LIKE most political reporters I’m looking back at 2016, rubbing my eyes and thinking ‘wow did that all really happen’.
The year began all about the 2016 Scottish Election campaign and then quickly moved on to Brexit, the fall out of which will be with us for years.
We were able to bring stories from Glasgow, Scotland, UK and European politics in the most bizarre year I can remember reporting on.
On the first Monday of the year, January 4, we were first with the news that James Kelly, Rutherglen MSP, would, if re-elected in May, bring a Bill to scrap the controversial Offensive Behaviour at Football Act.
It has a lot to do with securing a place high enough on the Labour list in Glasgow to be elected.
He got back in and his bid united the opposition at Holyrood and his bill is likely to become law in 2017.
My quote of the year comes from Westminster, when SNP MP Stewart McDonald stood up in Parliament in February to welcome the cancellation of an event in Glasgow by a blogger, described as “pro rape”. 
The MP said “Can I also condemn the sick minded half-wits who support these events and were planning to attend and welcome that they will now be sitting in their underpants eating cold ravioli from a tin instead, this weekend.”
In among the other votes this year the most ridiculous election took place at Westminster in April involving The Earl of Glasgow.
He was one of just three men of the aristocracy who got to choose a new member of the House of Lords.
It’s at moments like this I realise we are not living in a full democracy.
By April, the Holyrood election was in full swing and I arranged to interview the party leaders, Nicola Sturgeon, Kezia Dugdale, Willie Rennie and Patrick Harvie.
Ruth Davidson didn’t take up our interview offer. We shouldn’t have been surprised as she had already decided to dump Glasgow and sneak across to stand in Edinburgh.
On May 7 at the Emirates Arena, and the SNP sweep all eight Glasgow seats in another historic night for the party as Nicola Sturgeon wins a third election for the nationalists.
Labour are thoroughly deflated and the Tories, with two seats in Glasgow and second place overall for the first time are buoyant.
The election meant goodbye to long serving Labour MSPs Paul Martin and Patricia Ferguson, who both served their constituencies well for 17 years with a genuine desire to improve communities.
The EU referendum campaign brought the chance to interview Michael Gove and Nigel Farage in Glasgow as they headed north with their ‘take back control’ message and dubious claims about £350million a day for the NHS.
Farage was met with noisy protests at Glasgow University. Michael Gove on the other hand craftily chose a closed location for interviews with the press.
In the midst of the EU referendum, the Evening Times obtained a copy of a leaked report that showed Lightburn Hospital and beds at the CIC unit were to close.
The story would become one of the biggest issues at Holyrood for months as Labour accused the SNP of shutting services. It has yet to be resolved.
We go back to the Emirates Arena for the EU referendum count and jaws begin to drop as the results from England flood in.
A genuine world news story unfolds and the most bizarre week in British politics in decades gets spinning out of control as David Cameron quits. Nicola Sturgeon seizes the momentum with an opportunity to promote the circumstances for a second independence referendum.
Days before Christmas, Ms Sturgeon outlines the Brexit plan with the legislation for a second referendum barely hidden up her sleeve.
After the EU vote, I headed to the European Parliament in Strasbourg to speak to MEPs from across Europe to get their reaction.
I encountered genuine sadness from many across the political spectrum, except the European far right who were gleeful and emboldened.
I encounter Farage again, smug and satisfied he had provided the boost others like French far right leader Marine Le Pen were hoping for.
As the year draws to a close we revealed plans to shut half of the city’s Jobcentres which sparked anger.
And I haven’t mentioned Trump. Follow that 2017.