How to reimplement jQuery's default helper in a custom helper
<p>I'm creating a custom drag helper (in jQuery):</p>

<pre><code>$('.dragme', element).draggable({
    appendTo: 'body',
    helper  : custom_drag_helper,
    opacity : 0.5
});
</code></pre>

<p>I'm doing this because I want to sometimes clone and sometimes do the default functionality, i.e. drag the original element. </p>

<pre><code>function custom_drag_helper() {
    if (/*criteria on when to move instead of clone */) {
        return $(this); /* this is what helper: 'original' seems to do */
    } else {
        clone = $(this).clone(); /* this is what helper: 'clone' does */
        return clone;
    }
}
</code></pre>

<p>But I can't get the original functionality to work at all. return clone() works fine but return $(this) gives no joy.</p>
