I am in San Francisco.
San Fran Man, who is temporarily living with his 'mom' while his divorce is pending, has rented a rather swish pad at the top of a 14-storey apartment block on Nob Hill.
Here we will spend all of June and July shacking up together while I am on my summer break.
It will be a good test of our relationship, which has just entered the second half of its second year.
So far, so very, very good, but we have never spent such a long period in each other's company, and the time we have had together has been spent largely on the other side of the Atlantic.
I am confident that all will go without a hiccough, but time will tell.
The apartment affords us uninterrupted and expansive views of the Bay area, complete with the Sutro Tower and the spectacular Golden Gate Bridge.
I have never known such decadence and luxury.
I am being thoroughly spoiled.
Such atypical student hardship.
But it's not all holiday.
San Fran Man will have to work during our time together.
Fortunately he does not keep office hours, predominantly because he does not have an office, so his schedule is rather flexible.
Therefore we will definitely be able to share some adventures during our two-month Californian sojourn.
This morning he has gone to San José for a meeting so I decide to brave the city without my chaperone.
After all, I'm a big girl now.
Added to which I am a Londoner by birth and upbringing, so I'm used to big cities.
But as I have become more 'mature', my underlying propensity to anxiety has made itself known in less and less uncertain terms.
Consequently, I suffer severe comfort zone issues.
So what may seem like a simple trip to the shops in a civilised metropolis to some, can feel like a major excursion to me, fraught with all manner of irrational hidden dangers.
Undeterred, I map my journey on google.
It's a straightforward 15 minute walk involving one left turn followed by one right turn.
What could possibly go wrong?
But I take the precaution of writing down the directions.
Just in case.
Thankfully the characteristic San Francisco fog that sweeps in from the Pacific has taken a well-earned break; the sun is shining and it's beautifully warm outside as I venture into the unknown.
I pass the rather majestic Grace Cathedral on my left and cross 'California' at the crest of one of the city's famous steep hills to begin my descent of 'Jones'.
It's like a pedestrian roller coaster.
My instinct is to grab hold of something, but there's nothing to grab.
Why on earth don't they put handrails on theses streets?
Luckily there is no unsuspecting native in the vicinity who risks being assaulted by a flailing demented English woman.
I manage to compose myself and continue walking.
But I can feel my toes bunching uncomfortably against the top of my shoes as my socked feet slide violently forwards with each step.
At the next junction there is a small measure of horizontal respite, followed by a gradual decrease in the gradient of the hill as my journey progresses.
I try to push all thoughts of the return trek to the back of my mind, convinced as I am that such an undertaking will require crampons and ropes.
Consulting my hastily-scrawled directions, I take the requisite left hand turn on 'Sutter', followed 3 blocks later by the right on 'Powell', which brings me down to Union Square.
Where it would appear I have timed my arrival to coincide with everyone else's lunch break.
Despite the hustle and bustle of the crowd, I am impressed that I have managed to get this far without being mown down by a Hummer, confused as I am by the US road-crossing protocol and right-of-way conundrum.
As my destination, The Westfield Shopping Mall, comes into view I begin to relax.
Standing at the traffic lights waiting for them to change, I can almost feel the credit card in my handbag being magnetically drawn towards Nordstrum.
My anxious frown dissipates into a carefree smile as I allow myself to feel safe and happy.
But I hadn't bargained on Crazy Guy.
It's the shouting I hear first.
'You sycophantic BITCH!'
There are approximately 15 of us loitering at the corner awaiting the signal that tells us it's safe to cross the street.
We all look impulsively at the source of the shouting, then swiftly away again to avoid the eye contact that Crazy Guy is clearly seeking.
He is a wiry, 50-something black man.
And for some mysterious reason he appears to be looking for a fight.
'You sy-co-phan-tic BITCH!' he shouts again, only this time more emphatically.
The lights seem to be taking forever to change.
I can only assume that the young chap standing next to me, innocently listening to his iPod, has made the fatal error of briefly locking pupils with Crazy Guy.
Because Crazy Guy approaches him threateningly and shouts directly at his face, but with added vitriol and spittle: 'YOU SY-CO-PHAN-TIC BITCH!'
A mixture of fear and nausea washes over me and I'm sorely tempted to turn around and run for the hills.
Literally.
For now the prospect of a speedy 45º ascent to the relative safety of the apartment suddenly seems very attractive.
But I persevere.
While desperately praying for the lights to change before Crazy Guy turns physical, I ponder the lexical complexities of such a fucked up mind.
'Sycophantic' is certainly a curious choice of adjective with which to hurl abuse at a complete stranger.
Especially if the abusee is doing his best to ignore you.
The chap with the iPod is looking decidedly uncomfortable but has chosen the best course of action under the circumstances is to simply stare at the ground.
The strategy appears to stall Crazy Guy until finally the lights change.
We hurriedly scuttle across the street out of harm's way and I breathe a sigh of relief as I enter the sanitised peace of the air-conditioned mall.
Where I am accosted by a sales assistant.
Her friendly approach coupled with my joy at being removed from the threat of the street corner crackpot causes me momentarily to let my defenses lapse.
Firstly she simply hands me a free sample which I reach out and accept with a blasé 'thanks'.
'Where are you from?' she asks in a discernible East European accent.
I'm dumfounded by the question. It means I obviously look like a tourist.
'Ireland,' I say, feeling more foreign than her.
'My name's Marta,' she announces while grabbing my hand to shake it.
'Alacoque,' I reply.
'Oh such a pretty name!' she enthuses. 'Let me show you something!'
Marta is unfeasibly tall, young and beautiful, with stunning, enviable waist-length locks.
I struggle to understand why she is not on a catwalk or photo-shoot instead of promoting 'Oro Gold' cosmetics to a middle-aged Anglo-Irish tourist in a shopping mall.
I don't mention this of course.
In case she thinks I'm hitting on her.
Before I have a chance to protest she has grabbed my right wrist and rolled the sleeve of my cardigan up to my elbow.
On my forearm she is smearing the 24-carat-gold-infused miracle beauty product and launching full tilt into her prescribed and practiced spiel.
Marta demonstrates with great aplomb and a tad too much smiling the effectiveness of their exfoliating scrub.
I observe in astonishment as it expertly removes the remnants of my inexpertly-applied week-old fake tan.
As my dead skin forms into a muddy-coloured porridge under the circular motion of her finger tips, I feel decidedly grubby and just want the torture to end.
'I'm not going to buy anything,' I blurt guiltily.
'That's OK!' she replies, but her smile looks a little more forced than it already did.
Marta wipes my arm clean with cotton balls and another product from the 'Oro Gold' range and invites me to feel how soft my skin is.
I give my forearm a cursory prod.
'Lovely,' I agree.
But I have more pressing business.
'Can you tell me where 'The Walking Company' is?' I ask her.
She looks disdainfully at my North Face shoes as if to confirm what she should have known all along: I am most decidedly not her target market.
'Yeah, I think it's on the 3rd floor,' she sneers and turns her back on me.
