Ruth Davidson, MP

Leader of the Scottish Conservative Party.

Today a generous lecturer of mine moved our seminar from tutorial room 7 to the pub. Fresh off the back of double essay purgatory I was among the few people who took this a sign to drink beer well into the afternoon.

I had to put on my best sober face, though, on my mini-assignment to photograph a talk by the leader of the Scottish conservative party. I felt doubly out of place being one of two guys without a suit jacket and tie. I don't even own a tie. Or a suit. Perhaps I should claim it on my benefits.

I was also too dozy after my afternoon tipple to put in any sort of meaningful contribution. Too lazy to retort, then, my question about Nicola Sturgeon was batted down in a manner that made me look soft. So I resigned myself to sitting back and picking out rhetorical devices.

Did I do well in this endeavour despite the mess that the previous pints left me in? Yes. Did I feel that cuts in my beer consumption would be effective? Yes. Was I convinced? Absolutely not, thank you very much... and that's what lies at the real heart of the matter.

All politics aside, though, Ruth was very nice and went out of her way (way out of her way, considering that we went outside and across the road) for me to get a photo.

I'll stick her in alongside George Galloway, Iain Banks and Noam Chomsky in my list of portraits of the well-known.