It was the election that didn’t sleep. David Cameron campaigned throughout the night. Gordon Brown was so addled that he forgot that he was wearing a microphone. And Nick Clegg revealed that all his mother ever says after watching him on telly is: “You look so tired, dear.”
Even voters slept badly. A poll published during the campaign revealed that four voters out of ten had nightmares about politicians — the most common dreams involved being chased, bored to death, or thrown off a cliff by them.
Election night itself was more tiring than usual because no matter how long you stayed up the result remained unclear. What nobody knew then was that the politicians, pundits and journalists providing rolling news would go on working