Bathroom Radio Adventures

For Christmas I asked Santa (aka my mother) for a novelty shower radio having decided that at the moment showering wasn’t quite as musical or as novel as it should be. Mum then proceeded to ruin the magic of Christmas by immediately looking at various radios on Amazon; would I prefer the mood light effect duck, the pretend microphone or the penguin? The most novel one, I replied, thinking, quite uncharitably, that she’d probably just get the cheapest.

 Cut to Christmas day and I receive what can only be described as the most maximally novel novelty shower radio. Not only is this radio in the shape of a penguin but the penguin is wearing a striped rubber ring and goggles (which function as the on/off button), the volume is adjusted by turning one of its feet and the station can be changed by moving its flippers.  However, the manufacturer’s don’t even stop there, to top it all off they’ve added a special red button that, when pushed in an emergency situation, emits a loud beep. For those unsure as to what constitutes an emergency situation they’ve also handily printed on the radio pictures to represent when the button is to be used; namely if you’ve ran out of toilet paper, have forgotten your towel or you’ve slipped and had a terrible fall. So if I do ever need to press this button I’ll be expecting my neighbours to instantly rush to my aid brandishing toilet rolls, spare towels and a first aid kit.

Needless to say I am very happy with my new radio and on arriving back in Cambridge I immediately installed it in our communal shower. Although it’s actually quite hard to hear it over the sound of the water it has made the act of showering itself a little more interesting as I now have the added fun of having to delicately manoeuvre the flipper of a plastic penguin in order to tune into any station properly.

Given this recent foray into bathroom-based radio when I noticed that the first in a series of new “site-specific” Guardian podcasts Everyday Moments was supposed to be listened to in the evening and in the bath I thought I’d give it a go. So grabbing my dressing gown, towel and shark shower cap (another novelty Christmas gift from my mother) I went in search of a bath as we only have a shower on our staircase and I decided that, whether or not you should use an MP3 Player in the bath, you almost definitely shouldn’t use one in the shower. Having located a bath and filled it I settled down to listening to the podcast but only after having elaborately arranged my headphones so they wouldn’t trail in the bubbles.

The podcast itself was a little odd and I’m not sure I completely got into it especially given that my childish mind refused to let me listen to the repeated reference to holes without giggling. The song at the end was very soothing and probably the best bit of the podcast although the effect was somewhat ruined when it was followed alphabetically on my MP3 Player by Meatloaf’s “Everything Louder Than Everything Else.” All in all I enjoyed the idea of the podcast more than the content itself though I would recommend having a listen (in the bath) as it was an interesting experience; however I won’t be held responsible for any soggy iPods this may or may not result in.

And for those of you wondering whether or not this whole post was little more than an elaborate ploy to get you to imagine me naked, like mature ladies with perms in magazine adverts for bath cushions, I only ever bathe wearing a floral one-piece swimming costume.

This post was written as my first radio blog for the Varsity website (one of the Cambridge student newspapers):

http://blogs.varsity.co.uk/vulture/a-shower-not-a-hurricane

I should be updating the Varsity blog once a week and I think I'll post it on here as well  and if I have time also writing some smaller bits just for this blog.

The Fo' Show Review

On Tuesday night I went to see a recording of a comedy panel show for Cam FM (the University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University radio station) and reviewed it for one of the student newspaper's websites. Here is the link to the review for anyone who's interested:

http://www.varsity.co.uk/reviews/3043

I really liked it so you should probably also listen to the show as well as read the review. If you're really lucky you might be able to hear me laughing loudly at inappropriate moments unless they've edited that out. I think I may also groan a few times when Pierre talks about spiders. This is mainly because mentioning spiders alongside food brought up images of one of my greatest and most oddly specific fears, that of finding said creatures crawling on a dish of my favourite food, stuffed pasta.

I've Never Seen Star Wars

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00hcr5l/Ive_Never_Seen_Star_Wars_Series_2_Barry_Cryer/

Lately I've been listening to repeats of I've Never Seen Star Wars on Radio 4. I quite like the concept of the show (although it is dangerously similar to Room 101) where each week Marcus Brigstocke invites a celebrity guest to try a variety of new experiences and mark them out of 10. (The title of the programme stems from the fact that the creator and producer Bill Dare had never seen any of the Star Wars films.)

Marcus Brigstocke is consistently funny as the host and the experiences often contrast amusingly with the guest's public persona, for example Suggs was asked to read A Brief History of Time, however this doesn't necessarily guarantee good radio. As although trying to picture Sandi Toksvig stilt walking is a fun exercise of the imagination trying to picture Jan Ravens having her eyebrows threaded isn't quite so compelling.

Overall the concept of the programme, although interesting, does seem more suited to television and has in fact been adapted for BBC Four. However as a welcome break from variations of the comedy panel show format such as Heresy and The Unbelievable Truth, I've Never Seen Star Wars is an entertaining listen, if a little over demanding on the imagination.