Yesterday morning while I was having my breakfast, I switched on Mr Vain's Energylight.

Mr Vain suffers from a lot of imaginary defects etc. For instance, he thinks he has a chronic sinus infection, that he is too skinny and must work out lots and that he needs to take lots of protein supplements and other expensive things like ginseng and various seal oils.

One of his imaginary defects is that he can't sleep at night, which is probably because he goes to bed at like 2130 every day.

Mr Vain himself, however, thinks it is due to the lack of daylight which we suffer here up north.

So he has bought himself a Philips Energylight, which sits on our breakfast table, in front of which he positions himself in a little halo of white light every morning over his espresso.

Yesterday, when I had breakfast, I switched it on because I was too lazy to walk across the floor to the proper lamp. Hurts the eyes a bit, gives a reflection in my laptop, but all in all a functional if not cosy morning light.

And last night, you know what happened?

I felt sleepy. Really sleepy. At 2200 in the evening. So I managed to get to bed by 2300 and slept like a log until this morning. This never happens. My cortisol levels are waaay up there at the moment and usually I'm up till 0100 or so cause I just don't feel that tired.

But, I am now waiting for my eggs to boil again (when only one end floats, that means they're OK, right..?). It is foggy outside today, so foggy that the ocean below seems but some irregular flickering variation in a bucket of gray paint, and the sun is nowhere to be seen although it is already past 0900 in the morning. The lamp is on. Placebo effect or no, I'll take it.

I know of course that light therapy has been clinically proven to help people with SAD and delayed sleep phase disorders, but I have never really thought it had an effecdt on just "regular" people. I take myself as a clinical case study that it apparently does.


And no, Philips are not paying me for this post! Don't knock it till you've tried it..