You probably know the feeling. You get back home after a period away, and everything seems so normal. Whenever I travel between my two homes (one in Germany, one in England), I always make sure I tidy up before I leave, arrange it in the way I needed things last - then I get back and have to rearrange everything, because it doesn't look right anymore.

I usually leave the furniture where it is, but all the bric-a-brac that's collecting dust on the shelves, the books, CDs, DVDs - everything has to be sorted. Stuff I thought was worth keeping goes into the bin within seconds.

I'm in one of these phases right now, as I've just returned to my student room in a shared house in Carlisle after 5 months away. The mess unpacking creates always gives me an excuse to just continue and move stuff about (after all, all my luggage has to go somewhere) but for a day or two I create a bigger mess than I started with. When I went shopping for essentials on Sunday just after getting back, one of the things I bought was a massive bin bag.

At the moment I'm considering a backyard sale during Freshers' Fortnight, to sell all the surplus. There are things I won't wear anymore, books I won't read anymore and DVDs that I don't like too much but sounded great to start with. Since I always play my CDs on my computer anyway, I might as well sell my stereo...

At least, this time I have a week to settle back in and get everything organised (my life, uni and my room, that is) instead of going straight back to uni or work the next days. My room always looks full, although I don't really have a lot of stuff. The room is just very small, and everything that doesn't fit on the IKEA "Billy" shelf, the small shelf on the wall or inside the chest of drawers has to go on or underneath the desk or under the bed... all those hiding places your mum always checked first when you were a kid and told to tidy up!