Can you believe it’s been 1,000 days since we voted for Brexit? You know, that bold act of defiance against the nefarious establishment, where the disenfranchised majority seized back control of our laws, money and borders via a long awaited uprising of accountable democracy?

Given it was sold as a monumental moment of unprecedented triumph, you’d think the following journey would be one steeped in glory – as our swashbuckling nation forged its own path in this brave new world of nationalistic pride and a mandatory five portions of sovereignty per day for all citizens.

However, as with all decisions made at the behest of a spurious propaganda campaign, the cold, bitter reality rarely matches up with the fanciful proclamations of a tweed clad monstrosity. Which probably goes some way to explaining as to why, rather than basking in the majesty of a prosperous utopia as Jean-Claude Juncker hand waxes our Aston Martin, we’re currently staggering around in a confused stupor, drunk on the fumes of cognitive dissonance which have forever engulfed the Brexit debate and left us stumbling haphazardly along the edge of the precipice.

The miserable tale behind this excruciatingly overlong act of unnecessary national suicide is as grim as it is unfathomable, with staggering complacency and stupefying incompetence punctuating every plot point – each leaving a distinct yet indelible stain upon Britain’s global reputation.

The naivety was with us right from Brexit’s inception. David Cameron, thinking he could somehow resolve decades of Tory infighting, decided to call a referendum on our EU membership. Risky strategy, especially considering how our involvement in the union had granted Britain a powerful voice in the world of global diplomacy; but not to worry – Remain would win so it’d all be fine. At least until Remain didn’t win and suddenly everything fell to pieces. Many suspected that Cameron would now live to regret his folly – only we never really got to find out as, on account of having no actual fallback plan should unexpected failure occur, he promptly fucked off to live out the rest of his days in a shed.

National crisis? Perhaps, but such instances of governmental calamity were mere child’s play when compared with what was to come.

Through a series of bizarre events, within which the proverbial knife in the back became a prevailing motif as close chums Boris Johnson and Michael Gove demonstrated that the real meaning of friendship is only understood by way of brutal betrayal, Theresa May took the helm.

This raised eyebrows as May had backed Remain – which was likely the motivation behind the decision to transmogrify herself into the wretched, cretinous platitude spewing ghoul of farcical intransigence we know today.

“Brexit means Brexit” she proclaimed, apparently oblivious as to the notion of using the very word you’re attempting to define in its own definition being an utterly worthless practice. When understandably pressed for clarity, we were told that Brexit would be “Red, white and blue”, May again failing to appreciate that issues of unprecedented economic complexity can’t be magically solved through the dubious magic of selecting an appropriate colour scheme.

Senseless to the point of being infantile perhaps, but Theresa remained unmoved. Coherence be damned, the people had spoken in 2016 and she had to deliver Brexit – irrespective of whether anyone could actually explain it or not.

So off we went. With an ever befuddled leader and prominent Brexiteers in key cabinet positions, our nation embarked on its journey towards an indescribable destination. Sure there were plenty of pesky naysayers out there, eager to piss on the bonfire of unfounded belief, but what did they know? They were clearly embittered Remainers and their lack of compliance was apparently tantamount to treason, so why should May worry about them? Besides, having kitted herself out with a rucksack stuffed with meaningless slogans and blinkers designed to shield her gaze from a shifting zeitgeist they could easily be ignored.

Unfortunately for Theresa May, the one thing she couldn’t protect herself from was her own crashing ineptitude.

Starting from a position of parliamentary strength, May’s first masterstroke was to call an election. The plan was to cement her authority, in the process granting Theresa May the image of an inspirational leader the country could unite behind – and it would have been a good plan, were it not for the fact that its success entirely hinged on Theresa May being in any way plausible as an inspirational leader. So it failed and her majority was lost – because she’s Theresa May.

Her cabinet of misfit toys didn’t fare much better. While there was a certain logic in installing David Davis and Boris Johnson in important positions, allowing them to back up their pre-referendum bluster with credible results, the overriding logic regrettably indicated that their innards were comprised entirely of shit and they’d scarper back to sidelines the moment that inevitable shadow of accountability crept too close – which proved to be the case when they scarpered back to the sidelines, allowing them to return to their previous occupation of pretending to have all the answers without any actual power to put them to the test.

The public meanwhile watched on, our minds rife with bemusement and trepidation as this car crash of an administration bumbled ever onward, ploughing head first into one chasm of inescapable reality after another.

Was it really a surprise that the eventual, ramshackle deal May managed to cobble together was a pitiful boondoggle which pleased absolutely noone? Is it any wonder that we’ve arrived at endgame with a lamentable choice between miserable failure or cataclysm failure, teetering at the edge of the no deal abyss with the only celebratory voices being those of the ideologically deranged or disaster capitalists seeking to make a quick buck off their own nation’s demise?

