I left home when I was 18 and, aside from popping back for the odd slice of banana bread or Sunday Lunch, I’ve lived independently ever since. I’ve had some rather nice addresses I must say, from living in super lovely WC1 to overlooking the sea on Third Avenue, Hove.

I’ve lived at my current London address for 18 months now, but this weekend marks the end of the first ever week that I have lived completely on my own.

So one week into solitary living, these are my thoughts on the pros and cons of living alone…

• When you return home from work everything is exactly where you left it, no more hunting for the mobile phone charger which has miraculously disappeared since you used it that morning. But, if you left the place messy in the morning, there is zero chance it has been tidied by the time you return.

• You get an entire bed to yourself, which means the joys of sleeping diagonally can be fully experienced and appreciated. The duvet is yours and only yours. But, the chances of a bit of hanky-panky are (understandably) greatly reduced when you’re sleeping alone.

• You never go to wash your hair/brush your teeth/clean the dishes and find that the shampoo/toothpaste/fairy liquid has been finished by somebody else and not replaced. But, you take full financial responsibility for all of these annoying items that aren’t fun to shop for but are life’s little necessities.
  

• It’s your night to choose what’s for dinner, every night of the week. No more arguing over whether spag bol deserves a weekly appearance on the menu (or was that just in my relationship?!). But, it’s always your turn to wash up.

• When you want to work, sleep or relax you can actually do so in complete silence. But, sometimes it’s just a bit quieter than you’d really like it to be.

• The wardrobe is yours. The wardrobe is yours. The wardrobe is yours. I dare you to find a downside to this point.

I was terrified I’d be lonely living on my own, but I find the pros definitely outweigh the cons (so far). I’m a bit confused as to how I will do ‘the big shop’ at Sainsburys on my own sans car, how do single vehicle-less people get their bags home?! I may as well warn you now that you may find yourself being drafted in to help me with that one.

I am praying to G-d, Jesus, Allah, Buddha, Versace and anyone that will listen that I can negotiate my rent down so that I can afford to live here on my own for the foreseeable future. Otherwise, on the 15th of April I’ll be moving into new digs, most likely a flatshare with a bunch of strangers…an idea I find truly terrifying.

You know when you’re a kid and the Top 10 is about the most exciting event of the entire week? For me, it was even better than going for fish & chips after swimming club. The Top 40 itself was worth getting giddy for but when you got to the Top 10 you knew you were on to something special. After all, in them days you actually needed to sell quite a few copies of a single to make it in the charts. I remember the first two singles I bought with my own money, I bought them on the same day in an HMV in Chester and they were cassettes. It was 1998.

The singles?

‘Horny’ by Mousse T and ‘It’s Like That’ by Run DMC (Jason Nevins remix).

I still count ‘It’s Like That’ as one of my all time favourite choons and I don’t know what it says about me that I was singing ‘I’m horny’ at the top of my lungs when I was, ahem, 11.

Anyway, I digress.

Here’s the top ten new things with me…

1. I have an iPhone. It was a Valentine’s present to myself, because if you can’t love you then you can’t expect anyone else to. I’m a big fan of Tweetie, Locly and my new pet Koi carp.

2. I attended London Twestival. And wasn’t it lovely? A real treat to meet lots of online peeps in the ‘real world’ and to catch up with all those I’m fortunate enough to already spend a lot of time with…and all in the name of charity:water. Get drunk and save lives? Yes please.

3. I watched Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid. I highly recommend you do the same if you like to laugh and wish we all lived in the dizzyingly glamourous world of Film Noir. Films like this one make me wish I smoked, it always looks so god darn sexy in black and white.

4. I nearly had a pigeon in my bank account. My new marital status means I’m looking for new digs, Spareroom has been a source of strength for me as I’m probably going to share with a bunch of strangers (as scary as I find the idea). I fell in love with a one bed apartment in Holborn which turned out to be a scam, if you see any ads where the contact email is atameliat@googlemail.com…run for the hills.

5. Globrix had a love-in with Twitter. We’ve integrated a ‘tweet this property’ button into all of our property listings on Globrix, so now you can pimp your favourite properties to your Twitter friends with one easy click.

6. @PropertyPorn was born. Love sexy houses? Like to pretend you have a few zillion pounds in a Swiss bank account somewhere? Follow @PropertyPorn for your daily fix of hardcore homes.

7. I realised that I need to sort my health out. I don’t know if it’s the Jade Goody tragedy on the front of every red top paper, or just the fact that for a 21 year old I seem to be sick pretty much all of the time, but I’m going to sort my life the hell out. The boys at work say BMF is the answer. I’m sure fruit and veg is involved too. It starts next week…but this time I mean it, kinda.

8. I admitted that Eastenders is a bit rubbish at the moment. I know, a bit late to the game aren’t I?

9. I watched a lot of Flight of the Conchords. And I wondered, why is Bret not my boyfriend? We were clearly meant to be.

10. I continued with the never ending mission in my head to marry Dustin Hoffman. I could make him so happy if given half a chance.

And that’s about it. A lot less exciting than a real Top 10 chart, but I didn’t make any guarantees at the beginning of this post, did I? Hmmmm.

What the hell is wrong with me, do I have no discipline? Evidently not. Hence, this blog post is a week later than I would have liked to have posted it. But there my negativity will end, because meeting Jeff Pulver last week was a real treat. Positivity from this point forward :)

So, last week Mr Pulver hosted his first ever breakfast in London taaaahn. Around 50 people descended on the ICA to meet the man himself and, of course, to network with each other. I’ve been an avid follower of Jeff on Twitter (@JeffPulver), we’ve chatted on Facebook and we nearly met a couple of times in Israel, but the timing was always a little skew-whiff. But although we’ve conversed a lot on t’internet, I had never met Jeff ‘IRL’ until last week.

As with all of Jeff’s breakfasts, the guests were greeted with pens and stickers and encouraged to write their own personal tagline on their name badge and to keep another sticker blank for the other guests to ‘tag’ them. Now we’re all used to tagging our content online, but to tag each other…in real time? That’s nifty.

I’ve kept my tag cloud and stuck it in the back of my diary as it’s a nice little reminder of the event. Some of the people tagging me where complete strangers, others people I’ve spent a lot of time with.

Don’t worry, I know I’m crap at taking pictures (maybe I should upgrade from the camera on my mobile?!) so I have done the honourable thing and typed out my tags…

• Social Medium
• Girl
• Lush (from @PhilCampbell, who is rather luscious himself)
• Trusty Person
• I am content
  
• Twit Chick
• Star on 12Seconds.TV
• Followed by many
• Muse (awwww, thanks Jeff!)
• Touch texts
• Listen (i.e don’t just look, from the lovely @loudmouthman)
• Look up (i.e away from my booby area, again the always cheeky @loudmouthman)
  
• I like your glasses
• Likes chocolate
• Tuc Tuc
• Shower Periods (that one was the charming @PaulWalsh, see previous post for context!)

I liked tagging others and I liked being tagged, it was a great way to network. If you ever get a chance to go to one of Jeff’s breakfast, then go dammit!

I was also lucky enough to have dinner one on one with Jeff that evening, many wise words were shared…but now I’m just showing off.