Blue Monday? Not here.

Apparently today is designated as "Blue Monday", the most depressing day of the year. According to a psychologist at Cardiff University, the combination of the long nights, poor weather and post-Christmas debt catching up with us means that we all feel worse in late January than at any other time. And we all feel more depressed on Mondays than any other day of the week.

Now, I've been accused of being a miserable bastard in my time, but I feel positively chirpy (even chirpily positive) today. Why? Well, first of all there's the weather: here in Portugal it's much nicer than the rest of Europe. No storms, no snow, no sub-zero temperatures. It's not hot (I think about 11C today) but the sky is blue and the sun bright. I went to the beach on Saturday and watched the sun set over the Atlantic for the first time. Very agreeable.

Secondly, there's the football. How can anyone be depressed after a weekend when both Chelsea and Manchester United lost? Schadenfreude is never so good as when Jose Mourinho and Alex Ferguson are on the receiving end. Ok, so Liverpool and Arsenal might not quite come back to win the league, but at least it gives a semblance of competitiveness.

Thirdly, I don't work on Mondays (!). Consequently, I never have Sunday night anxiety or the Monday morning blues. I'd advise anyone to give this routine a try. I work Saturday mornings instead, but that way I avoid the queues in the supermarket and get to watch Andy Murray fight valiantly against Rafael Nadal. He lost today, but it was a great match and one that shows the wee Scot will be a top 10 player sooner rather than later.

In fact, dear reader, if every Monday were like this one, I'd be quite content.