What do you remember about what you were doing at previous election times?

[sethstarkaddersmum]

I remember being glad Thatcher got in cos she was a woman.
I remember that election Kinnock lost that we expected him to win - soooo depressing.
And 1997 I fell down the stairs after coming back from voting and knocked myself out and spent the day at A&E . But oh the euphoria
Then when Blair was re-elected the first time I cut my finger with the breadknife the next morning and it bled all over the photo of him and Cherie in the Guardian. Symbolic, in retrospect.
Can't remember the last one, must have been pregnant.

Was in California, listening to an LA radio station around noon, carrying "The World" from BBC + PRI + WGBH (Boston) with Eddie Mair telling Scottish and Welsh jokes (devolution votes were on back home).

Away in California visiting different friends in San Diego, for the one before that, too.

Sadly, not been away in past 10 years.

92 - hoping Labour would win and being very very upset they didn't. I watched it with my best friend, he went to bed and didn't get up for three days.

97 - sat up all night cheering and watching Michael Portillo lost his seat. Was a bright and happy day.

Don't really remember the ones in between those and this one.

Am voting conservative this time though. I have changed, the country has changed and the parties have changed.

1974: forced child labour for the libdems. Lots of leafletting and envelope stuffing. Also lots of confusing news footage of Jeremy Thorpe having done Unmentionable Things.

1979. more forced child labour for the libdem cause.

1980. child uprising against the forced labour.

1981. everyone else in tory Oxford was happy. the whole world seemed to be tory.

Same as most people on the 92 and 97 - everyone in Manchester utterly depressed in 92 and euphoric in 97, we used to watch it unfolding on a huge screen outside the town hall.

I am loving the symbolism of being able to remember what I had for tea but not his name - I thought it sounded wrong!!

And yes it was lovely thank you. I think we may have even had parmesan on top - the extravagance!

For 97 I was on the Press Association's city desk overnight, watching just in case anything market-worthy happened and in case they needed an extra pair of hands.

The atmosphere was absolutely electric, one of the best moments of my working life.

When we finally emerged at 8am into the glorious sunshine it really did feel like a new era had begun. Shame how it all turned out eh?

Dh was following the Blair campaign for one of the main tv news orgs so was with him in Sedgefield as the results came through.

My earliest memories of election day......it was very colourful, there were posters on every lampost, several vans went round the street with a loudspeaker on top encouraging the floating voters.
We got the day off school, and spent hours whizzing round on bikes collecting stickers, pencil and round plastic things emblazzoned with the party (any) name which we stuck between the spokes on our bikes. It must have been 1979 but I have no recollection who won just that the SNP had the best freebies.
I took my own children with me to vote this morning and there was NOTHING!! just one old man wearing a lib dem badge......

So am I the only person who remembers tortoises maggie and jim on Blue Peter in 1979?

I remember the tortoises!

I don't. But only because I was doing A levels and Blue Peter was frowned upon

Ah I can see why you don't remember them Pagwatch - I was 8 in 1979! I'm glad you remember them sethstarkaddersmum!

1997 a student in Oxford about a week away from Finals. Stayed up for May morning (Tory toffs popping Libdem balloons with lit cigarettes on Magdalen Bridge) and then vowed not to stay up for the election so as not to be hallucinating in Exam Schools.

Dinner out just after the polls closed, where it transpired a very staunch Toryboy had accidentally voted LibDem (both candidates had the same surname, Evan Harris was first alphabetically). Just watched a bit of it in the TV room with others similarly close to exams. Lots of jubilant shouting as results came in. Porters came to complain about the noise. Then when the Tories finally got a seat round midnight, the Blue-rosette contingent rallied and started saying "Never mind, Portillo will save us." You know the rest. Noise continued, porters stopped coming to tell us off. Stayed up till 5 in the morning, kind of passed Finals.

No real memory of later elections, though I always stayed up to watch the results.

1979: my strictly anti-TV (and Tory-supporting) parents took the TV into their bedroom for the night. I (aged 6) thought the end of the world was coming. Little did I know...

