I met Nick Clegg on Friday.

He was visiting Walthamstow as part of prospective parliamentary candidate Farid Ahmed's campaign and I have to say, it is possibly one of the oddest interviews I have ever conducted, at least location-wise.

The photographer and I were due to meet the Lib Dem leader at a Bangladeshi TV studio in Clifford Road at 3pm. This in itself was quite unusual as I never even knew the studio was there before Friday. At any rate, the hour rolled around and there was no sign of Mr Clegg. Ten past, twenty past and then half past went by before he finally emerged and was immediately surrounded by a knot of Lib Dem types, photographers and cameramen.

There was another few minutes of confusion as the melee cleared before we piled into the back of a car and I carried out the interview with a press officer sat between us while we drove to Walthamstow market. As it turns out, shorthand is not the easiest thing to do in the back of a moving vehicle, but for your sake, good readers, I persevered.

As is the case with most politicians, he gave me plenty of soundbites and very little substance, but at least this time I was expecting it. Also, it was quite clear he'd been primed in advance so the whole thing felt rather staged and less "real" than the Boris Johnson interview.

Still, it is all grist for the old mill, as they say.

Continuing in the vein of public visits, I also went on a tour of a polyclinic this week and the thing is an absolute behemoth. It's on Oliver Road, overlooking Leyton Orient's stadium, and is a warren of consulting rooms, waiting rooms and offices in plexiglass and blue linoleum. It also has a whole room dedicated to the display of continence products, which is a sight to see, let me tell you.

Still, it was interesting to see what a polyclinic actually is in real terms and how it operates, which is something a lot of people weren't terribly clear about, I think. The point of it, so I'm told, is to stop people going to A&E with every ailment they have as they can get such a variety of services in one place, but I can't help but wonder if this will simply displace hypochondriacs from one setting to another...

Finally, as I have in fact been requested to do so (no, really), the following is a brief summary of my second reporter's surgery, which also took place on Friday:

Another roaring failure, unfortunately.

Things looked promising at first, as an old lady came and sat with me, even though there were plenty of empty tables. Hoorah, thinks I, she must have something newsworthy to tell me! But no. Turns out she was most likely a bit lonely and didn't want to sit alone.

Or possibly just wanted someone to watch her bag while she went out for a smoke.

The waitress also asked me how to spell cottage pie, which made me feel useful at least, and thus concluded human contact for the morning.

Not quite such an epic disaster as last time perhaps but whether this is really an improvement as such is another question...