Did video kill the radio star? I think not...

Friday. At last!

It seems like it’s been a long week and gosh, hasn’t it been cold? Even today, when the sun has been shining and there’s been enough blue in the sky to make a sailor a pair of trousers (an old saying of my mother’s) the wind has cut through you like a knife.

Most of the day, of course, I have been indoors slaving away over a hot keyboard, apart from the time when I nipped out to officially put my name down for a spot of volunteering.

Yes, you did read aright. Volunteering, but possibly not in the way that you think.

I am not going to work in an Oxfam shop sorting out rancid clothes from black sacks. I am not going to clean out animal cages at the RSPCA. I am not going to work at the local day centre serving up cabbage and gravy to toothless old ladies. No, I have volunteered to be a DJ at the local community radio station from 7am until 9am on a Saturday morning.

I got involved in this only recently through a friend (the lovely Alex) who already DJ’s this slot and wants someone to alternate with him, as getting up at some unearthly hour every Saturday morning as well as doing it in the week has got a little too much. The plan is that we share the slot for a few weeks until I feel confident and they trust me, then we do alternate weeks so we each get a week off and a lie in.

So today, I went over and met the head honcho, who is an ex BBC radio producer, to fill in the official forms and be initially approved. I seem to have passed the test, and tomorrow bright and early I will be broadcasting alongside Alex for the very first time.

I’m really quite excited about this, the 6.15 alarm call aside. It’s something I’ve always fancied having a go at and now I have the chance, although I have no idea whether I’ll be any good or not. Two hours is quite a long time to fill with popular music and chatter, and I have no idea whether I’ll cope. But it’s got to be worth a shot!

So if you’re up and about bright and early tomorrow tune in to Ridge Radio on the internet (www.ridgeradio.co.uk) and click on ‘Listen Live’ and you’ll hear Alex and me exchanging banal chatter and amusing anecdotes.

Apparently, they get an average of 10,000 listeners to the show, based upon the number of hits they get on their web pages. I had no idea so many people listened to web based stations, but they are growing all the time. Ridge do work experience for schools, training for kids that want to go and do media at university and loads of fund raising events and other stuff as well as broadcasting from 7am until 1am seven days a week, quite an achievement when you consider that most community radio just does a few hours on a Saturday only.

It’ll be fun, and although I’ll be knackered because of the early start (mornings are not my optimum time of day) I will thoroughly enjoy it. I went along with Alex last week just to see how it all worked and have a look at the equipment and this week I get to have a little go myself under his supervision! So if there are any nasty silences, that’s my fault.

Go on, tune in and see what you think. In a few weeks hopefully, I’ll be going solo, and then you can e-mail me with your messages, requests and dedications. Only nice ones, mind!