When I'm under the weather the cure is colleagues

I should never have gone to Happy Valley theme park. It wasn't that I don't love lethal roller coasters, chaps in psychedelic bumblebee suits who look about as "happy" as a morgue, or teacup rides that threaten to hurl you into orbit at every turn. The problem was that I loved it too much. I expressed my excitement rather too loudly for someone who already had a "frog in my throat", or a "a bit of a cold".

The result was that, by Monday morning, I had gone from mild Kermit to completely mute. Nothing would leave my throat but a faint hiss. I had lost my voice - completely.

Complaining is a major part of being British. The weather, work, foreign food and people anything and everything is worthy of a moan.