JZ's Diary
Head of 大象传媒 Radio Scotland, Jeff Zycinski, with a sneak preview of programme plans and a behind-the-scenes glimpse of his life at the helm.
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Tom Told Me Where To Stick It
Our sports Editor, Tom Connor, came in to see me this afternoon, clearly excited about his forthcoming trip to Australia where he'll be leading the production team covering the for Radio Scotland.
We'll have special programmes every day throughout the games and Fred MacAulay will also be in Melbourne for two weeks, bringing us a fun-filled flavour of life 'down under'.Tom produced a stack of new Radio Scotland car stickers to mark the occasion. We'll be distributing them over the next week or so. (Do e-mail us if you would like one). At half-past five tonight I grabbed pile of the stickers and went walkabout throughout the building, handing them to anyone I met in the corridors or still working in the offices.
Most people took one from me with a bemused smile, four people suggested I buy them a car to go along with it (ho ho) and everyone laughed when I said I would be in the car park tomorrow checking they have the stickers on display.
They must have thought I was joking.
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435 Miles To Go
I seem to be at a standstill with my weight loss this week - nothing gained, nothing lost - despite clocking up fifteen miles on my Five Hundred Mile Diet.
A few people have mentioned they see the difference in me, but I try to retain a sense of reality about this. Let's face it, at 15 stone 13 pounds, I'm almost half a stone heavier than when I began a previous diet last year. Call me yo-yo!Still, not had a drink since the 10th of January and I do notice I have a better quality of sleep and more energy as a result. Newsdrive presenter Bill Whiteford
asked me about this at lunch today. I explained that I tend to write these diary entries last thing at night, but had I still been indulging in the odd glass (or bottle) of wine, I'd have been zonked by eleven o'clock.If you ever notice I start to skip a few days without posting anything, you can probably assume the worst.
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You're Kidding
I was in a room full of young mothers, midwives and nursery teachers tonight as we transformed the 大象传媒 canteen in Glasgow into a cabaret club. We were recording a new series about the joys of parenthood presented by comedian Susanne Fraser. It mixes real-life stories of parenthood with extracts from Susanne's stand-up routine. Tonight's audience was drawn from the women who had already contributed to the programme by sharing their own experiences.
For many, this was a rare night away from the nappies and sterlisers so we decided to make it a bit of a treat by adding a few surprises into the mix.
I don't think anyone could quite believe their eyes when John Beattie and James MacPherson took to the stage and gave it rock 'n' roll belters by performing crowd-pleasers such as Brown Eyed Girl and Teenage Kicks. James, John and their supporting musicians had styled themselves as MLC - or Mid-Life Crisis.
Compere Kevin Devine did a fantastic job throughout the evening and Irish comedian Frances Healy also kept the laughs coming with her own stories of being the youngest of a family of thirteen.
Afterwards I spoke to Fran about her own transition from mainsteam acting to stand-up comedy. She said she had been persuaded to try it by friends and somehow the bookings kept on coming. She said the biggest danger comes in the hours after you come off stage and the adrenalin is still pumping. Many comedians try to drown that energy by heading to the bar and getting drunk, but, said Fran, that's when you really see the "tears of a clown".
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Roll Out The...Carpet
A day spent down at the City Halls, first watching the 大象传媒 Scottish Symphony Orchestra in a sensational performance for Radio 3, then later watching a carpet being laid. You see it's not all fun and glamour in this job.
The lunchtime concert was for the Radio 3 programme Making Tracks and the audience was drawn from primary schools throughout Glasgow. I cheered and clapped along with the kids as the famous theme from the Harry Potter films was deconstructed to explain the various sections of the orchestra; strings, wind instruments, brass and percussion. The theme from Doctor Who was performed against a projected backdrop of images from the TV series. Four children heard how the music they had composed as ringtones for mobile phones was transformed by an epic orchestral version. Then four other children got the chance to conduct the SSO as they performed the theme from . The concert ended with the finale from the 1812 overture, with every child told to blow up a paper bag and burst it to simulate canon fire. There were squeals of delight as the concert ended and I saw a smile on every face.
Afterwards I congratulated Hugh MacDonald, the outgoing Director of the 大象传媒 SSO and met his successor, Gavin Reid as we toured the backstage areas of the City Halls and examined the recording booth.
