Year of living dangerously – Frank McNally on the madness that was Britain in 1974

Harold Wilson: his drinking was sufficiently concerning for an appalled aide to keep count in his diaries. Photograph: Getty Images Fans of the great BBC sitcom The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin will remember the character of Uncle Jimmy, Reggie's brother-in-law, a paranoid British army officer. His catchphrases included "bit of a cock-up on the catering front", delivered as he arrived yet again in time to share family meals. But he also talked obsessively about the need to prepare for "when the balloon goes up": code for the military coup he and others were planning to save Britain from…