Yet Theresa May remains, detached from the populace and having alienated Parliament, insisting that Brexit remains the only way forward, lest she fail to deliver not only the indescribable, but the impossible.

Well unfortunately for May, she has failed. We’re well past the point where we can delude ourselves into thinking that eventual triumph is but one crafty manoeuvre away.

Though in truth, victory was never on the cards. Brexit has ultimately been a failure right from the very moment it was conceived. Cameron failed to contain it, the Brexiteers failed to explain it and Theresa May failed to deliver it. Now all we have left to look forward to is the indignity of millions of pennies raining from the sky as, one by one, citizens have to reluctantly accept that humiliating failure was the final destination all along.

If only someone had said.

It’s long been observed that there’s something just a little off about Theresa May. No matter how hard she tries, each and every attempt to merge seamlessly into a public setting brings with it an unmistakable stench of the uncanny valley. Whether it’s her inadvertently subversive attempts at dancing, her recent failed bid to decipher the intricate mechanism of a pool cue or her obvious discomfort with any situation in which she’s confronted with a living, breathing member of the human race – there’s something unmistakably inhuman about Mrs May.

Understandably, at this point it’d be par for the course to launch into the seemingly obligatory ‘Maybot’ routine – unleashing a deluge of quips pertaining to her automaton tendencies and her apparent reluctance to undergo the Voight-Kampff test, but I’ll spare you the tedium.

The jokes have been made, relentlessly so but, as with all spawning points of enduring humour, beneath the wry chuckles there’s much truth to be had.

It’s been quite the roller-coaster ride living under the rule of Theresa May – by which I mean it’s been entirely characterised by terror induced nausea as we lurch from one pitfall to the next with no viable means of escape. While I can’t deny that there’s been the odd moment of light relief, namely the most pitifully inept election campaign in living memory, the experience as a whole has been underpinned by an ever growing sensation of helplessness – as we regrettably bear witness to a would be autocrat treating the nation as mere collateral, as she doggedly carries out her solitary compulsion to cling onto a power which can only be justified in her own delusions.

Then again, she did invent the ‘hostile environment’ as Home Secretary – so what did we really expect?

The May approach to leadership has been as obstinate as it has incompetent. While there’s an understandable school of thought that a steely determination to see your aspirations through to completion, remaining unswayed by the naysayers and potential hardships which litter your path to the finish line provides grounds for justifiable admiration, it pales in the reverence stakes when compared directly to the ability to both recognise and accept obvious realities. If your head is to be in the clouds, make sure your feet are firmly rooted on the ground – and May’s tootsies are stationed so far beyond the stratosphere that the millions of citizens below aren’t even visible, let alone a consideration.

Such ghoulish detachment to the consequences of her actions may seem unfathomable to anyone with a functional sense of empathy, looking upon callously negligent acts such as reducing human lives to poker chips and attempting to bypass the parliamentary process altogether with appropriate levels of horror.

Though if your envisioned route out of this nightmare is a successful appeal to her better nature, creating a storybook ending in which Theresa finally touches base with the concept of empathetic thought before striding joyously over the horizon to teach the world to sing, you’re likely to be bitterly disappointed.

May’s premiership has never really been about Brexit, despite it being set to make up the huge bulk of her ministerial epitaph. Her primary motivation has never been guided by a steadfast belief in delivering a glorious Brexit, that was merely a circumstantial necessity should she wish to hold onto what she cherishes the most – power. At any cost.

Curiously enough, Leave propaganda spivs have it somewhat correct when they argue that May is a Remainer in Brexiteer’s clothing. She is – though they’re mistaken in their assertion that she’s trying to bring the whole sorry caper down from the inside. Following the Brexit doctrine was a requirement for an incoming Prime Minister’s survival, such was the nature of the zeitgeist.

Trouble is, when the criteria for success was limited to such a narrow precept, May’s inclination to be brutally dogmatic came to the fore. All sense of diplomacy vanished into the ether, with the capacity to be rational and whatever dwindling morsel of empathy she may have once possessed going with it.

All that remains now is, in effect, an intransigent husk of a leader. Shorn of reason and flexibility of thought, with a laughable repertoire of pre-programmed slogans being the all purpose response to any line of inquiry – Theresa May has indeed become the very essence of the unfeeling automaton many have jokingly proclaimed her to be.

Just a shame her solitary directive reads “Brexit means Brexit”, leaving the rest of us doomed to be swept along in her mission to salvage whatever authority she can – by securing a victory that was never on the table to begin with.

