DEMS IN DENVER

WEIRDEST SIGHT I SAW ALL WEEK: a badge-selling old man who looked like uncle Jesse from 'The Dukes of Hazzard', covered in badges, with a teeny tiny dog tucked into his dungarees.

For one week only, the politics geeks ruled Denver.

It was such a great experience and I'm really pleased I went with Maxy to the DNC convention, even though I didn't get to go to any of the big speeches (erm, or small ones for that matter).

One major flaw in the DNC's plan to hold their convention in Denver is the lack of downtown hotels in the city, so we found ourselves staying in a Radisson inexplicably shaped like a castle, about 40mins drive out of town, on the side of a huge motorway. Max takes me to the nicest places!

Actually, it became a source of some anxiety to me as to whether I was allowed to be at the hotel with Max at all. We figured that it wasn't costing the BBC any more money, so it shouldn't be a problem, but then I found myself kind of being grilled by one of the managers. He was pretending to have a casual chat with me while I was waiting in the foyer one day, but fortunately I've started watching the majestic 'Veronica Mars' on DVD (another loan from the Megan/Anne DVD supply next door) - it's about a high school girl who's an amateur detective in her spare time - so can spot when someone's digging for information from a mile off. Like manager man would say, 'oh your husband, heeee's Andrew...?', to which I could only say, 'no, Max', then he'd say, 'oh yes, Max Giiiiilbert?' or whatever. Sneaky.

Anyways, nothing came of this (I thought he'd look up Max's details, see there was only meant to be one person in his room and throw me out) and it was all fine. Perhaps someone got into trouble, but I never knew about it.

It was a bit annoying to be reliant on the hotel shuttle bus to get into town, but it afforded me lots of really interesting encounters with other people staying at the hotel. One day, I shared a ride with a pollster lady who works for CNN and some other channels, who basically gave me a 40 minute analysis of where the polls are at and what the important issues really are. She was clearly pro-Obama, but said that although his chances are looking good, in fact McCain is very strong on issues that really resonate with the American people. Another time, I shared a ride with a lady from DC who's head of a DNC sub-committee and that was really interesting too - just getting these private audiences with people who are deeply involved in the election process.

I've never been political at all, because usually politics bores me silly, but I've got so into this election and for the first time, really like having long discussions with people about politics and feel like I know enough to hold my own in a conversation. So I'd emerge from these shuttle bus debates all energised. It's just such a bummer that I can't vote!

Denver is a great city - I really really like it a lot. It feels like the kind of city Baltimore wishes it could be. It's obviously been heavily redeveloped, having been quite industrial before, but it's been done in a much better way than in B-more, where just the waterfront is nice and the rest is a bit scuzzy. Fortunately for me, there's one central pedestrianised bit of Denver where all the shops and restaurants are, so it was a very easy city to immediately get one's head around and I didn't spend all week wondering if I was missing something just a few streets away.

Obviously the whole city was overrun with people adorned in Obama/Democratic regalia, which made it really fun just to saunter around the streets, but what I hadn't anticipated was the hardcore police presence that made itself known absolutely everywhere. It was extraordinary, the sheer number of police and the level of their armed-ness. They looked like something out of 'Judge Dredd'. We saw them on all forms of transport: on foot, bicycles, segways, motorbikes, cars, horses and massive tank-like armoured vehicles. We encountered a couple of demonstrations early on in our stay, where police actually outnumbered demonstrators!

Fortunately none of the demonstrations got out of hand, though we did get caught up in one, which was pretty funny. I was walking Maxy back to the convention centre one afternoon and we came across a huge crowd of anti-war demonstrators. So we picked our way through the crowd of people wearing Guantanamo orange jumpsuits, black handkerchiefs over their faces like bandits and angrily sloganned t-shirts, with Maxy wearing his lovely Ralph Lauren suit and me in typical tourist garb!

When we finally got through to the other side of this massive crowd, we discovered that the way to the convention centre had been sealed off, presumably because of the demonstration, so promptly had to turn around and pick our way back through the throng! But just as we reached them, they started to mobilise and move off, and we got swept along with them. Our situation wasn't helped by the fact that Maxy was actually in a massive hurry, because he had about 20 mins to get into the convention centre, through the crazy security, and get onto the floor before Bill Clinton's speech.

