I THOUGHT about writing more about the election today but I'm not sure I can face it. I've had a gut full. It's over. Ukip and the SNP have formed an unexpected alliance and Hadrian's Wall is going to be rebuilt and extended down the coast. They needed one vote for a majority and have done a deal with the Green Party, which has demanded that the wall uses reclaimed stone and has overhangs where swallows can make nests.

I'm not even sure I'm even going to vote. I know, I know – if you don't vote, you can't complain, but if you do vote, your complaint gets fast-tracked. Make way, make way – voters' complaint coming through.

I read an on-line article this week by a political journalist who came to the Dales to report on the the contest for the Richmond seat. I'll pluck out a few words and phrases to give you a clue as to how the Dales came of it – rabbit, hill farmers, Indian, racist, stink of working farms, tyre-crushed fox, Eastern European Roma, drink on his breath, cattle-mart hoodie flecked in manure, don’t like curry, Southerners, cheese. I'm still checking if the feature was sponsored by Welcome to Yorkshire.

Best to move on. I saw a man using a public phone box this week, like everyone used to do back in the 1980s. For younger readers, phone boxes were what you people used before mobile phones when out and about and they needed to talk to someone out of shouting range. I seem to remember some children would take great pleasure in setting off fireworks in the red phone boxes which were fully enclosed. A rocket correctly positioned would bounce and fizz about like, hmm, I suppose a rocket in a phone box.

They had other uses. As a youth, you could keep warm in them when you were up to no good. There wasn't much space. If you were lucky you would be squeezed up next to someone you fancied. If you were really lucky you might find 50p in the returned coins slot, which would buy a quarter of midget gems and a bottle of Tizer for the pair of you to share. Happy-ish days.