It's a funny old season, winter.

Most people cockily expect one every year. They get carried away with their boots and thick knits, their central heating and mince pies.

But for NHS managers and health ministers, who don't believe in mumbo jumbo like calendars, winter is a constant source of fear and wonder.

Impossible to forecast or prepare for, this random nightmare arrives in their world with a icy blast and descends on the wards like a wolf on the fold.

As luck would have it, winter struck again in 2014-15, and so it's crisis time in casualty.

Quoting a series of worsening A&E waiting times, Labour's Kezia Dugdale suggested the SNP might somehow be culpable for this annual mystery.

Nicola Sturgeon, aka Florence Natingale, the Lady with the Excuse, blamed external "challenges".

Like all those pesky patients, for one thing.

"A record number of people were admitted to our hospitals through A&E in December," sighed Flo.

"Demographics" were also a right pain.

She used weaselly percentages to suggest an improvement when absolute numbers had rocketed.

But enough about amputations in corridors, the important thing was that it's worse in Wales, she said, because Labour's in charge there.

"Perhaps that is why twice as many people in Scotland trust the SNP with our NHS than Labour!" Ms Sturgeon crowed to the approval of her MSPs.

Ms Dugdale glowered like a Carry On matron.

"The First Minister is responsible for the Western General not the Royal Glamorgan and it is about time she took up that responsibilty," she snapped.

Ms Dugdale brandished a quote about a party in its second term having to take "responsibility for its own failings" - that was Ms Sturgeon in her carefree opposition days in 2001.

"When will the FM live up to her own words and get a grip of the crisis in Scotland's accident and emergency departments?" she asked.

Ms Sturgeon tutted about Wales again and Scottish Labour's own dodgy health record before 2007.

"I have been reading all week that Labour wants to make the NHS a central issue in the next election. I say this to Labour: bring it on!"

The Nat backbenches, who seemed under anaesthesia last week, animatedly cheered their boss.

Labour's Jenny Marra deflated them by asking if ministers had downgraded the target of treating 98 per cent of people in A&E within four hours.

The Lady with the Excuse produced a classic.

"The government's aim for 98 per cent.. within four hours remains in place," she insisted.

But "as an interim target", NHS boards could hit 95 per cent, before moving on to 98 per cent.

If the idea of two targets is confusing, just picture the FM shooting herself in both feet.

Then, for the sake of novelty, a story, a genuine headline-maker on stop and search.

Tory Ruth Davidson asked how the FM felt about Police Scotland continuing to search children despite promising to stop the practice last June.

Ms Sturgeon revealed she had just spoken to Chief Constable Stephen House on the subject, and lo and behold, he now wanted to phase out consensual (ie random) stop and searches for all ages.

Given Sir Stephen virtually built his career on the frenzied frisking of neds and nippers, a sudden U-turn seemed decidedly far-fetched.

The suspicion he was encouraged to recant grew when Ms Sturgeon referred to "concerns" and "criticisms", especially about playground plods searching hundreds of under-12s.

It was shameless of Ms Davidson, whose party is on the Shoot to Kill end of the justice spectrum, to feign concern to get the information, as the LibDems had made all the running on the issue.

But that's pre-election politics for you.

Gazumped, LibDem leader Willie Rennie grimaced as he said the chief constable "had better have a good explanation" for the recent problems.

But his face was as cloudless as a summer's day next to that of Kenny MacAskill, as the ex-justice secretary stared from the back row as yet another part of his legacy was dumped in the trash.

Before Ms Sturgeon took over, Alex Salmond would doughtily defend Mr MacAskill on stop and search, who in turn would champion Sir Stephen.

That chain of mutual protection is now gone.

The Chief Constable might want to stop what he's doing pronto and search out his CV for a polish.