"You are living the good life right now!"

Rum and Raisin. A small, innocuous-looking white tub with a plastic spoon. It's the colour of rum and raisin ice-cream. It's as cold as ice-cream. I can see little things that look like raisins, and when I scoop a spoonful, the texture feels like ice-cream. I know it should simply be rum and raisin ice-cream.

But you always think you know. You think you are in safe waters, that you know what a biscuit tastes like from the look of it and the fact it is offered on a small plate with a doily and comes with your coffee. You think you have found blessed bread, with its bready colour and shape and name. But the bread is brioche or made of corn or has sugar in the middle and your biscuit tastes of soup. A chocolate filling is red bean paste and, if in doubt, most things are probably tofu. Looks can be deceiving.

Air Pollution: The Upsides!

You are probably not surprised to hear that the air in Beijing is totally not very. While it's not yet reached the record-breaking levels of early last year, it's one of the longest stretches of particularly bad pollution I've experienced since I've been here. I have a near-constant headache. My skin has had a teenage tantrum, no doubt to spite my earlier joy at how it had cleared up. My chest is tight. I regularly fight an urge to run outside and punch the air in its stupid, soupy face.

I went out to celebrate my birthday the other night, and the official plan to drink and do a pub quiz and drink some more then slur songs into a microphone fell by the wayside a short time after a triumphant bronze finish in said quiz. I am sure this was partly because the air gave everyone a headache, a cough and a bleak outlook, quite aside from the fact that one or more of us may have collapsed a lung had we attempted to belt out Dog Days Are Over.

It was then, dear reader, that I realised this smog had gone beyond being merely unhealthy - it had bloody well stopped me from doing karaoke. I will not let this happen on my watch. With at least another week of this blank, grey canvas ahead, I need a bright side.* So without further ado, may I present six reasons to be cheerful. About smog.

Smog Resistance: Activate

I've never had brilliant skin. By the word 'skin' I mean my complexion in terms of blemishes and grease content - my skin as a means of generally holding my blood and stuff inside my body is doing a sterling job of course. I don't want to overstate it as it's not the bane of my life and I know people for whom it’s a way more serious issue, I just seem to get a fair few spots compared to other 30-year-olds (from my non-scientific study of looking at people's faces), I scar easily and have some pigmentation issues. I wear a lot of makeup, which you might think is a chicken and egg scenario, except the spots definitely came first during adolescence and only then did I become trapped in a vicious cycle. Also, I really enjoy putting makeup on so I don't mind that part of the cycle I guess. Erm, anyway, I've become pretty good at concealing and these days, it's rarely so bad I don't want to leave the house. However, when I got to China, my skin (I can only presume in some kind of fit of solidarity) reacted precisely the way the rest of me did: with panic.