Deborah Ross: 'There are some things you can only do indoors. Say, if the bailiffs call and you’re outside, where can you hide?'

If you ask me, this magazine's timely celebration of The Great Outdoors is all very well, but what about The Great Indoors? I love The Great Indoors, which, as far as I can see, offers quite the best protection against The Great Outdoors, and all the horrors of The Great Outdoors – like having to go BIRDWATCHING!!!

There are some things that you can only do indoors. For example, if the bailiffs call, where else can you hide behind the sofa while pretending to be out? You can't do this outside. OK, if you're approaching your house and you see the bailiffs on the doorstep you can, I suppose, hide behind a tree or a car, but what if they have dogs? The game is up then. Generally, it's best to not answer the door – or phone – at all.

Life is full of surprises, but why would you have anything to do with them when you can avoid them? And – this is what people who don't truly get The Great Indoors often forget – don't ever open any windows, as this is tantamount to saying: "Hello, outside. Do come inside," and you do not want the outside to come inside because the outside is full of weather, always, and weather is a terrible thing. Sometimes the weather even throws down frozen balls, called "hail" – I know, hard to believe, but it's true!

My husband is certainly one of those people who doesn't get The Great Indoors, and not only throws open windows – Oh, for God's sake: what is the point of living in a house when you are always letting the weather in? – but will also say things like: "Let's go to the cinema tonight," which is just silly (or, as I often have to say to him: "But the film will be out on DVD in three months, you big dummy").

He might also suggest a walk without a fixed purpose, destination or time limit, just to be outside. How crackers is that? And lastly? Whistler's mother. Did she ever say: "Tell you what, James, let's ring the changes and why don't you paint me outside today and to hell with the frozen balls?" No. She most certainly did not. And she's iconic. So I rest my case and rest it in the hall. It is so not going out the door.