There should be a special celebrity version of Monopoly. Pretty much all the houses would be in Mayfair, and there’d be a special square marked: “Go directly to Rehab. Do not pass Go, and do not in any circumstances collect 200 grams.”

Singer Amy Winehouse is fame’s latest victim. She was taken to hospital last week after collapsing at her home in north London. According to the Daily Mirror, this followed “a suspected booze binge”. According to The Sun, it was a “massive drug overdose”. According to her record company, she was suffering from “severe exhaustion”. And who wouldn’t get a bit tired carrying around that hairdo?

At times like this, a good friend is always on hand to explain matters.

A “close friend” of the singer told The Sun: “We’ve been terrified something like this would happen for months. Amy has lost the plot and her partying is out of control.

“We are praying this is the wake-up call she needs”.

What Amy needs, of course, are older and wiser heads to tell her to say no to drugs. Tomorrow she is due to support the Rolling Stones in concert in German.

Sometimes life is just painful. Ask Nick Francis of The Sun. “I was shaking like a leaf,” he wrote last week. “It was one of the worst experiences of my life.”

Was he facing insurgents in Basra? Was he being forced to listen to Pete Doherty moan on about Kate Moss?

No, he was sent to have his chest waxed. And a few more sensitive parts as well.

Apparently more men – 13% – are having their chests waxed, and a quarter say they trim hair from the groin. “I can honestly say I haven’t felt pain like it in my life,” said Francis. “The pain of having my most intimate parts waxed is worse than childbirth.”

Is Francis saying he knows the pain of childbirth? Now there’s a real story.

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