So we were desperately trying to get through the slowly lurching crowd, while Max tried to keep his face away from the many cameras filming the event, through fear of either appearing on that night's news or getting put on some troublemakers' register! But unfortunately the organisers of the demonstration were adamant that everyone keep behind a big banner being held across the front of the group, so it was really hard to get out ahead and away from the masses. Fortunately we managed it and Maxy made it back round to the centre, but it was all a bit hairy for a while.

Anyway, none of the demonstrations caused the police too much headache, but it was really scary to hear about an apparent assassination attempt by three racist meth-heads, which was foiled when one of them was stopped by police for driving erratically, only for the police to discover guns with long sights in the back of their truck, along with camo gear and crystal meth. Frightening.

I ended up seeing very little of Maxy as he's had a crazy-busy week, as we anticipated. Having flown in (separately) on Saturday, we were able to spend Sunday together, exploring the city and getting a sense of where the convention centre was. Then for the rest of the week, I just saw him in the morning and then again after the speeches in the evening. We didn't really socialise with the other BBC people because everyone was so knackered, but I was really pleased to be there and look after Max at the end of his long days.

I spent my days really enjoying just wandering around the city, soaking up the electric atmosphere, and also took myself off to see 'The House Bunny' (I wish I hadn't. Don't judge me - it was the only thing that was on) and 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona', which I REALLY liked. It didn't feel at all like a Woody Allen film and I was really happily surprised by how good Rebecca Hall was (I feel sure she'll be relieved to know this) and was blown away by Javier Bardem (much hotter sans 'No Country' haircut) and Penelope Cruz - they were both excellent. Scarlett Johansson not so much, but that's not great shock.

Poor Max, it's been blisteringly hot in Denver all week and he's had to wear a suit and socks and shoes while running between the convention centre and the fringe events that he was covering.

He hasn't been writing news stories or features, but rather blogging from the convention, which has allowed for a slightly more freeflowing writing style than the strictures of news writing and has also meant that he's seen more of the convention than just the inside of the convention centre.

I was lucky enough to join him on one such mission, when he scored us tickets to see The Daily Show record live, under the auspices of blogging about how the media are covering the election!! Woooooohooooooo! It was so so awesome. I've never been to watch a TV programme record before - I've always been behind the scenes - so it felt odd to be a member of the audience, shepherded into a waiting area, then worked by a warm-up man and encouraged to whoop and clap as much as possible.

After waiting outside the theatre for about half an hour, it was another hour once we were seated before the show started to record and I found myself sitting next to a really nice lady who'd been working for the DNC at the convention and is a member of Florida's electoral college. So she's one of the people who actually gets to cast a vote on behalf of Florida. We had a really spirited conversation about why Obama rules and how awesome it'd be if he won. She'd been working double shifts all week and so was pleased to get time off to go to the Daily Show, then afterwards she was going to a Kanye West gig, so I didn't feel too sorry for her having been working so hard. I did feel a pang of regret that we didn't manage to go to any celebrity parties all week, because it seems half the celebrity world and his trophy wife were in town, but we had an amazing time anyway.

The Daily Show was brill. They record it absolutely as live - playing in the VTs and taking advert breaks during which loud music is played to drown out Jon Stewart's conversations with his writers who scuttle onto set as soon as cameras pause recording. There are no stops, even if Jon Stewart fluffs a line. Unfortunately John Oliver was one of the correspondents who did a 'bit' (I can't staaaaand John Oliver), but then there was a really funny bit with Samantha Bee and Wyatt Cenac (he's my favourite) - click HERE to watch the clip.

The song they played before recording started, to gee up Jon Stewart, was 'Born To Run' and the song they played at the end of the show as we were leaving the theatre was 'Don't Stop Believin''. From this, I can conclude that me and Jon Stewart would be friends if only I could meet him.

Max had to rush straight back to the convention centre after the recording, to cover the evening's speeches, which meant that - having filed that morning's blogpost from his blackberry while we were waiting to go into the theatre, he then had to file his Daily Show blog (scroll down to '1900 local time') from the taxi that took us back into town! Such a pro.

While Maxy got to go onto the convention centre floor for the big speeches, I had to watch them elsewhere. Because our hotel was so out of the way, I stayed in town each evening and tried to find somewhere showing coverage of the convention, rather than watching in our room. This wasn't difficult, as for one week, the bars were overrun by politicos and the big speeches were shown on TV screens, just like a sports fixture. So the bars and restaurants were crammed with people cheering, clapping and crying at the screen, with all the camaraderie between strangers of watching the cup final down the pub!

