things.py

import sys
import time
import uuid
from google.cloud import bigquery

TABLE = "locations.samples"
QUERY = "SELECT {} FROM {} LIMIT {}"

# runtime params
limit = int(sys.argv[1])
columns = ",".join(sys.argv[2:])

# build query
query = QUERY.format(columns, TABLE, limit)
print query

start_time = time.time()

client = bigquery.Client()
query_job = client.run_async_query(str(uuid.uuid4()), query)
query_job.begin()
query_job.result()
result_table = query_job.destination
result_table.reload()

# materialize rows in memory
rows = [row for row in result_table.fetch_data()]

duration = time.time() - start_time
print duration, "secs"

assert(len(rows) == limit)