Quote of the day:

“If you want someone to run a marathon, you want Tony Abbott. If you want someone to run the country, that’s me.”

— Prime Minister Julia Gillard employs the zingers in the final 48 hours of the campaign. She also described the media coverage of the election in an off-the-cuff aside, “”grumble grumble, tweet tweet tweet.”

“It’s been a tough race, but we’re finishing strongly.”

— Opposition leader Tony Abbott, who spent all night calling radio graveyard shifts around the country. When he promised not to sleep in the last 48 hours of the campaign, he wasn’t joking.