Getting on my wick

When I first came to Edinburgh, sporting a Charlie Nicholas mullet, pixie boots, frilled collars, bad specs, Lee Cooper dungarees and no clue whatsoever about fashion, I moved into a flat in Morningside.

This was a top flat with no heating and you had to scrape the frost off the inside of the window to see what the weather was like every morning. I remember these days vividly, and I always vowed that in the future things would have to be really bad before I allowed myself to live in such dire, freezing surroundings.

Why is then, that tonight I am wearing several layers, have been under a blanket all evening and my nose has a permanent drip? Perhaps airy Georgian flats with high ceilings and floorboards was a bad choice after all. I thought about playing Blip Chicken, where I would surface from the depths at 11.55pm and find something to photograph but I had to get up to make another hot toddy.

Meet my candle; it would seem my last source of extra heat has just run out.