Managed to get up at 9am this time, though I think I spent most of the morning reading things on the internet, which is still no good.

For some reason, much of today was reading about male writers who moved to different countries. I stumbled on the blog of Karl Webster this morning. He pretended to be that ‘Ugly Man’ blogger a few years ago (I do find confessions of internet fakery fascinating). Right now, though, he is having adventures living with cats in a French forest.  Or at least he says he is.

(I don’t think anyone’s accused me of making up my own persona to write this blog. As it is, I already look like a fictional character in real life. Even my hairdresser said my too-long hair was like a bad wig…)

I also started reading Geoff Dyer’s Out Of Sheer Rage, and found myself laughing aloud on the Tube as a result. It’s his account of trying to write a book about DH Lawrence, and failing, and details all the procrastination and dithering and hindrances that occur along the way. At the start, he has the chance to move house to write the book, and can’t make up his mind where to go. Not just which area, but which country. This makes him sound quite privileged and fortunate, but his experiences are far from blissful. Early on he goes from Paris (too pricey) to Rome (too hot) and then spends six weeks on a beautiful Greek island, only to discover that after the first few days all the beauty puts him off writing, or doing anything at all. Apart from killing wasps. It’s very funny, and the procrastination thought-processes feel very familiar (Of course, I’m reading this book instead of getting on with my own writing).

I also read a Paris Review interview with the Cloud Atlas novelist David Mitchell, another British writer who’s lived in different countries: Japan and Ireland in particular.

So naturally I found myself thinking about how I’ve only ever lived in the UK (Suffolk, Bristol, London) and wondering whether I could or should give living abroad a go. I don’t have the immediate financial means to do so, but that never seems to stop people I know. Once determination takes over, they just find the money and get the sort of work which can be done on a laptop anywhere, or they take an English teaching job in the country they want to live in.

I don’t think I could do it alone. It would have to be through some external opportunity – such as the decisions of a partner (Dyer’s girlfriend in the book is an American with a flat in Rome). But I’m not the partner sort of person… (and if this were a film, the great relationship of my life would start in the next scene).

Tangier is one place I’ve thought about a lot, having gone there three times and being an ardent fan of its bohemian history. The summers would be difficult, though, given my aversion to heat – I even find London too hot in the summer. Stockholm is another favourite city which I’ve had some happy times in. So if we’re talking sheer fantasy, I’d quite like to try ‘dividing my time’ as they say on book jackets, between Stockholm and Tangier.

But who am I kidding? I’m such a Londoner. One thing I love about London is how I can suddenly decide to see a recent-ish film in a proper cinema and know it will be playing somewhere. Today I fancied seeing Midnight In Paris, the Woody Allen film. It’s been released on DVD now, but there was still one cinema showing it this evening – the Odeon Panton Street. About 50% full, too.

Quite apt to see it so soon after The Artist, given it’s another love letter to the 1920s. The Owen Wilson character is a  gushing fan of Paris during the Jazz Age, with its writers and artists – much like I am with the Tangier of the 50s and 60s. Through a bit of handy time-travelling, he gets to meet all the great names of the era before deciding which timezone – and which woman – he truly belongs to. Pure wish fulfilment (and the story is not entirely unlike the premise of the TV sitcom Goodnight Sweetheart), but a lot of fun. The actor playing the young Ernest Hemingway is particularly good, and in his brief scenes he threatens to steal the film.

Any film that expects its audience to get the following joke is fine by me:

“Wow, was that Djuna Barnes I was dancing with? No wonder she wanted to lead!”