THE past year has been about four months long, and that's not just my view. I've stopped counting the number of people who've said: "I've never known a year go so fast."

Why 2004 has bowled along on oiled wheels, I can't fathom. As years go, it hasn't been fuller or busier in our house yet the major jobs on the list at the beginning of the year are, with the exception of the new kitchen, still hanging around for 2005.

If I didn't have the cuttings neatly filed, I'd be hard put to believe I'd written 52 (or, given the way Fridays fall in 2004, 53 actually) of these pieces on subjects as varied as a nice cup of tea, Dr Seuss, The Archers and the North-East Assembly referendum.

It has, however, been one of the hardest years for observing one of my self-imposed taboos here: no party politics, not even when discussing the referendum.

Simply by stating the difficulty, I may be breaking the taboo, implying as it does that the party in power is impinging more and more on our ordinary lives, but so many things I would have liked to have commented on have acquired a political element.

Among them are bringing up children, nursery education, the pensions crisis and house sales. All would, at one time, have been subjects for what is still, nominally, a women's column. Now any discussion of them can't avoid new or pending legislation, or the latest ministerial pronouncement.

I didn't feel it right, either, to remark on the spare-time antics of MPs of any party, though I am as puzzled as ever by the apparently aphrodisiac qualities of politics.

But I have commented elsewhere, scurrilously, scathingly, sympathetically or (I hope) sensibly and, above all, satisfyingly, on politics from loony left to raving right, as well as on "life, the universe and everything".

That's what keeping a diary is for. Not to have something sensational to read on the train or to keep with a view to publication and the settling of old scores when I'm famous - dream on - but as a means of letting off steam. A safety valve, if you like.

We all need a safety valve for the things we desperately need to rant about but can't, whether it's local and national politics, the in-laws or the neighbours' kids. A diary is just the thing.

It doesn't have to be more than an exercise book and needn't be written every day but it does need secure storage, unless you can trust the rest of the household never to peep or, like Samuel Pepys, you've invented your own shorthand. But give it a try.

At the end of an old year, thank you all once again for your comments and recipes. It has also been a pleasure meeting so many of you. I hope 2005 is a happy and healthy year for you all