Who is Cousin Flora?

It seems a shame to take away a mystery, but what the heck.

If you have never seen the movie Cold Comfort Farm, you really should, because it's very, very funny. It's based on a book by Stella Gibbons, and the movie version I have in mind is the most recent one, with Kate Beckinsale and Ian McKellan among the cast.

The story is set in the 1930s and our heroine, Flora Poste, is a young woman recently orphaned (though she makes a point of letting us know she wasn't particularly close to her parents - boarding-school upbringing and all that). Being one of those upper-class Brits with no actual money, Flora appeals to distant relatives around the country for a place to stay, at least for a while. Selecting Cold Comfort Farm from among many eccentric options ("At least it sounds interesting and appalling - the others just sound appalling!") she sets off pluckily and cheerfully to experience an adventure (for Flora, you see, aspires to be a writer), and "perhaps tidy up a few family messes."

And tidy she does, bringing sensible and creative solutions to the various disputes and dysfunction that she finds at Cold Comfort, and, perhaps more importantly, finding ways to make nearly all of the characters' deepest unformed aspirations come to fruition. Through it all, she is unflappable and sensible. And quite stylish.

The ensemble cast is truly brilliant in bringing this crazy lot to life, especially Ian McKellan, who gets to give one of the funniest fire-and-brimstone speeches ever.

My husband and I love this movie, which has been the source of numerous inside jokes. And while I certainly would never presume to suggest I am as clever, unflappable and creative as Flora Poste - and certainly not as stylish - it has been pointed out to me that I like to make things tidy. Perhaps even that I can't resist an opportunity to help somebody else tidy up a little mess in their life. Even professionally, I seem to have been drawn into management positions by an irresistible pull to solve problems, to make things orderly. When I start tidying, or sticking my nose in other people's business, my husband would call me Cousin Flora.

That's all there is to it, really. You should rent the movie sometime. Then you, too, can apply these handy little sayings in your daily life:

• "I saw something nasty in the woodshed."
• "Mother Nature is all well and good in her place, but she mustn't be allowed to make things untidy."
• "There'll be no butter in hell!"