Election Day

Vote early and vote often as they say in Chicago.

Like all ex-pats the UK Election Day will be viewed by me through a window and although I have found the whole campaign engrossing, although thank heavens it is only a month and not a couple of years like the American election, most of the issues don't directly affect me as I live abroad.

However it is still the place I call home, my son is educated there and we do have property in London, so therefore I naturally get drawn towards different themes than I'm sure I would if was still living and working there.

I watched a couple of the debates and have followed the campaigns avidly. As an original Lib-Dem cheerleader (SDP before that) I too was swept up with Clegg-mania but you can drive a bus through their manifesto and I'm not convinced Clegg is just David Cameron with a different colour tie.

The thought of a hung parliament both excites and scares me, but living overseas opens your eyes to how other people view us and our government and with a critical few years laying ahead, what is really needed is strong leadership and not an egoistical committee.

I have lived most of my life under Labour rule, but Gordon Brown's bigot gaffe last week surely proved to even the staunchest of followers that they are completely disconnected from the majority of people in the country. Actually ditto the majority of all MP's.

For shits and giggles I had a go at the Who should I vote for Questionnaire and astonishingly I came out Labour, in fact it wasn't even close with the Lib Dems trailing behind in a distant second!

Anyway I was unable to vote even though I tried to. I registered as an overseas voter but put the wrong address on the form of where I thought I was last registered. Then I couldn't remember the address of where I probably was registered, I think it was Paddock Wood but the house number and postcode escaped me. So I ran out of time and interest and will watch the events unfold on the BBC tonight when I get home as a fascinated neutral.