spend the waiting time wasting all my money in an internet cafe!

Anyway, I thought I'd have at least a brief internet fix (though I might be sensible and not just hang out here for the next two hours), so I saw all your kind messages when I logged on just now. Thank you all so much, I really appreciate having such lovely friends.

Other than that, nothing to report. I have been awake too many hours already, and I'm tired and bored. But nothing bad has happened.

I'm getting up stupid early tomorrow to leave for Sweden. I haven't accomplished half the things I wanted to get done before leaving, but I have more or less packed at least. And you really don't want to know about the self-recrimination loop I'm on the brink of; it's about as interesting as the effects abject terror is having on my guts. I'll very likely feel a lot better in a few days once I'm there and starting to get settled.

Weight and space restrictions mean I only have room for three small paperbacks. This could easily turn into one of those Desert Island type memes, couldn't it? I've taken The Stone Canal (Ken Macleod), Possession (AS Byatt) and Golden Witchbreed (Mary Gentle), which is partly to do with what I have available in small paperback format rather than being my three absolute favourite books in the world.

I feel bad about complaining, because there are several people on my friends list who have been made homeless at short notice this week. I'm in a state about a move I've known about for weeks, so it's entirely my fault I've failed to get organized. Anyway, from the depths of the self-inflicted stress of being six hours away from emigrating, I send my best supportive thoughts to everyone who has serious housing issues to contend with.

And love to everyone in general. I will try to check in when I can but I'm not expecting to be fully back online for a few weeks. Email is probably the best way to get hold of me but even that will not totally reliable for a while. Don't panic if you don't hear from me; if anything goes wrong (short of being abducted by aliens or total amnesia) I will do my level best to get a message to LJ. I'll also try not to drop off the planet if things are going well, but basically, no news is good news at this point.

There's nothing more I can do to prepare apart from sleep, I think.

Er, well, actually this post is mainly about shopping, but that would be a much more boring title! I decided to go into town yesterday in order to get a few things I need for moving. But Mum and Granny got on my back about buying new clothes, which I don't really need (now or ever), and the trip turned into this marathon clothes shopping expedition of doom. But boobies were involved too, so I supopse that makes it a bit better.

( shopping report )

Anyway, the promised boobies. I did the Bravissimo thing, as recommended by a number of well-endowed friends. It was an interesting experience; their idea is that instead of measuring you with a tape-measure, the assisant watches you trying bras on and adjusts the size until you get something that fits perfectly. Which is probably a good idea, given the vagaries of clothes manufacturers generally! And it wasn't too intrusive; the assistant was very matter-of-fact about it, which I very much approve of. She offered to go out of the room while I changed bras, so even if you were shy you wouldn't have to do deal with a stranger seeing you topless; I'm not shy, and her obviously sensible attitude meant I didn't care.

I came out as 32E, in line with the Bravissimo theory that most women need to go down in back size and up in cup size to get a good fit. But 32E is really into Barbie doll territory! I can cope with the idea of being an E-cup, but how can there only be 32 inches around my chest?! Anyway, I bought this bra in the end. It's functional rather than wonderful, but I am impressed with how well it fits. Oh, and it's slightly more expensive than I would normally pay for a basic M&S bra, but not ridiculously so. And they didn't pressure me into buying anything, which I was worried about with all that personal attention.

Bravissimo has a good range, including sexy, plain, colourful, feminine, something for almost every taste. And this was reflected by their clientele, which did seem to include women of all ages and dress styles (I'm assuming people's tastes in bras vaguely reflects their tastes in outer clothes, but of course one never knows!) The trouble is that what I want in a bra is that it should be made mostly out of cotton (synthetics against my skin are sweaty and horrible), and that it should not have a horrible piece of wire under my breasts. And in any lingerie shop those preferences restrict my choices a bit. The assistant said that underwired styles are lot less uncomfortable if they fit properly, and she did demonstrate this principle, but I still prefer elastic rather than wire.

The other thing that's interesting about Bravissimo is the area where you wait to be assigned to a fitter. It's nice, with comfy chairs and a generally pleasant ambience. But the table has a stack of men's magazines! Obviously they have a lot of customers who drag bored boyfriends along and make them wait while they're being fitted. And they're carefully chosen men's magazines too, hobby mags and Men's Health and so on, rather than lad mags. I can imagine that women waiting for bra fitting would feel very uncomfortable if there were a stack of Nuts and Loaded in the waiting area! Interesting anthropological observation, though.

Anyway, that shopping trip took about 7 hours, which is time I can't really afford and is an extremely annoying way to waste a whole day. Also, I feel as if I'm sickening for something, something vaguely tonsilitis shaped. Which I really don't need when I'm about to move to Sweden! I really hope I'm wrong.

So. I have booked a one-way flight to Sweden for 27^th April.

...

Nothing organized, but it will be. I'm playing the same trick as I did when I set myself a hard deadline to make myself finish my thesis.

You might not see me on LJ very much in the next few weeks. Please write emails, even if you'd normally just rely on my keeping up with you via LJ; emails will cheer me up a lot even if I can't check them every single day.

---

I wouldn't in a million years wish for Screwy to be stuck in bed for a week, but I'm still selfishly glad I got to spend some extended time with him this week. He left while I was on the phone to my future landlord finalizing things, so I didn't get to say goodbye to him. But hey, he's my brother, he'll be around.

I decided to schedule some time with pseudomonas yesterday. I don't see him enough because I tend to take him for granted, assuming that since he lives in the same city, I can see him any time... and then never make arrangements. But anyway, he had bank holiday Monday off, so we had a very pleasant day together.

It started off annoyingly due to train stupidity, but we met up in the end. I found a very cool patchwork padded jacket in the market for £1 (I love that jumble stall, I really do). And we had a picnic on Jesus Green; it was a lovely spring day for most of the time we were outdoors, which is really pleasing.

Then to the Fitzwilliam to see thir Blake exhibition. This turned out to be a small thing, mainly a couple of dozen plates from Jerusalem, The Emanation of the Giant Albion. So the rest of the afternoon was for quality time with the ceramics.

Lots of lovely conversation. I'm getting a bit stressed about the move to Sweden because I'm supposed to be going there next week and haven't really got the practical details sorted out yet. Nor have I written the grant application I'm supposed to be working on, and it would be starting on a really bad foot not to get that done before the deadline. But pseudomonas was really reassuring. I am going to do this, I am going to just turn up in a foreign country with a couple of suitcases and just see what happens. It's just that it's going to happen awfully soon, rather than at some point in the distant future!