I know this is a risky admission for an editor to make, but I wore my wife's make-up today.

Let me explain...

The BBC rang on Friday to ask if I would be filmed talking about council magazines after I'd described many of them as a waste of public money on my blog.

They said the camera crew would be coming at 3pm on Monday and, happy to keep the debate about council magazines going, I readily agreed.

The problem was that I woke up this morning with unsightly red sores down one side of my nose and on both cheeks.

I'm not sure exactly what's happened but here's my guess: I've been suffering from tennis elbow so I rubbed it with "Deep Heat" before a match yesterday.

I think I may have failed to wash my hands properly before playing and inadvertently got some "Deep Heat" on my face.

Combined with the sweat from running round a tennis court, it has caused an unfortunate skin reaction.

Well, what was I supposed to do? I couldn't go on telly looking like I'd been dragged through a thorn bush, could I?

Before rushing out of the house, I grabbed a pot of my wife's "Natural collection" loose powder and, when I got to work, rubbed it over the affected areas.

It worked a treat. You could hardly notice. Well, at least no one said anything.

I was feeling quite pleased with myself when the BBC rang at 11am - to cancel the interview.

Something else had come up - I could have screamed.

P.S. Please don't tell my wife.