IT’S FUNNY TO think that a broken gearbox could lead to a physics student folding T-shirts in my lounge room, but that’s the internet for you.

My addiction to outsourcing began when my car gave up the ghost in exactly the wrong place and I gave in to the temptation to hire a little help. But before I knew it, I was onto the hard stuff: rubbish removal, handyman jobs and eventually, to my shame, my clean-laundry pile.