Going out on New Year’s Eve is like walking to the South Pole in high heels through a crowd of drunk people. You traipse for hours in the freezing cold, as sober as Widdecombe and busting for the loo, until you’re rescued by a minicab driver who charges £150 to drive you three miles home.

Ahh, home. Home is where the heart is. And the truckloads of food and booze you’ve got left over from Xmas, and the loo, and all the telly you can eat.

After the break: What to watch, and what not to watch, at midnight this NYE

TOP 10 PROGRAMMES FOR RINGING IN 2006:

1. Elvis – Aloha From Hawaii. The 1973 greatest hits concert. NYE viewing par excellence, criminally tucked away on digital. ITV3, 11.40pm

2. Comic Aid. Rude words for good causes with Izzard, Pegg, Bailey et al. BBC3, 11pm

3. Jools’s Annual Hootenanny. Stick it on in the background and be sociable. (Warning: contains James Blunt.) BBC2, 11pm

4. Bleak House. Dickens turned into a soap with Johnny Vegas. Beeb4′s showing the whole thing over two nights, starting on Friday. BBC4, starts 7pm

5. The Comic Strip Presents… Sex Actually. (First shown tonight, C4, 9pm.) E4, 11.15pm

6. The 50 Greatest Documentaries, More4, 10pm

7. White Magic: Paul Zenon. Oddly compelling when you’re in that altered state where you’ve drunk all the Cava Brut your liver can stand. ITV1, 11.45pm

8. Ring. Original Japanese psycho-horror. "Ring in the new"… geddit? Sci Fi, 10.05pm

9. Pride & Prejudice. The one with Colin Firth. UKTV Drama, 11.20pm; contd 1 Jan 2.30pm

10. Derek Acorah’s Ghost Towns. Best watched in the dark, with pissed friends. Otherwise it’s shite. Living TV, 11pm

DON’T BOTHER WITH THIS LOT:

1. New Year Live. "Natasha Kaplinksy and her guests ring in the new on the banks of the Thames," says Radio Times. Great. BBC1, 11.35pm

2. The Year We Won The Ashes. Can I go to bed now? C4, 11.30pm

3. Scottish Parliament. BBC Parliament