The trouble with starting this "it's Friday, let's have a drink" blog is that, since the first one, I've been struck down with a cold, a flu, and finally, over the past two or three weeks, a kidney infection. This last one has been particularly yucky: think fever, listlessness and vomit frenzies to rival The Exorcist. Quite apart from the inadvisability of downing a cocktail while taking antibiotics, the whole nausea/illness business has rather put me off even thinking, let alone writing, about them.

Anyway, I'm a bit better now. And though I still can't have a drink I'd like to propose a virtual toast to both the end of the week and the end of this non-existent summer with this particularly lovely Caribbean concoction - the Green Swizzle.

As for the "literary" quote, we'll leave that to Bertie Wooster: "If I ever marry and have a son, Green Swizzle Wooster is the name that will go down in the register." Green Swizzle

2oz rum 1oz (green) crème de menthe Juice of 1 lime 1tsp fine sugar or sugar syrup 2oz soda water 2 dashes bitters Crushed ice Swizzle stick

Pop all the ingredients apart from the soda water into a cocktail shaker. Give it a good shake, pour into a Tom Collins glass, top up with the soda water. Serve (with the swizzle stick, of course).