Let’s be honest, Theresa May is far from an inspirational public speaker. Unnervingly stilted and forever crippled by an unmistakable undercurrent of disingenuity, she doesn’t so much kindle the fires of hope within your being, more gradually drowns your helpless soul under an ever rising tide of apathy.

Still, for better or for worse (spoilers: the latter) she is indeed our Prime Minster and, ostensibly, our leader on the world stage. So it was to the consternation of many to see her cutting a decidedly isolated figure amongst EU leaders at the recent summit in Salzburg.

It was almost as though we’d done something to piss them off.

Everyone saw it. The nation and indeed the world as a whole looked on aghast as Britain, once a major influence within the European Parliament, reduced to a similar role to that of a evolution textbook in Alabama.

The howls of indignation from the usual suspects of hard Brexit mouthpieces were as excruciatingly illogical as they were predictable. How dare they treat our Prime Minister this way – all the while conveniently side-stepping the fact that they’d spent the past two years accusing May of being a Remain saboteur who was desperate to sell out the nation to her EU masters. Though such transient morality should hardly be a surprise when it comes from those that place feelings firmly ahead of facts – feelings can change in an instant, facts tend to be more rigid.

Breathtaking hypocrisy aside, it seemed like an apparent eternity of ritual humiliation had taken its toll on poor Mrs May. As if being harangued at home by those who wish to replace her with a bumbling yet sinister Etonian new potato wasn’t bad enough, her cherished Chequers proposal (I’ll stop short of calling it a coherent plan) had suffered an inevitable rejection on account of it being entirely unworkable.

An understandable quibble perhaps, but it certainly proved to be the straw that broke Theresa’s back. So much so that, upon her arrival back on our shores, she felt compelled to take to the stage and deliver an unexpected statement – albeit after power issues at Number 10 caused a delay in a not at all metaphorical blooper brought about by sheer happenstance.

What happened next had to be seen to be believed – and even then it’s likely to mistake it for some sort of horrendous, narcotic induced hallucination.

It really was a sight to behold – almost a performance piece of denialism straight out of the uncanny valley. It’s fair to say that there was somewhat more vigour in this speech than the usual flat-line; as if the recent rebuff had finally ignited a flicker of emotion within the first replicant to ever hold high government office. However actually managing to win the attention of your audience does come with the odd potential pitfall – they’ll actually be listening to the words you’re saying.

The delivery may have been marginally more forthright, but the content was ultimately the same formulaic, heavily rehearsed piffle that we’ve heard a billion times before; yet here she was, repeating her incredibly dubious dogma as though the added semblance of gusto will somehow drag it kicking and screaming into the realms of plausible reality. Unfortunately, as our self imposed deadline grows ever closer with time fast trickling away, trotting out unfounded assertions and attempting to sling the burden of culpability over to the EU’s side of the court isn’t terribly useful – unless your objective is to look like a demented fantasist and crash your own national currency.

Granted not everyone looked upon it as an embarrassing failure – the Daily Express referred to it as her “finest hour”, perhaps unwittingly offering a tacit admission as to how low the bar of acceptability has really sunk when it comes to May’s time in office. The Sun also offered us this typically ludicrous front page, which clearly won’t be looked back upon in years to come as the very apex of nationalistic stupidity.

As for myself, well it left me feeling rather despondent. Perhaps I should be used to such a sensation by now but we really are approaching the end game. Seeing our nation’s attempts at international diplomacy still marooned in the jingoistic sloganeering stage is just further confirmation that absolutely no progress has been made since the UK voted to leave. It’s become almost immaterial as to whether the lazy attempts at PR wash with the public anymore, it’s clear by this point it’s all May and her government really have – so that’s all we’re ever going to get.

It’s this state of perpetual impasse that reveals the inherent irony which has plagued Brexit from the very beginning. While initially heralded as a bid to “take back control”, achieve true independence and show the world what we as a nation are capable of, in actuality it’s been a sorry procession of blunders, eternally undermined by the lack of any clear objective; all the while maintaining a stubborn insistence that the endless cavalcade of calamity is somebody else’s fault – namely the European Union.

Which leads onto perhaps the most delicious irony of all. Hidden away amongst the more familiar soundbites in May’s speech was a minor yet oh so telling new addition – frustration that the EU haven’t provided a counter proposal to soothe the headaches exclusive to the United Kingdom.

For all Theresa’s attempts at posturing and playing hardball, it’ll all be for nought. The only thing Donald Tusk will see is a desperate British Prime Minister, waiting in vain for the EU to solve a Brexit conundrum entirely of the UK’s own making.