I’M DOING the kindness advent calendar this year. I already ate a whole chocolate one. I swear they put drugs in those tiny chocolate Christmas trees, so you can’t resist ripping off the back and going mad on December 1.

The husband started buying Christmas Day treats like roasted peanuts which I ate immediately.

There is no point buying mince pies or chocolate covered raisins before December 24. I can’t sleep knowing there is Toffifee in the house.

When I was a kid, my mum used to buy Fussells condensed milk and leave it in the fridge. I’d sneak down in the night for a spoonful and my dad would be there already, in his pants, dolloping it onto a shortbread biscuit.

I’m trying to teach the children Christmas is not all about getting presents. It’s hard though, being an atheist.

My daughter has one line in the nativity: “No you can’t come in” which is used in our house all the time, so she’ll be fine. I wanted her to make the most of her time in the spotlight, maybe sing that old Nineties dance classic “Not tonight, not, not tonight, your name’s not down you’re not coming in” but she said no.

I got offered the role of Mary when I was nine. Gary Hales was playing Joseph and I loved him (Gary, not Joseph). I spent hours practising how to look pregnant and ethereal. I made my aunt sew me a pretty blue dress. The night of the play it started raining, and my parents, who wanted to go to the pub, told me it had been cancelled.

It hadn’t, why would it? If Mary managed to get herself knocked up by God and travel 1000 miles on a singing donkey, then give birth in a stable, with loads of animals and kings watching, I’m pretty sure the church would “solider on” through a spot of drizzle, what with having a roof and all.

The next day, Hayley told me how she’d taken over my role and how great it had been, how Gary had held her hand and everything. I’ve never got over it and still wonder if Gary and I would have ended up married had we had the chance to act together.

We have recently had a shed built, it’s unfinished with a flapping roof and perfect for a nativity play.

I’m tweaking the story slightly and we are going to perform it together nearer Christmas.

My Labrador will be the donkey and my miniature dachshund will be baby Jesus. I’ll finally get to play the part of Mary at last.

The husband is going to be King Herod. My daughters will be three feminist Queens, coming to tell (me) Mary about the #metoo campaign and help her realise she doesn’t have to do what she’s told by a man. I’ve even made a playlist.

This won’t go down well with everyone. Peta has asked people to stop using “anti-animal” phrases.

They won’t like me using my dog as a donkey, or my dachshund as baby Jesus. They want the phrase “Bring home the bacon” changed to “bring home the bagels”.

What about people on the Atkins diet though? We can no longer kill two birds with one stone, we need to say “feed” them instead.

We can’t “flog” a dead horse, we have to “feed a fed one”.

We can’t take the bull by the horns. Instead we must “take a flower by the thorns”.

The world has gone mad.

Next fruitarians will demand we stop saying things will be “butter no parsnips”. Does it really matter?

I’ve never killed two birds with one stone (I missed) or flogged a dead horse. I’ve never thrown a baby out with the bathwater.

They are just sayings, nothing happens. Like when my husband says he’s going to do something.

Wolves don’t dress up in sheep’s clothing. Money doesn’t talk. A watched pot does boil in the end. Not all thieves are thick. Horses don’t go on courses.

Even if it goes without saying, we still say it anyway.

Life doesn’t start at 40.

I have an apple tree and sometimes the apples fall really far away. How many of us have actually skinned a cat once, let alone enough times to learn there are different ways of doing it?

Sticks and stones may break my bones, as the saying goes, or maybe we can’t say that anymore in case it hurts a tree’s feelings.

Before we know it there will be a #yewtoo campaign.

We need to take things with a pinch of salt, or can’t we say that anymore?

Maybe if people decided to laugh more and get on their “high-horse” less (apologies to all low horses, I’m sure you are equally good) the world would be a better place.