How Annastacia Palaszczuk will choose the election date

If politics was a bowl of nuts, speculating about an election would be the nuttiest nut of all.

Talk of a Queensland election has been going almost daily since January but has gained pace lately because the date - whatever it is - is getting closer.

Annastacia Palaszczuk is the last premier who gets to choose a polling date - a distinction she seems to be enjoying; teasing the opposition and the media like a cat with a wounded grasshopper.

The election was "on" in August when the government used parliament for a series of cheeky valedictory speeches usually reserved for the last sitting.

It's also been "on" during cabinet trips to the Gold Coast and "definitely on" in a trip this week to Maryborough.

For the government to reach a full term the day should fall somewhere around Valentine's Day 2018. The premier has only deviated once from predicting this is when it will be threatening to call a snap poll should anyone or anything get in the way of her determination to create jobs.

Since the months remaining in 2017 are fast running out the parties are naturally preparing themselves for the inevitability an election is coming sooner rather than later.

Labor's released "ads" that really only exist online.

Likewise the LNP has released "policies" like the duplication of the clogged M1 that only really exist online as petitions to gauge support and probably to gather email addresses for their direct marketing campaign.

I'm willing to bet - in fact I have - that the premier has not yet picked an election date.

Although she and Labor are not, surprisingly, getting ready for an election, a host of options are yet to settle.

Does she go before Christmas to give us all a summer break?

Does the shifting Canberra landscape have an impact?

Even the prospect of a Broncos v Cowboys grand final could influence her decision... riding a wave of state pride through to an end of year election.

Above all the Premier will be deciding when she is most likely to win... to hang on to all the seats she has plus win a few more.

And when she makes that decision and tells just one other person, the amount of time the date remains a secret will need a stop watch.

Doesn't mean the clock's not already ticking but anyone who thinks they know already is just... plain... nuts.