I know I have been quiet for a while, but I have a very good excuse. In 18 days time, I have a visitor who is coming to stay here while I am in Kentucky.

My house is, in fact, my mother’s. To explain my domicile in the best possible way, so that you get an idea of what I am up against, I would like to draw your attention to a film called June Bride. It was one of those screwball comedies from the 1940s/50s that were subtly sophisticated in their way and totally hilarious.

June Bride stars the inimitable Bette Davis and Robert Montgomery (father of Elizabeth, of Bewitched fame, but I digress). It also stars a house. Decorated in a style referred to throughout as McKinley Stinker.

In other words, desperately old fashioned, and in sad need of a makeover. But McKinley Stinker covers it with so much more class.

I’m sure you can see the chintz. So… picture that chintz. Add a good hefty dollop of pet depredation (curtains dangling drunkenly from not frightfully well attached curtain rails… that sort of thing), sprinkle with moving boxes from a three bedroom maisonette from when adult daughter returned home with a husband and a caravan (caravan and husband have now gone… I miss the caravan…) add in a soupçon of very strange decorating choices, and some seriously ill-advised colour schemes, allow to simmer…

E voila!

Overstuffed McKinley Stinker.

There is way more accumulated bric a brac here than fits on the bookshelves. The loft is full. And we do not have a basement.

Before you all jump on my case, I should point out that in terms of hoarding, my mother makes me look like a dilettante. Up in the loft is the Silver Cross pram that was last occupied by yours truly. My mother kept it just in case. Okay, maybe that is understandable, I am female and she was hoping for grandchildren. But that does not explain how the pram was ever going to be got out of the loft, it was a tight fit before the loft ladder was installed.

That also does not explain my grandfather’s golf clubs (he passed away in Melbourne, Australia in 1960!), there are also off cuts of carpets, none of which actually match the carpeting scheme in this house, wallpaper – 172 rolls at the last count… a toy box, a mountain of old, broken and curiously ugly Christmas decorations. They were pretty ugly before age withered them.

This house has a seriously redeeming feature. It has a real fireplace. Toasted crumpets by the fire in winter are just perfect, except that before I am even vaguely tempted to think about that the chimney needs sweeping.

There are a million ornaments that need dusting, pictures stacked three deep on the stairs, and I am attempting by sheer force of will (as opposed to green fingers or any real gardening skill) to keep the kalanchoe I bought two weeks before Easter alive. After all, my old, and very strangely decorated bedroom needs serious brightening up. Anything that draws the eye from the hideous pink frilly curtains I count as a serious plus.

So, I am sweeping under rugs, forcing closet doors shut on the mountains of clothing and assorted other items that are welling out of them and transferring boxes of stuff that doesn’t need to be kept particularly tidy into the garage. One day, I might even fix the garage door so that it actually shuts.

I am the least domesticated creature on the planet. I crave ultramodern and minimalist surroundings. But until then I will try to keep the hoarding at bay!

I was born with wanderlust permanently ingrained in my soul. Anywhere but here was something that spurred me on to greater endeavour at a very young age. I used to wander off. Regularly. My mother would turn round and I was miles away. Again.

I always wanted to be some place else. Particularly foreign places.

My parents would up sticks at the beginning of the summer holidays and we would head out of the UK for a fortnight (I have been a huge fan of fourteen whole days ever since!).

The adventure always began with packing. Boy… did it ever! My mother is a just in case person. (In case of what? My father would gently enquire!). She truly belonged to the days of gracious liners, steamer trunks and a line of sweating porters schlepping her monstrous accumulation of luggage down the concourse in her wake. I vividly remember our early holidays. Partly because I would be squished between huge piles of suitcases throughout the journey.

Hand luggage was something that did not need to be raised by forklift. My mother once took a suitcase containing 27 pairs of shoes for a fortnight’s holiday. And no, that is not rational.

