THE right-bending Times has made Nigella Farrago "Briton of the Year".

You might think this is a sick joke but you would be wrong. Though he defends Ukip tubes who use terms like "chinky" and "poofter", Mr Farrago is deemed in certain circles in the Deep South to be a bit of lad, the kind of blokeish neanderthal bore you'd body-swerve in your local if you had any sense. Says the Times, Mr Farrago and his party have had "a stellar year" and could yet have an even more stellar one in 2015. It likes him because he sinks pints like a darts player, "often sports a thin sheen of sweat", and says what he thinks, which does not make him Descartes. Recently, he blamed an M4 traffic jam on immigrants while another Ukipper - one Trevor Shonk - insisted that it's immigrants who have made Britain racist. Mr Shonk - Google him if you want a giggle - is a councillor in Kent which, if Ukip ever gets near power, may well become Ingerland's Vichy.

2014, I've just discovered, was the "Year of the Haggis". Why wasn't I told? And who decides these things anyway? A Celtic Confucius? Alexei Salmonella? The Daily Record? Now I come to think of it, haggis was pretty much everywhere these past 12 months. At Bute House, the First Meenister's Edinburgh pile, I was served haggis bon bons, several of which I stuffed into my jacket pocket assuming they were Ferrero Rochers. I also spied on a menu haggis lasagne, which is a travesty of two great delicacies. Then, as readers of this still throbbing organ may recall, I enjoyed in Northumberland an "Auchtermuchty", which is a bacon roll stuffed with haggis. Magnifique! What this coming year is designated, I know not. It could be the "Year of Porridge", which I have resolved to consume regularly, or the "Year of Broth", which is due a comeback. More likely, however, is the "Year of Tripe".

MODERN men, a "study" suggests, are eschewing sexist words such as "blonde", "sexy" and "pretty". "Sexy" is particularly suspect and is now rarely heard in common parlance. Also, insists a professor, "the association between 'naked' and 'woman' has gone down". What's more, whereas in the past women were described in terms of their hair, that's all but disappeared. In their stead have arisen words such as "international", "gypsy" and "Italian". Not for the first time I am discombobulated. In my superior oasis, Staggs, the menfolk always behave decorously when women are in eyeshot, insisting, for example, that the channel is switched from one showing beach volleyball or mud wrestling to another offering Thai boxing or rugby league. In this neck of the woods this is the very definition of enlightenment.

SO this is it, then, 2015. Doubtless we can look forward to another year's worth of anniversaries and commemorations. In January, 1915, for instance, the Thames flooded, Windsor Castle was surrounded by the wet stuff and the only game you could play on Eton's sodden fields was water polo. "The milk and the post is being delivered by punt," ran one report, "and even those wearing waders are getting their feet wet." A few months later the residents of Buck Palace and "other Royal Households" announced that they were giving up booze because the King, whoever he was, wanted to set an example to armament workers whose heavy drinking was slowing doing the production of killing machines. Several Cabinet ministers agreed to follow suit. Soon, however, the teetotal Chancellor, Lloyd George, felt he had to return to the subject, saying that Britain's main enemies were "Germany, Austria and Drink" with the latter "the greatest of these deadly foes". LG may have had in mind his own Pee-Em, HH Asquith, who was often pickled and more than once nodded off while purportedly trying to figure out ways to best the Hun.

A dispatch from inside the Westminster bubble suggests that the Home Secretary is positioning herself to take over from Posh Dave when the time comes for him to step into the gutter of history. Needless to say, this is news to me. As it is, I hasten to add, to the HS when I confront her as she is weeding the croquet lawn. But this is the kind of rumour that has a tendency to go viral if not treated quickly with antibiotics. Immediately, the HS drafts a press release in which she gushes about PD and insists that she loves nothing better than banging up ne'er-do-wells and ejecting immigrants in the wee sma' hours who contribute to the wellbeing of the nation. Reading it through, it appears that she has confused herself with another HS called May. When I point this out to her, the HS is unfazed. Brandishing a trowel, she instructs me to release her statement anyway. "After all, what harm can it do?" she says, as another hapless weed is dumped on the compost heap.

NOW we know; it was the ghastly Oliver Letwin who persuaded Maggie Thatcher, a fruitcake, to use Scotia as an experiment for the poll tax. Mr Letwin, who is currently employed as an adviser to Posh Dave, told the Iron Loony that she should "use the Scots as a trailblazer for the real thing". Never fond of Us, the Grantham-born grocer's daughter merrily concurred. Bizarrely, Sir George Younger, then Secretary of State for Scotia, did not throw a hissy fit at the thought of such imbecility. He is thus destined to enter the annals as the man who consigned the Dodos to electoral oblivion hereabouts for decades. Back then, in the 1980s, the Dodos had 22 MPs. At this hour it has one, David Mundell, aka "Fluffy". Come May, it may well have none. That is Mr Letwin's, and Mrs T's, and Sir George's legacy, for which one is, of course, deeply and profoundly grateful.