A rest for the music makers coincided with the appearance of more food, in the shape of mince pies and an enormous Christmas pudding. These were accompanied by two giant vats, one full of thick, sweet yellow custard, the other of white sauce laced with a heavy dose of rum; there were also large bowls of brandy butter and clotted cream.

Yet more beer, cider and glögg was drunk and by ten o’clock a fair few were so intoxicated that the crowning of the new idiot, due shortly to take place, would mean nothing to them. When you’re growing up here, you come of age when your parents let you stay up after eleven on this special occasion. Then the Wild Oats Roguers return with a bawdier, adult selection, full of the sort of double entendres we British seem to love. (Few people appreciate the debt hip-hop owes to folk music in this sphere.)

At length, at around midnight (not on the stroke of it, as that is not the way things work here), Mr Samuel Wells, the chair of the Parish Council, climbed onto the dais at the far end of the building. Following the customary one-two-one-two-ing of the microphone in the centre of the platform, he began his carefully prepared address.

‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ he announced, ‘Ladies and gentlemen! Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please!’ The noise in the hall subsided as people realised the high point of the evening was nigh. ‘It is my great pleasure to welcome you here tonight for the investiture of our next village idiot.’

There was a burst of applause.

‘Before we get down to the proceedings, I would like to offer a big “thank you” on behalf of everyone to all those who have worked so tirelessly, whether on the election itself or on the refreshments tonight –Emma Hammond deserves a special mention there. It has been a superbly run operation, and we can all be rightly proud of ourselves.’

There was another outbreak of applause.