There was a touch of the Alan Partridge about the introduction to Nick Clegg's conference speech.
The LibDem leader appeared on a giant television screen in front of the party faithful as part of a little promotional video about, er, him.
In the film he clearly had been tasked with carrying off that most difficult of tasks for any politician - or member of the public for that matter - looking human when you have a camera stuck in your face.
In recent days the Deputy Prime Minister had given a number of interviews in which he has revealed something about his hinterland.
The subtext was, of course - I will be OK after politics.
It seemed a necessary move for a politician who, after all, sparked an internet craze called 'Nick Clegg looking sad.'
But yesterday his answers appeared just a little bit wooden. Real life had intruded, he told the camera. His local bike shop had rung him.
When a woman thanked him in a shop for one of his party's policies he appeared perhaps a little too keen to describe it as the best moment of his week "by a long way."
There were also shots of the Prime Minister in action.
Of course, a politician's life can be very exciting at times.
Also one middle-aged man in a suit travelling on a train does look quite like any other, it turns out. Mr Clegg continued, fulfilling his task, in the jargon of modern-day politics of "speaking human."
But then, after this and other clips, because of the events of recent weeks and the problems in the world, when the Deputy Prime Minister did come on stage he rightly and properly had to open his speech by addressing the most difficult subject matter.
Wearing a pink tie, because Lib Dem yellow would clash terribly with the huge canary coloured background behind him, he immediately and with a statesman-like bearing had to address the jihadi terrorist threat of Islamic State and their appalling recent actions.
There used to be a saying: it should not happen to a radio dj.
But never let it be said that a politicians's lot is always an easy one either.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article