Yet I cannot remember any moment in my life when I have been less exhilarated and cheered by Christmas, a season which I normally love and long for.

This year, it feels as if Christmas has gone into exile somewhere else. Even in church I am expected to undergo a macabre, truncated ceremony where everyone stands around in muzzles as if they were in an abattoir or attending an autopsy, stinking of blasted sanitiser, and it is forbidden to sing (though humming may be permitted).

And some noodle at the World Health Organisation even thinks we should wear face-nappies at home on Christmas Day. A masked Christmas? I’d rather not have one at all.

Frankly, I wish you an Angry Christmas, not a merry one, because if you aren’t angry this year, the chances are very strong you won’t be allowed to be merry next year, or the year after that.