Imagine the dismay of catty people and Hollywood sycophants when they realized that the Golden Globes, the longtime lecherous cousin of the Oscars, would be reduced to a “press conference” on account of those nasty, selfish writers. No longer can the 85-odd, so-called Hollywood Foreign Press journalists hobnob with the celebrity elite while passing out awards that are worth more melted down than they do in their original, globular absurdity.

No longer can we all gape and gasp at the fashion faux-pas lining the red carpet and cheer with glee when an actor wins the Best Comedic/Musical “award,” knowing that they have just received the kiss of death and won’t even score an Oscar nomination mere weeks later (Gene Hackman, The Royal Tenenbaums; John Travolta, Get Shorty; Hugh Grant, Four Weddings and a Funeral; Jim Carrey, Man on the Moon; Richard Gere, Chicago – just to name a scant few).

Most seriously of all, what will we ever do with all those mini-bottles of cheap champagne, tuxedo-front T-shirts and year-old nacho cheesier dip?

But what choice did the HFP and Globes have? Knowing that many, if not all, nominated stars would skip the ceremony in solidarity with the writers, telecaster NBC had to either show an auditorium full of empty seats or cancel the show entirely.

Even faced with the loss of advertising revenue (some estimates say around $15 million in a normal year), NBC pulled the plug and darkened sets across the world. There will be no chance for Christine Lahti to miss her category by being in the bathroom, no Robin Williams to mumble crazy nonsense into the microphone anytime he’s let anywhere near the stage, no conspicuous shots of inebriated stars in the audience pretending that they’re Sober As A Judge (not, of course, sober as Judge Judy. The lush).

The Golden Globes was that one night of the year that Hollywood let on – just the teensiest, tiniest bit – that they really were suffering from a severely underdiagnosed case of selfcongratulatoriosis.

So here’s my suggestion of how to recreate some GG magic without crossing the metaphysical picket lines. Take four large, plump grapefruits, cut a tiny hole in their bottoms, squeeze out all of the essential nutrients and stick their desiccated remains into tiny silk stockings.

Lay a red scarf down a small declining plane, turn on all of the lights in your home and roll them down a red scarf one by one into the toilet. Fish the grapefruits out of the bowl, steal some cheap semi-gold earrings from a friend or family member and stuff the earrings into the husk of the grapefruits.

Ideally at this point the last ounce of juice should teardrop down from this hole. Finally, stick all of the grapefruits behind the refrigerator and come back to them in a year’s time and see if you can remember what the hell you were doing, what these things are or why they have gold earring embedded inside of them.

This year, a year where no small amount of arm-twisting has provoked a legitimately meaningful awards press conference where the artists of this town have banded together in the most admirable of partnerships, enjoy what the Globes have truly wrought. Let us celebrate the outstanding artistic, imaginative and creative accomplishments of the craftspeople in this field while not denigrating the real-life struggles of one of its most essential groups.

In temporary death, the Golden Globes has done more than it ever could have in its fanciful, fleeting life.