January 20, 2009
In just over two hours' time, Barack Obama will be sworn in as 44th President of the United States of America.
He of course carries with him the hope of a nation and an increasingly tediously interested world.
But I doubt very much that the sun will shine any brighter tomorrow morning because of it.
Nor do I expect the starving to wake up no longer hungry, warring factions at peace, or penguins and polar bears holding an End Of Global Warming Party (though, dammit, I'd like to at least see what that last one looked like - especially if they held up protest banners declaring: "What makes you smug liberal bastards think we actually like snow?").
Because much as I'm glad to see whom I consider to be the right man getting the job, I'm now finding the euphoria and expectation just a little grating.
The reality is that we're not seeing the arrival of Superman here.
We're just seeing yet another politician get yet another job.
And as inspiring and impressive as his rhetoric has been so far, this afternoon the much feted Mr Obama - imminently most powerful man in the world and all that - merely becomes the West's most senior civil servant.
And I do wonder if, like billions of other mortals waking up for work today, he sat there on the toilet this morning with a fag in one hand and the Wall Street Journal in the other, and ruefully thought: "I really can't be arsed with this today."
* That chocolate bar was a timely gift today from a colleague who's just returned from a trip via Los Angeles. No idea when the "best before" date is....
SeasideMan
Pro 
He's Impotus really - nowt will change...