So farewell then, Jack McConnell.

The Scottish Labour leader is stepping down after 6 inglorious years as helmsman of this great nation, and it is safe to say that few will miss him. The most ludicrously over-promoted Labour apparatchik since, well, his predecessor, McConnell in office embodied all that was worst about his party (though, in fairness, not just his party); a persistent refusal to confront the country’s problems, an inherent timidity in policy matters and resistance to change, and a crony culture that has done much to perpetuate the stifling consensus politics that does so much to hold Scotland back.

But I come to ignore Jack, not to abuse him. Let him fuck off to Malawi and play the humanitarian. The only upside for the poor suffering people of Lilongwe is that their country’s even further down the pan than this one, so he can’t possibly fuck them up any more. No, my true purpose here is to focus on McConnell’s likely successor as Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander.

Reader, I have a confession. I am in love with Wendy Alexander.

No, wait, don’t go. I’m serious. One sight of that diminutive figure is enough to send me into raptures of delight that I blush to describe on a family blog such as this. How shall I count the ways? Eyes, wide and bright like saucers of champagne, yet also dark and passionate as goblets of ruby Buckfast. A neck, slender and playful like a faun’s, framed by hair delicate yet supple, like silken ropes of song. Her mouth – the mouth that launched a thousand policy discussions – a mouth that seems to defy the laws of physics, that exists in four or even five dimensions, curving space and time around it into an exquisite event horizon of pure sensuality. Breasts like quivering moulds of vodka jelly, barely restrained by the power suits and prim blouses, with peaks hauntingly reminiscent of Paisley Abbey on a misty, moonlit night. And the lisp – O, the lisp! Each word magically transformed into a teasing, seductive invitation that no mythological siren of yore could ever hope to match. And Wendy knows lots of words; she’s brighter than a brain pie.

Oh, I know it’s wrong: for a start, she’s a socialist, which is bad enough, and she’s Douglas Alexander’s sister, which is even worse; and last, but by no means least, she’s happily married to Professor Brian Ashcroft, a man almost as galactically clever as she is. But fear not, Brian, if you are reading this; I would no more steal your Wendy from you than I would plant a rare orchid in a shoebox filled with Irn Bru and mud, or urinate on one of Monet’s sunsets. I know that I am not worthy, and I know that it can never be.

And so I will hide my love from view like a throbbing wound barely restrained by its thin covering of medicated gauze; and I shall record her appearances at First Minister’s Questions, and sit up waiting for Newsnight Scotland every evening in a state of obscene arousal, and make her mix tapes but never have the courage to mail them, and never say a bad word about her on this blog ever ever. And you can hold me to that.

We now return you to your scheduled programming.