Thank you, Susie Dent, for reminding us that coffee really is the devil’s drink

I have never understood the appeal of coffee and now the ‘Countdown’ clever clogs agrees with me. Sense at last, writes Rupert Hawksley

Wake up – but don’t smell the coffee

Susie Dent is obviously the cleverest, most sensible person in the country. Everybody knows that. She sits in “Dictionary Corner” on Countdown, showing up the contestants and finding nine-letter words that shouldn’t really exist. She is the queen of logolatry.

So it was, to put it mildly, unexpected when Dent appeared to be slurring her words occasionally on television. Some viewers thought she might have been drinking – which seemed a very un Susie Dent-ish thing to do. The truth, thank the Lord, is rather more prosaic. Caffeine is to blame.

Dent told The Mirror recently that her body goes into “toxic shock” if she drinks too much coffee and she gets “incredibly cold” and “starts shivering”.