An hour later I was back at the City Halls, this time in the Recital Room where we'll be recording eighteen comedy performances next month. The acoustics aren't quite right for comedy, so we tried to reduce the amount of reverberation by laying a carpet and bringing in a few sound screens. As Andy Britton, our sound engineer, listened though headphones, I took to the stage, script in hand, to help act out a comedy sketch.
The acoustics had improved, but after several tests, the same could not be said for my performance.
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A Book at Bedtime
A mad dash into Glasgow city centre tonight. I offered to buy Mrs Z. the big course book she needs for her studies and, knowing I'd never get around to it during the week, I decided to visit one of the big late-night book stores in town. The Zedettes offered to keep me company on condition they got to choose a book from the children鈥檚 section. I agreed, but reminded them of the New Rule. I invented this a couple of weeks ago. If they choose a book from an author they already know then they pay for it themselves out of their pocket-money, stocks and shares or other sources of revenue they have squirreled away in the bedrooms. If, however, they take a risk and try something new then I fork out. This seems to be working and means they're not adding to the existing collection of stories.
To be fair, they have worked their way through dozens of different authors over the years. is the obvious favourite and seems to have stood the test of time. I didn't have much luck persuading them to read my own collection of books. Buckeridge's most famous comic creation was Jennings who, with his friend Derbyshire had all sorts of boarding school adventures. I tell you, those stories kept me sane. How I longed to escape my comprehensive school in Easterhouse and enroll at Linbury Court Preparatory School. I imagined the fun of life in the dormitory, of walks to the village for tea and buns and all manner of hilarious misunderstandings.
So the Zedettes chose two books - an author they hadn't tried before. I won鈥檛 tell you how much Mrs. Z's computer book cost me. It had no price tag, just a little sticker with a picture of an arm and a leg. As we made our way out of the shop I noticed shelf after shelf stuffed with books about Glasgow's criminal underworld. Another rack contained books about Bird Flu.
What a cheery world we live in. If only we could escape into the land of make-believe that we read about in books. Fancy a midnight feast anyone?
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Going Underground
Mrs Z. is a student again, albeit in a part-time, distance-learning capacity. She鈥檚 studying for her and hopefully, by September, she鈥檒l be fully qualified and able to drive a computer down the fast lane of a motorway without breaking the law. In reality, she came back from the induction session at the other night, flashing her matriculation card and explaining the intricacies of her study timetable. I felt like Julie Walter鈥檚 husband in with Michael Caine. I should have stubbed out my fag on the ironing board, stormed out of the house and gone down the boozer with my mates. Except that I鈥檓 not drinking at the moment, have never smoked and, oh yes, I have no mates.
So, today, I decided to take the two Zedettes out of the house for a couple of hours so that she could get started on her first online module. We went to the Transport Museum at the Kelvin Hall. Our favourite part is the old cobbled street that has been made to look like a night-time scene in Glasgow from seventy years ago. You can wander into an old Underground train station and even watch movies in a miniature cinema festooned with Shirley Temple posters. Hey, and it鈥檚 all free!
I noticed that there are plans to build a new home for the Transport Museum down by the River Clyde and that the designers hope to use the riverside location to tell more of the city鈥檚 maritime history. It all sounds very exciting, but I鈥檒l miss visiting the Kelvin Hall. As I鈥檝e said before in this diary, the Kelvin Hall once played host to the Scottish Promenade concerts and was the original venue for the Modern Homes Exhibition. (I鈥檝e never quite understood why you have to pay good money to watch lots of people trying to sell you stuff you don鈥檛 need.)
The Kelvin Hall was always where me and my big sister came to watch Neil Reid in concert. He was the Motherwell teenager who got to fame on singing Mother of Mine. In an era when every other young girl was daft about Donnie Osmond and David Cassidy, my sister took a shine to Neil Reid. She dragged me to his concerts across Scotland and even persuaded me to wear outfits that resembled those worn by Neil. I have a vivid memory of a beige safari suit and I kid you not. Can you imagine what this did for my street-cred?
And you wonder why I have no mates?
