In the last entry I mentioned problems with my current accommodation, and my intention to search for private accommodation.
Scrub that. While I typed that, the mentor I meet weekly as part of the assistance offered to me by the university - though not properly last week, as I believed my newly-revised meeting time was 1400 and not 1300 - had been in contact with someone who deals with accommodation here. She had seen me in a panic as I briefly mentioned the living environment to her before she dealt with the person she was scheduled to meet, and when she received an email describing the situation in more detail she became concerned. Hence the contact with powers-that-be.
From there, I headed to a rescheduled meeting at (ironically) 1400 to-day. Just as I entered the house almost adjacent to campus that the university has purchased for this purpose, my mobile rang. Peering through the windowed door, I could see that the phone call was from my mentor. She then said that she 'didn't want me to miss a minute' or words to that effect. I was scared, fearing it could be bad news.
Um, no.
I have been offered a self-catered studio flat in a separate wing of my current hall, an entirely self-contained building (albeit one positioned such that it effectively completes a quadrangle with the U-shaped older building I'm in now) that is mostly occupied by postgraduate students. Such is the cost of catering here that I will actually be paying the university approximately £17 <i>less</i> per week than I am for my current ensuite room with two meals provided per weekday and one meal on each of Saturday and Sunday and a shared kitchen for the other nine meals per day. Given that I am quite content with simply cereal for breakfast (though I've chosen the cooked breakfast option most days here), the only way I can see my food bill increasing by much more than £17 per week is if a) I insist upon shopping at Waitrose, rather than Aldi as I tend to at present; b) I adopt a new eating pattern (probably eating mostly high-protein meals, and more than three of them per day) in order to facilitate Stop Being A Rake, Damnit. Either are possible but unlikely.
I am so delighted-yet-shocked I actually looked depressed to some people as I curled myself away, completely shocked, trying to comprehend what had happened.
I can scarcely believe my good fortune.