The first of a month, and I mark it by screwing up at work. I forget to do stuff and I drop things all the time. Although I am a clutz, I'm not normally this clumsy. Today is just another bad day. What makes it worse is that I don't think I've done anything wrong until now. After I get ticked off, I start dropping even more things and I can't concentrate until I run out of the office and buy myself a mocha from The Coffee Bean. Thus sedated slightly with caffeine and sugar, I fumble my way till the end of the day and I leave the office almost giddy with relief.

I don't think I'm a perfectionist or a control freak, at least not over everything, but I like to be as perfect as I possibly can. So no screw-ups, no stupid mistakes, no carelessness. And most of the time I pull it off. Just not today.

Most of us, (myself included), assume that perfection equals flawlessness. In Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, Jeanette Winterson questions this assumption. A prince is searching for the perfect woman, but when he does find her, she is not flawless but completely balanced.

I am neither balanced nor flawless.

My favourite ex-tutor once jokingly said, when I presented him with a short essay for my application to university, "Since it's you, I expect it to be perfect." And once he read it, he told me (seriously this time) "This is perfect, I can't make any changes to it." I'm still working to that kind of perfection in my daily life.