The position of “Royal Correspondent” must be one of the most soul destroying things imaginable. Perhaps even worse than that of “Liberal Democrat Campaign Manager”. All those years at university studying journalism and for what? Hanging about outside somewhere or other, spending your days speculating.

Yesterday’s Royal Birth has been a classic case in point. The “Royal Correspondents” were all stood, for most of the day outside the “Lindo Wing” of St Mary’s Hospital. Waiting.

Waiting for anything to happen and filling in the gaps with speculation and speculating on the speculation with doses of the painfully obvious thrown in for good measure:

When the baby might be due (probably anytime now), what the Queen thinks (expected to be delighted), what the doctors and nurses are doing (likely to be attending to Her Royal Highness with great care and attention), when will the new arrival have her first poo (expected to be around 5 and rumoured to be potentially sloppy and on the whiffy side)…

I could go on and on and on. They did! ITV cancelled their local news coverage to speculate in this manner for a further 20 minute “special”. Look at the BBC’s poor old Nicholas Witchell. Prince Charles famously was overheard to say he “couldn’t bear” him. Nowadays, Witchell looks like he can’t bear himself. He looks dead behind the eyes. Too much speculation can do that to a guy. Too much of the blindingly obvious can eat away at someone.

I guess he goes home at the end of a hard day watching a bunch of priviledged burdens on the state, waiting for them to do something mildly interesting feeling depressed and remembering the days of anchoring the 6 o’clock news, breaking stories such as the Zebrugge disaster and sitting on lesbians.

Then again I’m just speculating.