the brilliantly leaping gazelle

Before I get into the nitty-gritty of election night coverage on the BBC – I mean come on, who watches shITV on election night – let me first say that their graphics department is always hi-jacked by someone armed with C.G.I skills and a large amount of acid.

That seems to me the only plausible explanation of the BBC’s coverage; namely that only a drug addled lunatic would think that we are incapable of processing any information if it isn’t presented in a way that resembles a collision involving Hieronymus Bosch, Jackson Pollack, a paint factory and a 1950’s science fiction film.

But before that we have to endure the farrago of lots of people talking earnestly about not very much at all. The first results trickle in between 11pm – 1am and until then we are treated to the spectacle of people discussing an insignificant amount of results yet imbuing them with a nationwide significance that they don’t deserve.

The bullshit-o-rama is in overdrive. There’ll be the old favourites; “It’s far too early to tell”, “we can’t read too much into this yet, but…”, “we never do well here, so it isn’t a surprise”, “ I would just like to pay tribute to X who has been a fine servant of the people and didn’t deserve this”, “I think the voters were not voting on local issues, I know the area well and that’s not the impression I got talking to people on the doorstep”, “I think we had difficulty getting our message across” And there’ll be lot of new bullshit for this one election only,  along the lines of, “The voters aren’t voting according to traditional tribal loyalties. Their lending their vote for this one time for parties that they hope can deliver the Brexit outcome they want”, “One thing is clear though, the real winner ultimately is democracy”  They’ll be loads more of this bollocks until 1am and then it goes fucking mad.(Actually, now I think about it,  this’d make a great drinking game.)

Results just pour in. Of course we’re all hoping for a Portaloo moment, however younger readers of this blog might not know what a Portaloo moment is. It was the incredibly life affirming moment in 1997 when Michael Portaloo, a Conservative cabinet minister, lost his supposedly safe seat and provided the abiding image of the impending momentous Labour landslide. Who can forget his incredibly smug face trying not to look crushed as people cheered loudly his defeat. That’s what we’ll all be hoping for, and when I write ‘we’ I mean me. Now its nearly 5pm so I’m sober – I’m not a hobo –  but I’ll be opening my first bottle of champagne at 10pm…