Way on down south, in London Town.

Having had only 5 hours of sleep between last night and this morning, I was rather less receptive to my wake up call this morning than usual. It wasn't helped by the fact that my waking this morning happened at the tender hour of 5:30.

I was off to the Capital with 50 other VI form students to attend an open session with our local MP Steve Webb. He had arranged for us to arrive at the New Palace of Westminster (to give it its full title) or the Houses of Parliament to you and me for a tour of the entire building. This morning the Lords and the rest of the MP's had been given a lie in, and so we were able to view all the chambers including the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Much to our amusement there were warnings of 'don't sit down on the red chairs, you aren't a Lord' Tee Hee. Needless to say some people had a quick bottom shuffle along the benches.

After this we descended to the basement level, along a passageway, under the main road and into a very nice, new office block situated next to the Palace. Here we were given the chance to grill three MP's, one from each of the main party's. Unfortunately we didn't quite get the flames high enough to claim any points over any of them, but we did make one of them break a sweat.

By this time it was 12:45 and we had until 2:15 to go out and explore the surroundings and grab some lunch. A friend and myself dashed to the Underground and promptly ended up on Oxford Street. After a quick trip to Selfridges (the only UK supplier of Root Beer.) we walked around looking for somewhere sensible to purchase appropriate nourishment. Unfortunately both Pizza Hut and Subway were full, so we trotted off to the only other option left, Boots. £3.30 later and it was time to head back to Saint Stevens Gate at the Palace to rejoin our group so that we may be able to go to the Strangers Gallery. (For those of you who are 'PC' its now called Visitors Gallery.) We sat up there for 30 minutes in which time we saw Tessa Jowell during her departmental questions, as these are selected a week previously, no on was able to ask anything of her Husband.

After our time in the Palace we headed back to the nice office block and we sat down for an hour session of 1 on 50 with Steve Webb. I have nothing but praise for this man, he is completely honest and selfless.

So here concluded my day in London, but in closing there is two other points worth mentioning.
One is that not only did we see Mrs or maybe Ms Jowell but we also saw Boris Johnson- the legend, and George Galloway- the Twat.
Two is that for once...Thee Underground was all working right when we needed it.

All in all, a good day by all.