CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY IF YOU GET A BED AND NOT THE COUCH:

I can't always choose who I sleep with (Nigel Farndale, 09/03/2008, Daily Telegraph)

According to a report published on Friday by the Sleep Council, a quarter of all couples now sleep in separate beds. This statistic in itself does not surprise me: what does is the reason given.

I would have thought it would be children. I often find myself waking up in a different bed from the one in which I started, sometimes a bunk bed that is suspiciously damp. I feel puzzled for a moment then remember that at some point in the night one of our three children came in saying he'd had a nightmare and could he sleep in our bed.

What he will have actually meant is, "Can I pummel your kidneys with my hot little feet until I drive you out of your own bed, Daddy?"

I'm not alone in this. I stayed in the spare room of a friend's house not long ago only to find him wandering in like a zombie in the middle of the night. He'd forgotten I was there. He explained blearily in the morning that he often finds himself playing musical beds in the night because if his children don't force him out, his wife's snoring does.

But neither of these is the reason given in the survey. It is technology. Gadgets.

One half will want to sleep while the other wants to play on a games console, text, shop on line, watch television, or check a Blackberry. I did try this myself briefly. I like to play postcard chess online and would take my laptop to bed, checking if a move had arrived before I switched off. A mistake. If one had, and it was knotty, I wouldn't be able to sleep.

Nowadays it's books. My wife can't get to sleep unless she has been reading one. I can't get to sleep with the light on and so will sigh, roll over, puff up my pillow and sigh again until she gives in.

Then she will lie awake in the dark fuming at my lack of consideration. By this time I will also be wide awake, worrying what sevenfold retaliation she is planning.

In this, if in no other respect, we are like Mr and Mrs George Bush. Laura Bush has revealed in a biography that her idea of an exciting night is to curl up in bed with a book. She calls reading for pleasure her "one vice" and her husband agrees, often protesting, "Laura, for God's sake, turn off the light!"