‘I JUST don’t want yellow,” I said.

“It’s not really yellow, it’s yellowy but it looks perfect,” my girlfriend said.

“Right, I don’t want yellow, I don’t like yellow, I hate yellow, you would have to kill me to paint the hall yellow, and even then, my last dying wish would be for no yellow in the hall,” I said fairly categorically.

And so it was decided; the hallway was going to be painted yellow, and I had no power in my house.

Now, it was just a short drive through a blizzard to pick up the paint followed by a short but terrifying drive though the snow back home.

Naturally, the paint wasn’t the right shade once home and applied to a wall.

At this time, the radio was warning people not to undertake non-essential journeys.

It was decided swapping some yellow paint for another shade of yellow paint was totally essential, and if I were to crash horribly then I’d be happy to have died on such an essential journey.

As luck would have it, I made it back through the snow without serious incident despite a very determined attempt by a taxi to make me crash.

Thankfully, it looked like death was off the cards for today, so I decided to tip the balance in favour of a tragic demise once more by climbing up a ladder.

The ladder in this case was a rusty little number borrowed off Dave from next door.

As I rested the elderly ladder against the bannister to reach the top of the hallway, above the stairs, I had a feeling of déjà vu – but from where?

Of course, I was in the first five minutes of Casualty; I was the extra just waiting for the inevitable; I was about to get my very first big break.

With all this in mind, climbing the ladder was done with extreme caution.

Half an hour later, extreme caution had been replaced by pure complacency as I propped the base up against a carpet grip.

Inevitably, the base of the ladder slid across the carpet, I fell off and by pure chance managed to avoid falling down the stairwell.

Luckily I was fine apart from a bleeding thumb, trapped ankle and a sense of disbelief I hadn’t fallen down the stairs.

In fact, my first thought was “I hope I’m all right; hospital will be packed with people falling around on ice, it’ll take ages to see a doctor”.

It was now time to hire some decent ladders and accept you can only go so far with the laws of gravity.

And while we’re on the subjects of do’s and don’ts, here’s a couple I’ve learned over the last few days.

Do warn your girlfriend there is paint on a door frame.

Don’t just “expect her to know”.

Do paint with the lights off and an unhealthy confidence you should have covered everything.

Don’t ever put the lights on again, thereby exposing the blotchy patches.

Unfortunately, my house seems to be like the Forth Road Bridge, no sooner has it been painted than it needs painting again.

So it came as no surprise when I heard my girlfriend say those immortal words: “Now the hallway’s done, it looks like the living room needs another fresh coat.”

Great, and so it continues.