Every morning, even before I roll out of bed, I wonder how the sky is behaving. I lie still for those few moments between sleep and wakefulness and take a guess at the weather.

I prise open my right eye (the one nearest the window) and make a mental measurement of the light streaming in through the gap in the curtains. Sometimes, the brightness bounces painfully off my retina. I clamp my eye shut and my brain registers with a jolt that it’s sunny outside. Other mornings, there’s only a soft splash of daylight that dapples the carpet and I sense it’s overcast, clouds on the move.

As I throw back the doona and my feet kiss the floor, I can tell you whether the air this morning is crisp, chilly, bracing or brisk. Crisp is any May morning before 7am. Chilly is unpleasantly cold. Bracing is cold, but pleasantly invigorating. Brisk is for the conversation I have with the man next door after nipping out to get The West in my nightie.