So where was I? Ah yes, bespoke perfumes... that's what I was musing on when last we met, in what now seem like sunnier times, when spending between £1,000 and £2,000 on something as spoiling as a handcrafted perfume didn't seem quite so reckless as it does now.

Since then...well, you don't need me to tell you what's happened to the financial markets. Which is why this week I've been thinking about my own pet ritual for dealing with what Holly Golightly called “the mean reds” (when you're afraid and you don't know why you're afraid as opposed to the mean blues, which, Holly says, are just when you're feeling fat or it's been raining too long).

I'm with Margaret Visser, that wonderful anthropologist of everyday life and author of Much Depends on Dinner, when she says that it's the everyday things that really matter. So I look to the small treats, the sort that cheer me up every day; upgraded versions, if you like, of life's essentials: good coffee, gorgeous flowers or a lovely real leather diary. They don't usually cost much more than their pedestrian relations but oh, the difference they make.

I have a bit of a thing about soap. There's a world of difference between divine soap - soap that comes deliciously wrapped, that keeps its shape, that is lightly perfumed - and the sort that smells like a cheap brothel and goes slimy and mushy. Look for triple-milled, which means it has been fed three times through heavy rollers, known as “mills”; this gives the best soap its fine consistency and lather and means that it lasts and lasts. (For the finest of fine, some soap makers even offer bars that have been milled seven times.)

One of my all-time favourites is Sapone al Melograno, a soap that comes lightly perfumed with the scent of pomegranate, from the Farmacia di Santa Novella (117 Walton Street, London SW3). Bars are beautifully wrapped in thick, cream paper with black and gold lettering and make fabulous presents. A single bath-size bar costs £16 - more expensive than Boots, but not so expensive that you need a mortgage.

Selfridges and The Conran Shop both sell the Gianna Rose Atelier French triple-milled soap - it looks fabulous wrapped in its old-fashioned paper, smelling of honey and aloe and costing £8.50 for a large bar. The Conran Shop also sells Claus Porto's soap, which is Portugal's answer to the Farmacia's range (and can also be bought online). Each bar has been hand-milled seven times, is fabulously perfumed with almond oil, verveine, citron, wild pansy, red poppy or honeysuckle and is traditionally wrapped (£29.50 for a box of five).

Selfridges' Fig and Almond Husk Soap (£12) comes wrapped in fabulous Japanese floral paper and smells of... fig and almond. A friend with amazing taste tells me that she likes nothing better than Catherine Memmi's soaps, which she finds at Brissi (0844 8009912) in sweet almond, green tea and vanilla noir. All are £5.

Then there's chocolate. If one is going to get fat, one might as well do it in style - and since really good chocolate increases levels of the happiness-inducing chemical serotonin in the brain it has to be good news. Knowing your chocolate beans is the new snobbery - the best, in case you need to know, is generally agreed to be Criollo, from Venezuela - and wonderful little chocolate shops are popping up everywhere.

The latest is Coco Mayo at 35 Connaught Street, London W1 (020-7706 2770). It makes all its own chocolate on the premises and proprietor Joel Burstein has developed a range of tastes and flavours that you won't find anywhere else. Try the crisp lemon peel dipped in chocolate; pomegranate or ginger paste chocolate; or chocolate flavoured with cinnamon, cloves and ginger. Burstein uses only the finest beans and adds no preservatives - so they don't keep very long, but the chocolates are so moreish that, I am told, one Middle Eastern princess sent her private plane simply to pick up a bigger fix. Sophisticated shops such as Liberty are beginning to sell Burstein's wares.

It is never worth being a cheapskate about tea, and Postcard Teas are a new discovery for me. The shop is at 9 Dering Street, London W1, but you can also purchase via mail order at www.postcardteas.com. It boasts an amazing list of teas, some of which you may never have heard of (ever tried Monsoon Flush Goomtee?) and some you know well (English Breakfast). The website tells you more about tea than you ever knew and, best of all, sends you on an exploratory tour of its tea estates in India, China, Japan and Sri Lanka.

Finally, I do love a good scented candle. Some think them naff, but I am more of the mind that when they're good, they're divine, and when they're bad, they're horrid. Try True Grace's scented grass candle (01985 210894 or www.truegrace.co.uk) - it evokes late summer, and is subtle and elegant. All are made from natural wax with 10 per cent fragrance and they burn for about 50 hours; prices start at £28.

All these are small treats - none will break the bank and it is nice and reassuring to know that a New York psychologist, Dr Jane Greer, believes that “shopping can contribute to your psychological health in times of stress”. No need to feel guilty, then; it's therapeutic.

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