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It was the American politician Mario Cuomo who said: "You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose".

Mr Cuomo never had the pleasure of a Welsh assembly election campaign or he might have had to rethink his analysis.

It's hard to think of any poet whose vocabulary would include words such as "ring-fence", "capital" or "revenue", terms with which our politicians are all too familiar. And too few words rhyme with "doorstep", although I'm ruling nothing in and nothing out, as they say..

Campaigning in cliches might be a more appropriate phrase for political parties who declare in their manifestos they are "not afraid to roll up their sleeves" and "will never be afraid to rest on their laurels".

The absence of poetry may be one reason why this election campaign feels flat, an atmosphere not helped by the stop-start public holiday weeks.

Strategies are a bit last year in Welsh politics but one party is proposing them for shopkeepers, seaside towns and even religious heritage. It sounds like a strategy for strategies.

Two parties are promising a "happier" Wales. The others aren't promising to make us more miserable; it's just that the happiness agenda doesn't appear in their manifestos.

Some policies are more long-term than others. I suspect even I won't be around to report on whether bilingualism has been delivered by 2051.

I've avoided attributing any of the policies above as I'd hate to disappoint those of you who've yet to read every manifesto.

If that challenge proves resistable, you could always start with my colleague Daniel Davies's policy poker here.

Never mind election fever: the speculation over wedding attire is at fever pitch on the doorstep. Who will design it? How much will it cost? Will someone else turn up in the same gear? Can I buy one in Primark?

As of today, the speculation will stop. I can reveal, as those royal reporters say, that the Welsh first minister, Carwyn Jones, has decided to shun morning dress for the big occasion.

"I will be wearing a lounge suit," he told me. "I don't look good in tails." This despite Labour leader Ed Miliband joining David Cameron and Nick Clegg in morning dress for the occasion.

Mr Jones said: "Really, I associate tails with being part of the official party as it were. I don't think people are going to be looking at what I wear.

"It is up to people to decide what they want to wear. The option is morning suit, lounge suit or uniform. I don't have a uniform, so it's lounge suit."

Another notable Welsh guest is also shunning tails. Presiding officer Lord Elis-Thomas will also be wearing a lounge suit, although probably one of immaculate tailoring. (It was once suggested that the reason he was so demob-happy during his last days as an MP was because he was the only one wearing a demob suit styled by Giorgio Armani).

Lord Elis-Thomas has been known to express the occasional republican sentiment in the past, although he was once late for his own leader's speech at a Plaid Cymru conference due to a visit to his constituency by the Queen.

As Bethan Jenkins, one of his past colleagues in the Welsh assembly, put it on twitter: "The Lord works in mysterious ways".

With two weeks to go, it was a chance to remind people of what happens on May 5 - and for me to brush up on my knowledge of electoral systems (there's no better way to start the day).

Back in Cardiff, sorting through an inbox creaking with election propaganda, I spy a challenge from the Welsh Liberal Democrats - "the only party to have published a full set of costings as a part of their election manifesto".

The Welsh Lib Dems are consitent on this, publishing costings in their UK general election manifesto last year; a manifesto that promised to increase the Welsh assembly government's budget in year one and put more police on the beat, two pledges that didn't survive the coalition negotiations.

The fullness of the latest costings, which largely rely on using assembly government reserves, are equally debatable.

Take this from page 16 of the party's : "We will promote Wales to visitors....by making St David's Day a public holiday".

Any reader of the manifesto could assume this is additional to current public holidays and, as the Lib Dems' best friends in Westminster have pointed out, this is not a cost-free option. Nowhere in the manifesto, so far as I can see, does it say that this holiday would replace another one (the policy of the Welsh Conservatives).

Indeed, the (Conservative) Wales Office Minister David Jones has put the cost at £138m, not a trivial sum when budgets are squeezed and probably worth including in any "full set of costings".

The Lib Dems don't have far to look for the impact on public budgets of extra public holidays - the Lib Dem-led coalition on Cardiff Council estimates that next week's royal wedding holiday will cost the city £840,000.

Another day, another market cafe. Today it was the Teapot in Llanelli, where I caught up with the Labour leader, Ed Miliband.

He had to share top biling with the Welsh WI conference in the town, but it's fair to say he got a warm reception in a seat his party wants to win back from Plaid Cymru.

Not everyone knew who he was. One lady confidently told me that the Labour leader's name was Miliband but despite my clue ("David or Ed") was unable to be more specific.

He wasn't short of ideas from supporters either. Another lady wanted something done about what she called "these bloody Tories".

"I know," said the Labour leader sympathetically. "We have got to do something about them."

He then received an interesting contribution to his party's policy-making process: "Machine gun them".

Ed Miliband: "Well, I don't think that is a good idea but we need to get them out".

Lady in street: "Machine gun.....shoot 'em....rat-tat-tat..." Mr Miliband moved swiftly on to the next handshake.

He's on the look out for contributions to Labour's policy review, although somehow I can't see this one making the next manifesto.

It's a tough job, but someone's got to do it. Somehow, it fell my way.

So I found myself at seven o'clock this morning at Caesars Cafe in Barry trying to explain the alternative vote to an expectant nation.

Explaining how AV works can be a challenge in broadcasting. Some of the Ö÷²¥´óÐã's greatest brains, and me, have been struggling to find an appropriate gimmick, sorry visual metaphor, for TV audiences.

So I turned to in the hope that supporters and opponents alike would give their views concisely within 140 characters.

Here's a summary of the response:

@CharlotteV: "Many have tried, and many have failed. Have not yet seen AV described in 140 chars"

@moronwatch: "Have yet to see FPTP defended coherently anywhere"

@bjhallett: "Rank candidates by preference, candidate has to get 50% of votes, lowest goes out & next pref counted till 50% reached"

@SimonThomasAber: "AV is the same as first past the post except the goalposts move as you count the votes"

I do hope that helps. Tonight, I shall be trying to explain it for a Wales Today audience, this time with an added Welsh angle.

It's difficult to predict how seats would change hands in future elections under AV, as voters' second preferences may change and political parties may campaign differently.

But academics have tried to look at how AV would have made a difference during the last campaign. The found 43 seats would have changed hands a year ago, including five in Wales.

In Cardiff North, Labour's Julie Morgan would have held off the challenge of the Tories; Labour would also have held Aberconwy, won by Conservative Guto Bebb. The Liberal Democrats would have taken Swansea West and Newport East from Labour and in Montgomeryshire, Lembit Opik would have survived the Tory challenge.

Never mind changing the course of political history, AV could well have changed the world of celebrity television as we know it today.