During an unsuccessful search through my medicine drawer for some Lemsip yesterday afternoon, I decided to clear out everything that was past its use-by date. All my amassed blister packs of Zirtek, Beconase, Cuprofen and Paracetamol were slung into the bin, along with never-opened vials of Rescue Remedy, ancient Hungarian medicines that might have been decongestants but might equally have been hallucinogenics, and bottles of Actifed which had leaked stickily into the back of the drawer, creating pools of gunk that were slowly absorbing an ancient pack of chewing gum (?) and some loose Rennie tablets. By the time I'd finished the purge, my only weapons left against the onslaught of disease were a roll of bandages, some Nytol, two Boots toe-seperators and a Lypsyl. So I went to the chemist to re-stock, where the owner took one look at me and shouted over to his teenage female assistant “You can serve him.” I didn't look that contagious, really, but the poor girl seemed terrified. I smiled at her. “Yes, I'll have some of your leprosy ointment, please.”

I had a weird night, waking up every two hours or so to let out an enormous but strangely dry sneeze, then back to sleep again. I was prepared to take the day off work, but after 30 minutes of pottering around this morning I decided that I couldn't really get away with it. I wasn't really that ill. Yet. But there does seem to be a rather nasty cold going around, and it's inevitable that we'll all get it, so I suggest that we do what parents do with their chicken-pox afflicted children: Throw an enormous party, invite round all the kids in the neighbourhood, make sure they interact enough to spread all the poxy bacteria, and just get the damn disease over and done with. So, anyone for a cold party? Round at my house. We'll wrap up warm and watch my video of “The Death Of Yugoslavia” while I pass among you, breathing heavily into all your faces. Bring a bottle.

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Charles Clarke slams the Prince Of Wales' old-fashioned attitude towards ambition amongst the lower-classes by saying on Radio 4: “Everyone has a field marshal's baton in their knapsack.” Groovy, Charles. Groovy.