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Scotsman
15-05-2025
- Business
- Scotsman
I sold my Edinburgh property in three weeks and I'm feeling smug
Arcady - I'd almost given up, then it happened Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... I didn't see a black cat anywhere, and a seagull didn't splat on me. Nonetheless, my luck changed rather quickly a week or so ago. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad I felt like I'd never sell my Edinburgh property, then, boom, after getting four unexpected notes of interest and another informal one, we decided to go to closing. In the end, we received an offer we couldn't refuse, from buyers who aren't in a chain and are a perfect fit for our flat. They're having a baby, and this is a very family-friendly area. They're going to love it. It took a while for the news to sink in. I kept waiting for the catch, but it didn't come. On the day itself, I felt a bit dazed and frazzled. It didn't help that the estate agent read the offers out, lowest first, so I expended about a year's worth of adrenaline in one three-minute phone call. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad However, though selling a house is largely dependent on chance, I have started to feel pretty chuffed with myself. After all, we weren't passive sellers. Instead, we tap-danced to within an inch of our lives. There aren't many circumstances in life, where you can say you put in the work, and actually reaped the benefits. It certainly doesn't usually happen to me. We were like a pair of dung beetles, heaving those stinky boulders up the hill, for three weeks. I thought they'd come rolling down again and crush us flat, but they didn't. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad We tidied, cleaned, lit the candles, bought pretty marguerite daisies and primulas, and filled a windowbox, which was formerly a pansy graveyard, with sweet-faced and joie de vivre-filled violas. That's as well as investing in a new garden bench - THAT is the secret, my friends - and placing tulips in vases on windowsills. I was only one step away from putting crisps in bowls, or pushing a tea trolley around, like Mrs Overall in Acorn Antiques. We hosted viewers with total flexibility, let them test the toilet, and poke about in cupboards, did all the things, and it paid off. I've never experienced childbirth, but they say that you forget the trauma relatively quickly. Otherwise, you'd never have any more offspring and the species would die out. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad I think moving house is a bit like that. At one point, I did say, I'm NEVER doing this again. Now, I think, yeah, that was actually quite fun. As our house begins to slide into being comfortably messy again and the petals fall off our last batch of tulips, I've already put the scariest bits behind me. I put the lid on the memory box that is marked The Weeks When I Thought We'd Never Sell Because Our Flat is a Dump, and taped it firmly shut. Sure, I'm already slightly fed up with the de-cluttering process and am dreading the stress of the actual moving day, but I think that will pale into insignificance against the buying and selling elements. As the process rolls onwards, we've even agreed a move-in date for our property, and for the new owners to get into our flat. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad I'm so excited that it's going to be in mid-July. Earlier this month, I was resigned to it being autumn or beyond. Summer was always my dream. That's when you can fall in love with a house. When you can see how the light falls. I've got a big birthday looming then, too, so I feel like a house move will distract me from feeling depressed about that, but I might also combine a house warming/birthday shindig. Anyway, though I am always prepared for disaster to strike, everything is looking positive. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad I did have a small blip, when they took a few days to confirm our preferred date, and, always a catastrophiser, I managed to convince myself that they'd changed their mind. Because, you can, at this stage. It's not legally binding yet. But, it was fine. Another hurdle jumped, as neatly as Eilidh Doyle. I don't want to get too full of myself, but our current success has also made me feel giddily deluded, as if I could actually be an estate agent when I grow up. I'd be up for the viewings, no bother. I love doing the tour - starting with the best rooms, and working your way round to the worst. If they look at broken or dusty things, distract them, by pretending to fall over. I'm sure I'd be able to write excellent schedules, now that I've pored over so many. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad I'd remember that you always have to say, in an oleaginous fashion, that you're 'delighted' to bring the property to the market. Also, I know that you upgrade areas, when they're not in the exact postcode. For example, in Edinburgh, Haymarket becomes the West End, and Slateford is suddenly Polwarth. The Grange and the New Town seem to grow bigger every day. Wherever the property is situated, it is essential to use the phrases 'sought after' and 'highly regarded' in reference to the area. There are also words like 'charming', which are code for raggle-taggle and needs a lot of work - we had that on our schedule - or phrases like 'well proportioned', when one can't think of anything better to say. You can never simply say 'spectacular', it must be preceded by 'truly', and viewing is always 'essential'. Every cul-de-sac is 'peaceful'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Yeah, I could really get into this house-selling malarkey. I know it all now. It's easy-peasy.
Telegraph
21-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Backstroke: It's a tough watch – but Celia Imrie and Tamsin Greig are superb
The chance to see Celia Imrie and Tamsin Greig on stage together – and up close at the 250-seat Donmar too – has meant that tickets are scarce for Backstroke, despite Anna Mackmin's play being flagged as a tough watch. Although the title's swimming reference is duly honoured and explained, 'stroke' is the operative word; the evening explores the distressing aftermath of one. Set those two names side by side and you'll likely think of comedy in the first instance. Aside from being in the latest Bridget Jones film, and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel hits, Imrie is still cherished as the affected Miss Babs in Victoria Wood's Acorn Antiques skits, while Greig is a darling of British sitcom who became adored as just-coping Jackie in Friday Night Dinner. Despite Imrie playing a critically ill mother called Beth, and Greig her beleaguered daughter Bo, there are aspects of the evening that play to these strengths. Mackmin's script jumps about in time, achieving an Ab Fab dynamic in its evocation of Beth as an outspoken, boho child of the Sixties – whose metier is woven sculptures – and her sensible, self-contained offspring. But there's no sugar-coating it, the core of the piece confronts what many of us will likely go through, and many of us have to witness: a medical crisis that renders a once autonomous adult incapacitated, and approaching the point of no return. A wail of ambulance sirens ushers in the sight of Imrie bed-bound in hospital, staring into space. If you're easily triggered perhaps steer clear, but catharsis may await too. Mackmin valuably catches the agonising shared powerlessness, and nigh impossible decisions on treatment. The obvious topical, and ethical, considerations around end-of-life care are only gently touched on, though, apparent most in Bo's recoiling at the issue of long-term support (this struggling TV writer has a disturbed adopted daughter to contend with). Mackmin's main focus is on huge emotional upset, the way we are borne back into the past during these crunch-moments – revisiting causes of resentment, and happier times too. The dramatic structure neatly mimics synaptic connections as it builds up the backstory, requiring the leads to convey their characters at different ages. But Mackmin, who also directs, errs towards overload. Bursts of flickery video convey a home-movie of the mind, but are distracting too. Stirring? It is, but running at two hours plus an interval, momentum flags. Even so, the production confirms Greig as one of our finest actresses – her deadpan features a surface beneath which churns so much; she can convey incredulity with a raised eyebrow, exhaustion with a sustained blink. A choked-up funeral oration achieves a wrenching sense of belated filial appreciation. And Imrie musters the complexity of this raffish, motley matriarch, who, when active, smokes at breakfast, dishes out tactless insults, divulges her sexual history with disinhibition and becomes ditzily inclined to malapropisms. A show, then, not unlike a domineering but dear relative: there's much to pick away at but much to hold on to and admire too.
