I read the most hilarious post ever on the glow the other day. I started reading posts on mamamia after the amazing Hugzilla started writing for them, and I also fell in love with Rosie Waterland’s bachelor recaps. Oh, and I somehow got an article of my own published on there. So while I’m not a mum, I do read mamamia *hopes you noticed that shameless plug.

The post in question wasn’t meant to be funny, though. It was just a nice review of a book that has taken over the world. Kate Hudson swears by it. No, sadly that book is not Pussweek. Yet.

It’s this:

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up.

First of all, anything that involves tidying up for me is just hilarious. My idea of tidying is shoving everything into a cupboard box/fridge/washing machine/cat’s house regardless of category and then complaining when I can’t find it. I gave up trying to be a tidy person years ago. I think being a pig is a somewhat endearing trait, but my husband has compared me to a snail that leaves a trail of crap everywhere it goes.

But the title resounded with me: ‘life-changing magic’ – because it would take a fucking magical miracle to get me to clean up my act.

So when I read this post I couldn’t help but think: “Challenge accepted”.

This very well organised Japanese woman, Marie Kondo, claims to be able to convert even the MESSIEST people. Clearly she has not met me, or set foot in my house.

So I decided to read this ‘life-changing’ book and then blog my progress, so that everyone will know that some people just cannot be tidy, no matter how hard we try. And I do try, really I do. Which is why I am doing this. I know it won’t work but I really hope it does.

So off I went into Kinokunya to track down this baby. I even flung my phone in the shop assistant’s face so he could see a picture of the exact book I needed. He nodded, then led me a down a kilometre-long path to the back of the shop where this was sitting in a very prominent spot on a very prominent table:

Try not to be confused. Two different covers and a slight change of title means nothing to the shop assistant, even if you pester them to tell you what the actual difference is. Turns out you should not spend an afternoon trying to figure it out. And you should not waste hours googling ‘what is the difference between the life-changing magic of tidying up and the life-changing magic of tidying’. They are the same book. I’m, like, 90% sure.

So there it is. I have purchased this book. Now watch over the next few weeks as I put these lessons into practice and most definitely fail.

Watch this (very untidy) space…