Actually on the first night of the convention, when Michelle Obama spoke and her daughters made that adorable appearance on stage, I stationed myself at MSNBC's outdoor stage, where much of their broadcasting was coming from. We really like MSNBC and watch it all the time in DC, so it was exciting - in the most absurdly geeky way possible - to lay eyes on the likes of Keith Olbermann and the awesome Rachel Maddow in the flesh.

Not many people where aware of the stage right at the beginning of the week, so it wasn't difficult for me to get a spot right the front of the crowd, which meant I scored loads of MSNBC tat from the runner handing it out to people who'd be appearing in the back of shot. I was kind of meek at first, but after a while, was grabbing anything I could get and ended up with a Keith Olbermann t-shirt (actually that was given to me by a kindly man standing next to me who had a spare), a polystyrene MSNBC boater and lots of massive MSNBC badges. It did cross my mind that it might not look great for the wife of a BBC journalist to be seen in the back of a shot, bedecked in tat from another news channel, but I figured no-one knows who I am, so it was fine.

We had dinner with Oliver from the Guardian and Max's college friend Shehani who does video things for the Guardian website and is just over here for the conventions, which was nice. Though it was really strange to hear the Radio 1 Evening Session show being blasted out of a PA system on a street corner opposite, where an impromptu street party had started up!

And I had dinner with my state department tennis friend, Jean one night, too, which was lovely as I really got to know her better and hear all about her boyfriend and stuff. We watched the Joe Biden speech together - as well as his amazing introduction from his son Beau Biden - and both got quite choked up by just how good he was. I'm so excited that Obama has picked as his VP someone who fills in the gaps in Obama's experience, while retaining the same values and integrity that Obama embodies. And I thought it was so classy of Beau Biden, when he said that he 'won't be around' during the election, rather than scoring points by explaining that he'll be in Iraq with the National Guard. Having heard McCain make such a massive deal of his time as a PoW and the great service he's shown this country, it would've been really easy for either Biden to cash in on Beau's service, but neither did. And it was so moving to see how much Joe Biden obviously loves his family, after all the tragedy they've suffered, and hear how he goes back to Delaware every night instead of staying in DC. And it's amazing that he's been in the Senate more than 30 years, but hasn't got any enemies there. Awesome.

I didn't really see Hillary's speech, but was in a bar where once again it was being played. On Tuesday, I took myself off to the art museum, which was really excellent. It's a fantastically laid out and curated museum, with a terrific range of art. I particularly liked the modern art I saw. It was good in rooms where there was art and artifacts from different countries, because often I feel a little bit uncomfortable that these things have been swiped from the cultures in which they were made, but in Denver's museum, they have little gestures like headphones playing African music when you're in the African room, so you get a bit more of an immersive sense of the art and the circumstances in which is was created.

I got picked up from the museum by Katie, a friend of Emily's who moved from DC to Denver a month or so ago. We'd really got on on the couple of occasions when we met before she moved, so it was nice to see her. It was also nice to get out of downtown Denver and see a whole different neighbourhood. Katie loves Denver to an almost evangelical extent, but I can see why. She's got a lovely little flat and has made friends with someone round the corner, who we met to go for a walk with in the gorgeous local park.

I thought nothing of the fact that Katie changed into sports clothes when we got to her flat, before heading out for the walk, until we met her friend who was also dressed in sports clothes and looked me up and down (once again, I was wearing the tourist staples of skirt, summer top and sandals) and said, 'well isn't that just the cutest little outfit to go for a walk in?'! Turns out this was a hardcore speed walk designed as exercise. Whoops. But it was lovely - the park was really nice and it was fun to hear about life in Denver, with talk of ski passes for the winter and stuff. We didn't really get much power into our walk, as we were constantly dodging the fitness fanatics who covered the park. There were rollerbladers, runners, cyclists, volleyball players, skateboarders and even a blind man being taken for a jog by a guide runner on a lead-like thing. And I thought DC was outdoorsy!

Katie and I then went for supper at a local diner where the Clinton speech was being shown, but I didn't really see any of it. I was busy being amazed that Katie - in Colorado, a really important swing state - is still undecided as to who to vote for! Especially as education (she's an elementary school teacher) and economy are her two prime concerns and Obama whips McCain's ass on both.

I tried to be all impartial and tell her what I knew of the two policies from both candidates, but was perturbed to hear her say that she had a lot of time for McCain because, 'at least he admits that there are more important things to him than education' and it's good that he's realistic, unlike Obama who seems to be promising more than he can deliver. Ehhh?! I don't get it at all. Surely it's good to at least have aspirations, even if you can't deliver absolutely everything? To just ignore education because you're too busy with other things is loony to me.