[big gap]

1997: the only elections I ever voted in in person (also in swing seat Edgbaston). Being the naive idiot I shall probably remain to the end of my days, and never having heard of exit polls, I thought the guy would assassinate me if I told him I'd voted for the wrong party (I was studying Russian at the time, so probably been reading too much about Stalin ), so I refused to speak to him .

After that I always voted per proxy (Lib Dem I hope, but my mother disapproved, so probably Tory), and now I'm no longer eligible to vote having lived abroad too long...

1979 - I was 1.
1983 - i remember waiting in the car whilst my parents voted. It was a nice day, and they voted in a red brick Ex-methodist church where we went to playgroup.
1987 - I remember my parents arguing with my grandparents about poliics! that is all. Pleased a woman had her third win.
1992 - The full grip of recession! i don't remember the actual night.
1997 - I was at university, and my friends organised a drink-per-result drinking game (Blue Curacao, Limoncello, and red wine..) which, in that night, resulted in the drinking of much red.
2001 - out of the country.

2005 - happened to notice it was election day whilst nipping out before work. This election offered so little choice, the fact of the date had completely escaped me. My bos said'I voted, doesn't matter where i live but it made me feel better'..which i think sums up a good reason to vote.
2010 - just waddled down to the poll station (a local pub under renovation) and voted. lovely spring evening, cherry blossom in the late sun..

Yet another who was excited about a woman running the country in 1979. 1992 was my first election but I lived in the safest Liberal seat in Scotland so not very exciting. 1997 I was a graduate student in Oxford and was very excited to be in a marginal seat. I've been in safe Labour seats ever since. I want to move to a marginal seat again!

i have to say the only time i have ever seen councillors really being moved to action, was in a marginal seat.

Thatcher resigned on my 21st birthday.

It was fab.

That was bloody nice of her Rosebud

Yes, best pressie ever.

Remember staying up late and going to bed very depressed in 1992. Up all night and oh-so-happy for a naive day or so in 1997.

97 - in the middle of my 2nd year exams at Uni, living in a student house, we all stayed up all night supposedly revising, with the help of Pro-Plus, remember chasing the milkman down the street for breakfast milk at 5am and vowing to never ever use Pro-Plus again. Passed the exams though.

Should have said 87 [old emoticon]

I remember my vote being stolen in my very first election. (People who moved into our house must have lied on the form - WE were living there on the qualifying date.)

I remember everyone walking around in shock in '92 and gradually the Tory voters coming clean. Saying things like 'well, I didn't go in meaning to vote Tory, but I just thought I'd give Major a chance'.

I remember all the hope and excitement in '97...

1979, I was six. I can remember going to the polling station at the crummy local community centre with my Mum. She explained (in a very non-political way) that the man in charge was probably going to lose. I remember feeling sorry for him and saying I thought everyone should vote for him (I've always favoured the under-dog!). Sadly no-one listened and Thatcher won.

This time, my son is 5.5, and after DH explained (in a non-political way) to him that the man in charge is probably going to lose, he has been begging us to vote for the 'red team'.

I fear history is about to repeat itself (only I'm not aware Cameron is a woman) .

A small insight into the mind of a 5/6 year old there: I think it's something to do with the fear of the unknown.

1979- I was 7. We did a mock election at school. I didn't understand it, but was quite impressed at the idea of having a female PM (ha!)

Thatcher resigned- I was in the student union and the place erupted with cheering. we were still smarting up here from the polltax fiasco (which all of we students refused to pay)

1992- sat up with fellow students and ex-boyfriend, getting more and more depressed. Had huge argument with ex-boyfriend as we were in Scotland, with a good Labour majority and yet were to have a Tory government forced on us again because of the English vote (he was English, a staunch Tory-hater, and suitably offended!)

1997- in my first job, in my tiny flat, on my own, watching avidly. Couldn't stay awake, but went to bed hopeful, and was very happy and amazed to wake up to a Labour government the next morning, having really known nothing but Tory rule all my life.

THis time- bit worried! DH is going around predicting doom and gloom, regardless of who gets in!