JANUARY
Venus passes through the underworld, a pale sun rises in the east and another year begins. It is the age of wisdom, it is the age of foolishness.
Carrie Johnson shuffles her tarot deck. Boris Johnson ponders the Omicron figures through a hangover. Sue Gray goes for a jog. Temperatures in St James’s Park hit 16.3C. The Queen asks a footman to turn the central heating down. It is the epoch of belief, it is the epoch of incredulity.
A bleary nation looks for omens in the five-letter solutions to the new puzzle craze. BOOST. DRINK. BANAL. SIEGE. What could this mean? Among the ‘microtrends’: dark academia, fairy grunge, cosy crime. The domestication of the dog continues unabated. One bitcoin is worth £34,225.
Each day brings fresh revelations about the sheer scale of revelry at Number 10 during lockdowns: wine fridges, Abba sing-alongs, balloons, party bags, Fondant Fancies. Each day, Johnson is forced to issue a ‘heartfelt apology’ — or else pretend not to understand why everyone is so annoyed.
Russian forces mass on the Ukrainian border. Mars moves into Capricorn. A woman cries into a sink. Danny Dyer announces he’ll be leaving EastEnders. We don’t talk about Bruno.
‘The Three of Cups, the Fool, and the Hanged Man,’ says Carrie. ‘What can this mean?’ History will recall that on 3 January the Wordle solution is: Truss.
FEBRUARY
In a fusion lab in Oxford, physicists create a brief, tiny star inside a reactor. In the star’s five-second existence, it emits enough energy to boil 60 kettles. Trend forecasters detect the first murmurings of a Vibe Shift. In the metaverse, Nick Clegg and Mark Zuckerberg marvel at each other’s new bodies and talk about the future. The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born.
Partygate worsens. Boris Johnson hires a new communications chief who states: ‘He’s not a complete clown.’ Footballer Kurt Zouma kicks a cat across a kitchen. A Marvin Gaye impersonator sings ‘Let’s Get It On’ to frigid monkeys in Stoke-on-Trent. Natalie Imbruglia wins a game show in a panda suit. Prince Andrew settles out of court. At the Winter Olympics in Beijing, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin declare there are ‘no limits’ to their friendship.
There’s a huge storm: 100 mph gusts blow the roof off the O2. Everyone livestreams jet planes landing in high winds at Heathrow and takes a moment to appreciate the miracle of aviation.
Putin launches what he calls a ‘special military operation’ and almost everyone else calls it a sadistic war. Russian missiles rain down on Ukraine. Millions of refugees pour over the borders. On Snake Island in the Black Sea, border guard Roman Hrybov messages the cruiser Moskva: ‘Russian warship, go f*** yourself.’
MARCH
‘When human connections disrupt, you realise how much you depend on them,’ writes the Ukrainian philosopher Volodymyr Yermolenko. A huge column of tanks inches towards Kyiv. A woman downs a drone with a jar of pickles. Chelsea Football Club takes the opportunity to remove Roman Abramovich.
The Vibe Shift makes landfall. Everything that was cool five minutes ago (ethics, sportswear, wellness) is no more. ES Magazine christens this the ‘age of the hangover’. Readers are urged to put ‘career progression’ and ‘self-improvement’ on the ‘cultural bon-fire’. Two thirds of Londoners are reporting burn-out. One third are still in goblin mode.
Iran releases Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. Generative AI is coming on leaps and bounds. Will Smith takes exception to a Chris Rock joke at the Oscars and punches him in the face. Everyone is angry over cake.
APRIL
The Conservative MP Neil Parish, 65, wakes up from a horrible anxiety dream. He googled a certain type of tractor known as a ‘Dominator’ and ended up watching porn in the Commons not once but twice.
Covid-19 still very much a thing: a record 4.9 million people have it on All Fools’ Day. Lateral flow tests are no longer free. The energy price cap rises by 54 per cent. Priti Patel is forced to apologise as only a quarter of Ukrainian visa applications have been processed. A state funeral is held for Dot Cotton in Albert Square.
‘It doesn’t really mean anything,’ explain indie band Wet Leg when they’re asked about their name. ‘It’s just a reminder to not take yourself too seriously because, at the end of the day, you’re in a band called Wet Leg.’
MAY
Rebekah Vardy begins legal action against Coleen Rooney. But Vardy’s agent accidentally dropped her phone — key evidence — in the North Sea. Kate Moss also made a court-room cameo thanks to Johnny Depp.
Ukraine wins the Eurovision Song Contest. The Elizabeth line opens and it’s now possible to travel from Paddington to Farringdon in 0.6 parsecs. Someone reportedly calls Piers Morgan a c-word live on Talk TV but sadly there are no witnesses.
The police conclude their investigation into Partygate. Johnson is the first PM to be sanctioned for breaking the law. Graham Brady starts counting letters from unhappy MPs. Everyone is sick of Instagram Reels.
JUNE
It’s the Platty Jubes! Paddington Bear visits Buckingham Palace. Everyone has a really smashing time, fist-bumping neighbours over sharing platters of marmalade sandwiches and Bovril. Lovely stuff.
Kate Bush finally makes that deal with God and swaps places with Harry Styles at the top of the UK charts. ‘You know it’s not the same as it was,’ counters Styles. No Harry, it’s better. Mick Lynch, the RMT boss, tells Richard Madeley that he does come up with the most remarkable twaddle.