Suitcases were inevitably retrieved from the attic at least a month before departure. In vain my father would point out that everything would be creased. It was washed and packed and that was that!

In addition to these suitcases, my mother was an avid shopper. It was absolutely inevitable that she would buy more clothes on every trip. And she did. I have been forcing suitcases shut since before I hit puberty. I am a mean suitcase stuffer! One of the side effects of this excess was that the suitcases got heavier, and this was before someone thought to put wheels on the bottom. My physical size and shape have probably got a lot to do with the fact that I spent a vast amount of my early life schlepping suitcases. By the time I was five or six I was lifting cases, this stayed with me throughout my life.

Heckscher family holidays were defined by chaos. My mother whilst highly decorative, was a complete scatter brain. She could lose anything. My father was endlessly harassed, but somehow we would muddle on to the next stop and we survived these forays into France, Spain and Italy relatively easily. Both my parents spoke French, my father because he spent a good deal of the war in French speaking places, and my mother because she had been to classes at the YMCA.

I am off travelling at the end of May. And believe me when I say that this trip is going to buck the trend for Heckscher chaos. There will be lists, there will be one SMALL carryon bag – in this life there are two classes of luggage, carry on and lost – I am taking two pairs of shoes, and the flip flops I plan to wear on the flight. I was a professional administrator, it will be organised and nothing will get lost.

At least I do not wear the thing that has vexed me since I was old enough to know what they are. Contact Lenses. While I appreciate there are many wearers of these things out there, and I applaud your fortitude in wanting to stick your finger in your eye on a daily basis, and all the attendant hassle associate with the things, I will pass thank you very much.

When you have spent as much time as I have, on my hands and knees, crawling around the floor, looking for my mother’s missing contact lens, you will appreciate that the things drive me nuts. The genius who invented the pot with the springy plastic clips I personally wish to take outside and show him the error of his ways. You know it was a him. No woman would ever be that stupid. Springy plastic prongs that fire said wretchedly small item clear across a fifteen foot room? Huh!!! REALLY??

There was the joyful holiday in Greece. Not only did I have to contend with being very white and very English (sunburn, peeling like a ticker-tape parade!!), we were unprepared for electricity failures in mountain villages, cockroaches the size of dogs, my mother lost a contact lens in every place we stayed. (Three pairs). Several thousand years of culture and history did distract me from going nuclear. Just.

I love Greece. Classical architecture, history, ruins (I like ruins)… my travelling soul was appeased. My BS meter was going spare.

No, this trip will be joyous. This trip will be organised. And for one glorious week, my saintly employee will discover the idiosyncrasies of life in a Heckscher household. (Heaven help her!).

This is the post that I have been trying to write for three days. Probably a lot longer than that in reality; simply put, this is the single most important step that I have taken this year. I need to get this right.

At the moment, I am looking at the steps that I am taking in social media and marketing. I have spent the past couple of years studying, in a vague sort of way, social media and the sheer growth phenomenon. Now is the time to step it up.

Social media is moving, there has been a seismic shift in the process. Facebook is still a good place to be, and for visibility it’s hard to beat. So growing an audience, interacting with them and offering them insights into what you are about to do. Twitter is the conversation. Google +, Triberr, Klout, LinkedIn… all of those fit into the picture too.

Sounds a little like designing by committee doesn’t it? Well, not really because it is all part of the conversation. Engaging people in the conversation and then letting your imagination run riot is all part of the process.

Imagination plays a part in marketing this, so I have to find out up front what is going to work.

 I am still developing my plans for the two books that we have published via Throwaway Lines, the company that I own with my business partner, Jason Horger. Jason’s book Whom, and our friend Jessie’s book Divorce.

My approach is in for the long haul. It involves learning things, stepping outside my comfort zone, and bringing new things to the table for my separate interests.

The technology is offering a brave new entertainment future, and we can offer books which crossover into the world of moving pictures and sound. Interactive is the way to go.

Finally, I really do know where I am going.