by Jonathon Stern

Created on: August 08, 2008

KB felt about for the irritating alarm clock. She found it and managed to bash it. She had very little time to get back to sleep, however, as there was another alarm clock which she had cunningly placed in a closed drawer the night before. She was then forced physically to get out of bed and turn that one off when it started. She was just about to get back into bed when a third one went off. This time it was above the chest of drawers.

"All right, I get the message!" she said. She had successfully conned her today's self yesterday into getting up at this ungodly hour. Typical student that she was she rarely rose before 10:30. But today was different. President Gore was coming to London, the town where she studied, and she had to be ready to protest, even if it did mean getting up at 5 in the morning.

By half past five a small crowd had gathered outside Friern Barnet Town Hall, where the president would be passing. KB wanted to be right in the forefront. Everybody knew how strong her feelings were about the war and she didn't want to disappoint anyone by not getting herself arrested for screaming at the so-called "Leader of the Free World".

Some of KB's friends were there with placards. One of them handed KB a placard. It read "Hey Gore - NO WAR!" and had a picture of Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe's president, cradling a crying African child while cluster bombs exploded in the background.

Sure enough the motorcade soon appeared through the morning mist and everyone immediately started to shout, "Peace for the Zimbabweans!" and "Hey Gore - NO WAR!"

Al Gore, America's 43rd President, drove past with the British Prime Minister, Margaret Beckett, by his side. They were both used to these ugly scenes. Anti-war protesters would complain about their attempts to remove the Zimbabwean leader by force and their desire to democratise the African nation. What had that to do with America or Britain, they would ask? And if the British and American governments were so keen to bring about democracy, how come they did nothing about the Iraqi leader, Saddam Hussein? The demonstrators held up taunting images of the Iraqi dictator shaking hands with CIA operatives whose cover had famously - and embarrassingly - been blown and cartoons of Margaret Beckett being pulled along on a dog lead by President Gore.

"Oh, not the dog lead one again!" groaned Margaret.

"I must get one of those - looks kinda fun!" joked Al.

KB ran out in front of the motorcade which had to swerve to a halt. American security

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