Got a new mattress this week, big event actually after 22 years on the old one. My brother, who bought a new mattress, passed his newer than mine one on to me. Normally I wouldn't be much of an advocate of used mattresses, you know with imaginations of bed bugs and every manner of bodily leakage but this one came all in the family, so how bad could it be?

My old mattress, my daughter described as a 'brown mattress'. Not as in colour, but as in race - and this isn't a derogatory inflection. Brown people, apparently like me, buy rock hard mattresses. We like them that way. Rock hard mattresses however, have different heat retaining qualities - as I've discovered this week. The loft and foam of the new mattress retains heat - whereas my old one was more like sleeping on the floor.

Not having much of a life at the moment, this has been a big topic of interest to me and I even emailed my brother with my discoveries - to which he promptly responded:

'The warm bed effect… I totally understand it. As a matter of fact, I am an expert on the subject. The bed is warmer because of stored gas. Let me explain....J was excessively farting all night, every night. Her excessive fart gas was being pushed (under pressure) into the mattress and stored for future use. When you toss and turn during the night, the stored gas is released and heat is created. Too many blankets on the mattress, keep the heat from escaping into the atmosphere. The warm bed/too many blanket effect is very similar to global warming.'

Man it's good to have heat science properly explained. My youngest son, who deeply appreciates all things fart, thanks you also, R.