During all my encounters on shuttle buses and at Daily Show recordings with people connected to the DNC, I kept desperately trying to find someone who might have tickets to the massive Obama event at Invesco Field, but with no joy. So yesterday, rather than wandering around the ghosttown that would be Denver, joining the forlorn few who were unable to get in, I got up early, rented a jeep and took myself off into the Rockies for the day!

Throughout the day, I kept getting texts from Max about how amazing Jennifer Hudson's soundcheck was, or how cool it was to see Stevie Wonder up close, which was obviously disappointing, but it was just the most glorious weather to be pootling about by myself that I managed to have a wonderful day in spite of what I was missing.

I headed into Boulder, which is a great town - I really really liked it. It's really small and feels kind of retro and very laidback - not a bustling metropolis by any means, but a lovely little town at the foot of the mountains.

Then I headed on towards the Rockies, stopping in the beautiful Estes Park for lunch. All the way, I couldn't really make out the mountains in the distance, because the horizon was really hazy. In Estes Park, I discovered from a kindly man collecting trolleys in the Safeway car park that it was because there's an enormous forest fire just over the border in Utah and that I should be careful if I was planning to go up into the mountains. After my Florida quasi-ordeal, I was starting to wonder if I was doomed.

In fact, it was fine and I had a wonderful day in beautiful sunny sunshine with bright blue skies, driving through the Rockies National Park along the spectacular mountain roads, sometimes stopping to take photos and gawp at the phenomenal scenery and sometimes not stopping, but taking photos while driving along. Hazardous but effective. Blame Max! If he'd have been there with me, rather than hobnobbing with Obama, he could've taken them!

Anyway, it was just breathtaking. Actually literally. I walked up to the highest point in the Rockies at one point, but it took ages, because the altitude robbed me of my breath with every step. Both Max and I found the altitude quite tricksy in Denver and both had really bad headaches for the first few days. I thought I was painfully unfit when I went swimming on our first day in the hotel but could manage little more than 10 lengths of the miniscule pool. In fact, I'm sure it was because I'm unfit, but I'm sure the altitude didn't help. Quite how Teddy Kennedy managed to speak to the convention having only flown in that afternoon, so not acclimatised to the altitude and with a brain tumour, I don't know.

I crossed the continental divide during my pootle and also saw a little mountain rodent that might or might not have been a chipmunk AND saw a whole field of elk! Ha - stick that in your pipe, Obama boy. I also visited a little village called Grand Lake, where this sign made me chuckle, as it was on a tiny lane, off another tiny lane called Broadway.

As I was rushing around hairpin bends in an attempt to get back into Denver to watch Obama's speech somewhere, I got a very excited text from Jean to say that she'd managed to get into Invesco Field as well! But had to bear in mind the amazing day I'd had and try not to be jealous...

Unfortunately I paid the price for my myriad photo stops and realised there was no way I'd make it back into town to watch the speech on a screen somewhere, so I ended up listening to Obama speak on the radio, with the sun setting behind me, driving along a freeway. I was so impressed and encouraged by his speech and found myself welling up a few times, just at the sheer ambition of Obama's hope and the prospect of someone really making a difference for the better. It was the clearest statement of his positions that I've heard come from him - often I get a bit lost in all the impressive rhetoric to actually get to the bottom of what he's saying - I thought he laid out his policies brilliantly well and that they sounded so sensible and encouraging.

I got back to the hotel while he was still speaking, but didn't want to miss any of the speech, so drove around the car park for a while and then parked up listening to it. But in the end, I made a dash for our room, just in time to see him finish. It looked like an incredible atmosphere at Invesco Field, though I was sad that Obama didn't look happier when he finished his speech - he looked really serious.

Poor Max got stuck in the thousands and thousands of people coming out of the stadium and lost all his BBC folks, so I drove into town to pick him up in my handy jeep. Turns out he hadn't really been able to pay much attention to Obama's speech because he was live blogging for Justin Webb (Justin make comments to Max and Max would type it up and post it immediately on the BBC website). But I think he had a great day, being in the thick of it all.

Now Max is off to St Paul for the Republican convention and I'm going to LA to spend the week with Tom and Bambi and my good friends Tom and Nina, because I have no interest in St Paul and can't imagine it'd be as fun a week being surrounded by Republicans as it has been here in Denver.