Traditionally, I spend the Christmas period watching Doris Day movies, drinking a crate of port, and listening to Scarlatti. No such luck this year. It is an oddity that, despite having achieved our twin aims for 2009 (keeping Gordon in office and David on message), we end the year less well placed than we started it. This takes some explaining away and I have been asked by our blessed leader to spend the holiday period, not curled up with Doris, but touring the heartlands to discover where we might have gone awry. The itinerary David has set me would, frankly, give Ranulph Fiennes pause.
Christmas Eve: Midnight Mass with the Moggs
This may be the most alliteratively depressing invite in the advent calender. The only bonus is that the Rees-Moggs have their own church, so there is no buggering around with taxis and you can simply mosey over, with a bottle in each pocket, at 11.30 or so, snooze through the boring bits, and then deliver a belting "Hark the Herald" to remind everyone you are still alive. The downside is that because Bill owns the church, it is his to do with as he will. And this year, in recognition of the fact that two of his children will be standing as Tory candidates, we are promised not one, but three sermons, with Bill, Jacob and Annunzi-bloody-ata (An Unholy Moggery?) all inked in for the pulpit. The ETD of the service is a scarcely credible 2.30am. I think I will bring a pillow.
Christmas lunch: Chez Sam'n'Dave
They could hardly not invite me, given my services over the year. What is notable is who will not be "hanging with the Camerons" this Yuletide. There are, for instance, no seats at the table for George and Frances Osborne, who are believed to be spending a Woods-style Christmas - not that this should be taken as a suggestion that Georgie Boy has been accumulating trollops and harlots; quite the reverse. Nor is there space for the Goves. This, I am fairly certain, will have been Sam's call. The one-time school-run partners are not as close as they once were and the blame lies with Gove. Poor Samantha cannot speak without leaving Mike wiping away tears of laughter. She cannot leave the room without Gove's tongue lolling out in appreciation. In an attempt to defuse this patently embarrassing situation, I engineered an "assignation" between Gove and Sam Taylor-Wood, who, according to private polling, 70 per cent of the electorate think is married to Dave, but neither one bit and I was left not only footing the bill, but in possession of sufficient information about John Lennon to last many lifetimes.Instead of the Osbornes and Goves, it will be the Pickleses (trenchermen both), and the Heseltines, quite literally "stepping up to the plate".
Boxing Day: Hunting with Charlie and Rebekah Brooks
I predict I will be too ill to venture out on this day.
27-29 December: Board games with the Lawsons
This, good judges agree, is the most remorseless and relentless invitation on the circuit. The only thing that ever surprises one is the utter awfulness of Nigella's cooking. I have had the misfortune of attempting to eat parts of her Christmas lunch. This year it seems I will be confronted by, at best, two-day-old leftovers of something that has been inedible since inception. It is no coincidence that Nigel's extraordinary weight loss coincided with his daughter's even more extraordinary decision to ply her trade in catering.
There is no escape, however, because with Ken Clarke too lazy to bother even looking for his phone these days, we are reliant on Nigel to provide us with some economic heft. And if it makes him happy to spend the evening playing Monopoly, then so be it. Even if it involves listening to our Nige explaining each and every play in arch Friedmanite terms.
30 December: Andrew Neil's Festive Quiz'n'Chips Night
I can pretend to like a quiz as much as the next man, but Neil's annual effort provides the exception. It is common wisdom that variety is crucial
to these occasions, but Brillo eschews such conventionality. His quiz is played out over 12 rounds, one for each month of the year, and each one containing ten questions on the subject of "mine host". Last year our team failed to register a point.
New Year's Eve: GQ Man of the Decade Dinner Dance
Guess who Colonel Fawn has slated in to win this one. Barack Obama? Guy Ritchie? Wrong both times: it's our Dave's turn to collect should he care to do so. And, award junkie that he is, he'll be there, and therefore so will we, filling up the table and clapping when appropriate. The indignity of it all.
