Ugh. It has finally happened. I've burned the candle at both ends for too long, and the wicks have met in the middle. I woke up in the middle of the night with a thumping headache, the kind of sore throat where you can barely swallow, and an overall feeling of malaise. To make matters worse, we had a windstorm and the power went down.

Anyway, I can't actually be sick right now (sandwich generation, anyone?) and at six thirty when I got up in the dark, using my mobile phone as a flashlight, I found that even though I had laid out my clothes the night before, I couldn't bring myself to wear them. Instead, on went my comfiest jeans, a plain black tee-shirt, my beloved merino cardigan from the men's department, and a pair of Converse.

So, what do you wear when you've got to get up and carry on -- when you'd much rather be sitting around in your pyjamas and drinking Neo Citran?