As anyone who’s the wrong side of 30 knows, living in someone else’s house starts to feel like a bad idea. I don’t know why. Other countries in the world don’t think like we do. They accept that they have to rent, as housing is either unaffordable, or just a ball and chain they don’t want.

I’ve been feeling this for some years, and especially more so this year because moving on to a different house, at a much greater cost, just amplifies how much I am spending on giving it to other people, who in turn are using it to either pay for their mortgage, or profit. In effect, those who cannot afford a house are subsidising the ones who can afford a house. Nice economic logic there.

We thought we’d waste a bit of time seeing if there was potential at buying a house, or, at least, getting a mortgage. How wrong we were. Lloyds Bank hilarious said they’d lend up to £190,000. Great! Then it said underneath it needed a 50% deposit. To say I turned up the cynical snark a notch would be an understatement. The poor employee of the bank seemed to turn into a counsellor. “Don’t be despondent” she said. I laughed and had a go at the system. She then chided me for not wanting to work within a system. Stop being a rebel, in other words. Fucks sake. Well over 30 and being told to sit down, shut up and toe the line.

J took it quite badly. Even though I’d told him to be prepared to be disappointed, I don’t think he realised just how awful it would be. Being told that while you earn enough money, we think that you are such a “risk” that you need to pay for most of the house yourself. All because Computer Said No. Computer doesn’t care that I’ve been saving since I was 10 years old. Fucks sake, again.

This is the society we live in now, where computers, programmed on a human algorithm, of course, are used as the infallible determinants as to whether you can or you can’t. For those the wrong side of the line, we’re told to try again another time. By which point, the rules will have changed, and so too will the context. Every time is another roll of the dice.

We move on. We’ve agreed that thanks to this little hiccup we won’t be moving anywhere next year. Another year or more in this god awful house.

Never mind.