Nest hunting

While Spongebub Fetuspants continues to live the life aquatic in my uterus, we have been on a frantic flat search to house the bundle when it arrives.

It's a bittersweet process, as we love the flat we live in at the moment, but it has very baby-unfriendly stairs to climb, and a rather polluted environment to chill in. Not to mention the flying bags of dried seafood to dodge each time delivery day comes around...

And so we have had to ask ourselves a few questions – do we compromise and submit our little'un to the unsavoury life of our current place? Do we submit ourselves to the market's sky-high rental prices and find another tiny flat in the middle of town? Or do we move out to the middle of nowhere with no friends to get the benefit of a garden? Just thinking about it is exhausting.

And exhausted I'll be, no doubt (I googled "typical day with a newborn baby" and almost threw myself out of the window), so perhaps being a million miles from any sort of cultural or cerebral stimulation would be relaxing. Then again, maybe it would be a mistake - I'd be too tired to move myself to see my old acquaintances, and ever keep abreast of what's going on around town. Not great for an editor – it would be best for me to actually know what was going on...

In any case, we are keeping our options open. We have seen village houses in a field, with wild dogs roaming and cicadas singing; we have seen Mordor-style towers with 2,000 flats piled up high; we have seen tiny rabbit cages with lacquered floors... None of it has grabbed me yet.

How am I supposed to know what I'll want when little chickpea arrives?