When did that happen? When did nine months to go suddenly become nine days - and when, while I'm at it, did the weather turn so bloody miserable? Each day now in the run-up to the wedding, I can be found glued to the BBC weather website, scanning anxiously for anything that resembles a sunshine symbol. Actually I'd settle for sunshine and showers at the moment - all I seem to find is ominous thunder clouds, one after another, and those evil-looking yellow strikes of lightning. It really is enough to turn a bride to drink. Anyway, I am trying to follow everyone's good advice (including my own just a month ago) and remain calm under low pressure. There's no good worrying now, and there's absolutely nothing I can do. The weather stinks and that is all there is to it.

It doesn't help that having a clear run of trouble-free planning, little problems are cropping up all over the place. Firstly, there was the outbreak of chickenpox in the bridesmaid camp, then there was the call to say that one of pageboys had tripped over a step at school, had broken his wrist and would be in plastercast for the wedding. This was followed by a flurry of last-minute cancellations - nothing too catastrophic but as every bride knows there's seating plans and name cards to think of which all require a certain amount of unexpected ball juggling.

Then, last week, disaster of disasters, my colourist rang to say that she was off to a wedding on the day of my appointment, and my shockingly neglected roots were going to be left high and dry with just a week to go before the wedding. On any other occasion I would probably shrug, think, "Oh well, how bad can the replacement junior colourist be?" and just hope I wouldn't emerge with yellow tiger stripes. But with only days until the most important day of my life, and a deep-seated fear that at such short notice every salon worth its salt would be booked up, I did what any panic-stricken bride with two-inch roots would have done in the same position: I called in the big boys. So, come Saturday afternoon, I will be sitting comfortably in Charles Worthington's Percy Street salon, safe in the knowledge that I will emerge, four hours and a head full of toffee highlights later, one happy, glossy locked bride. There is something immensely reassuring about being able to specify "very natural", and know that's exactly what I'll get. So thanks Charles Worthington; you have saved the day. Don't suppose you can do anything about the chickenpox now, could you?