Two days ago Olivia said to me; “Mummy, you’re never ill.” Well, now I am. I feel like death. My head hurts, my throat hurts, in fact my whole body hurts. I am constantly coughing and sneezing. My husband has had the same thing and now two of the three children have it as well. So my trip to Blightly has been postponed.

The illness has its upsides. One, I am not hungry so if I ever get to start my publicity tour I will be as thin as any self-respecting Frenchwoman. Two it meant I got to stay at home today instead of carting off to London. This had two main advantages. I could spend some more time blowing my nose and coughing with my children but also I could watch the Australian Open Men’s final while my husband bought me cups of hot honey and lemon (despite the fact that he has been ill all week and I have been fairly unsympathetic to say the least, there’s nothing quite as boring as an ill man).

Of course I would have preferred a final with Marat Safin in it (maybe a picture here would be appropriate to remind those of you who don’t know who he is) but watching Federer reminds me of Mozart.

In an effort to wean the children (and me) off Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy Rupert suggested we all watch Amadeus. The kids were gripped by “Wolfie” as they call him and his story.

I was struck by how far ahead of his contemporaries - or indeed anyone else - Mozart was, just as Federer is proving to be. Genius, in all its forms, is compulsive viewing, even when you’re dying of flu.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007