There’s an escalation in the War on Woke: transgender armies assail the Houses of Parliament, demanding compulsory sex changes for all police officers and the banning of Mr Men books . It’s increasingly hard to tell what’s real. People coin new words for what’s going on: Polycrisis. Pseudoreality. Bedlamcore.
Kendrick Lemar brings Glastonbury to a riotous close with a live crucifixion. The Government launches a scheme to fly asylum-seekers to Rwanda to distract from Partygate or as part of the Vibe Shift, who can say? A Google engineer is convinced machines are sentient and is put on sick leave. It emerges no one in the Metaverse has any legs.
Matt Hancock eats a penis on I’m a Celebrity and emerges with more credit than he had as an MP
JULY
Finally! Rishi Sunak resigns! Sajid Javid resigns! Everyone resigns including, eventually, Boris Johnson! We all crowd around a laptop to watch his speech but he still doesn’t seem to get it.
Everyone worries about nuclear war. Everyone googles: ‘pegging’. The London Fire Brigade has a busy night.
And the Conservative leadership contest is underway. It’s a crowded field but Ekin-Su CülcüloÄlu and Davide Sanclimenti emerge as clear front-runners. Meanwhile, in Casa Amor, Tom Tugendhat tells Suella Braverman she is ‘faker than a Louis Vuitton from China’. The contest feels increasingly detached from reality.
England defeat Germany 2-1 in extra time to win the European Championship.
AUGUST
After bison are released into the Kent countryside, beavers are now a regular sight in the waterways of Wiltshire. Some of us have a really nice summer: swimming in streams, kissing strangers, seeing our friends again. The blackberries come early this year.
In fashion, it’s now all about #regencycore, periwinkle, air fryers as outerwear, #sexypope and industrial action.
Salman Rushdie is stabbed in New York. Money Saving Expert warns that rising energy bills are a ‘national crisis’. Ex-PM Gordon Brown warns of financial apocalypse. Rishi Sunak tells Liz Truss bad things will happen if she does what she says she’s gonna do — and she goes ‘la la la la la la’.
SEPTEMBER
The Summer of Discontent has passed; the Autumn of Insanity is upon us. Inflation is now up beyond 10 per cent. In a terrible mix-up, Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng become Prime Minister and Chancellor. ‘You alright?’ Truss asks the public. ‘Have you got an issue with me? It feels like you’ve got an issue with me.’ Ekin-Su and Davide are forced to shelve their industrial strategy and settle for true love instead. Peppa Pig features a same-sex couple. Nasa smashes a spaceship into an asteroid.
Then the Queen dies. It’s been on the cards for a while but it’s still a shock. Center Parcs evicts holidaymakers as a mark of respect; supermarket chain Morrisons turns down the beeps at checkouts.
The Queue begins to form down the Thames; by the end of the month it stretches three times around the circumference of the Earth. Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield are burned in his’n’hers wicker effigies. King Charles III’s pen doesn’t work. It is a truly emotional time for everyone.
Then: the mini-budget
OCTOBER
We cut live to Kwasi Kwarteng, at an orgy of hedge fund managers and grouse moor owners in Tufton Street. But no sooner has he opened his mouth than the pound literally goes missing. No one can find it anywhere. The gilt market craters. A plague of sores hits the Home Counties. Everyone whose name begins with ‘N’ loses all their body hair. It’s a bloody disaster. He has to go. So does Truss. Sir Keir Starmer allows himself a celebratory pint.
In a now familiar ritual, Sir Graham Brady sacrifices some children, drops three stones down a well, sings a song of sixpence and absolves the Conservative Party of its sins. Rishi Sunak is our fifth Prime Minister in six years. The new Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, tries to load a saved game from 2013 only the graphics have gone all weird.
The world of chess is gripped by a cheating scandal involving anal beads. Crocs with socks are a thing. The Vibe Shift has claimed 20,000 lives. One billion crabs have gone missing in Alaska. One third of Pakistan is under water. The Ukrainian counter-offensive has been a partial success.
NOVEMBER
Cuffing season begins. Crypto turns out to have been a massive scam. The World Cup starts in Qatar and England and Wales decide against wearing rainbow armbands. Still, nice to see Marcus Rashford smile again. Ukraine recaptures Kherson from the Russians. Elon Musk’s $44bn Twitter purchase seems to have been purely to set up a lame joke involving a sink. His reign isn’t half as fun as anyone hoped, including Musk. ‘It was hell but it was our hell,’ someone complains. ‘Yeah? How many electric car companies have YOU started?’ counters a troll.
Matt Hancock eats a penis on I’m a Celebrity and somehow emerges with more credit than he had in years as an MP. Riots in China. We don’t talk about Kanye West.
DECEMBER
The Winter of Everything is Really Expensive and Nothing Works. Cara Delevingne brings herself to climax on TV. A bitcoin is worth £13,846.80. Volodymyr Zelensky addresses a weary nation. Mercury moves into retrograde. A one-year-old sees a host of angels in Finsbury Park but lacks the vocabulary to alert her mother.
Then Christmas comes and takes everyone by surprise as usual. Liz Truss helps her Labour-voting mum dish up the veg. Elon Musk taps out a tweet — then thinks better of it. Carrie Johnson deals the tarot cards on the drinks trolley she rescued from Downing Street: the Ace of Coins… the Wheel of Fortune… what could it mean? We end the year poorer and colder but maybe, just maybe, a bit wiser. We don’t talk about Brexit.