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A Chip Off The Whole Block
I was talking to the Good Morning Scotland production team this morning and the discussion turned to housing. This was prompted by today's news about the Glasgow Housing Association's . I was reminded of something I'd seen when I'd been travelling through Garthamlock in the east end of the city. Many of the original streets have been demolished, other tenement blocks have been refurbished. The strangest sight was this block in the above photograph which appears to have been left stranded by the demolition squad. Clearly the flats are still occupied, but I wasn't sure whether this is a temporary arrangement or whether there are plans to attach new buildings in the future.
Last time I saw anything like this was in the sixties and seventies, when many of Glasgow's Victorian tenements were being cleared on a block-by-block basis. It was common to see the opened side of a building, with the fireplace still intact and the wallpaper of the various rooms visible to the outside world.
It seemed like a violation of personal privacy.And, of course, many of the people who were cleared from those so-called slums eventually ended up in vast housing estates like...Garthamlock.
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Inspecting Gadgets
A curious end to the week as the 大象传媒's Here & Now roadshow reached Glasgow. This is a travelling seminar in which staff are brought up to date with all the latest gizmos and gadgets on the market and then asked to think about the implications of each for our programming plans. The fun part is when we get shown into a room which has been stocked with all sorts of electronic
games, computers, cameras, digital radios and televisions. My eye was immediately drawn to a huge widescreen television showing a high-definition
DVD of an Elton John concert. It was kind of comforting and made me realise that even superstars have trouble controlling their weight. I made a mental note never to be filmed on an HD camera.Among the smaller toys was a little hand-held electronic version of Twenty Questions. You thought of an object and this little plastic ball of fun then asked you a series of questions before guessing what was inside your head. I thought of a jukebox, but after twenty questions the game's best answer was "slot-machine". It kept going, often repeating itself before finally giving in. I felt a sense of triumph in that I, a mere human being, had beaten this puny machine.
Afterwards we returned to a conference room for a group discussion. Many of us admitted to feeling overwhelmed by the speed of technological change. One person revealed that she still owned an old turntable and played vinyl records. Some of the younger people in the room had no idea what she was talking about.
There were some sympathetic nods when I confessed that my children now understood computers and video games far better than I did. They were less sympathetic when I told them I indulged in midnight practise sessions on the Playstation 2 so that I could outfox my eight year old son.Oh well, let them mock. At least I know what a jukebox is.
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Picking a Winner
The time has come to name and shame a few of my colleagues after what I can only describe as an episode of high farce this afternoon. In fact, it's on days like this that I wonder how we ever manage to make any programmes. I don't mean to be harsh, but, well, here's what happened...
You may remember a few weeks ago we were conducting an online survey of the Radio Scotland website. A little box would pop up, inviting you to give your opinions of the site. In return we promised you the chance to enter a prize draw. The prize was a digital radio. Thousands of you took part, for which we're very grateful. So far so good.
Today it was time to pick a winner and I was asked to do the honours. I'd pick a name out of a hat and then we'd take a photograph of me holding the prize. Simple enough, you might think.
First of all, Sally, my PA, refused to print out the thousands of individual e-mail addresses on the grounds that it would waste paper. She has this thing about trees having read somewhere that they help the environment. So then Stuart, from audience research, devised this complicated system in which he would assign each e-mail address a number and all I had to do was pick a number between one and 10,000. BUT, and here's where the panto started, Stuart said we had to "be faithful to the universal laws of chance." We all looked at him. Frankly he spends too much time locked in a small office looking at pie-charts. Anyway I wasn't allowed to just think of a number, it had to be "mathematically random". Not, at that moment, having access to a NASA mainframe computer, we scribbled the numbers one to ten on a post-it note, tore it into pieces and put them in a big 大象传媒 bag. Then Stuart's colleague Alice realised we would have to add a zero to the bag because we might need a four digit number. More paper was torn up and thrown into the bag. Sally wasn't pleased and went off muttering something about the ozone layer.
I picked four scraps of paper and we then matched that number against the relevant e-mail address. By this time Keir and Carol from Interactive were talking about editorial guidelines and whether or not we were allowed to award prizes, paid for by the licence fee, to a listener from outside the U.K. Some calls were made. I believe the United Nations may have become involved at this time.
As it transpired, the issue became hypothetical because the winner turned out to be resident in this country. All we had to do now was take a photograph of me holding the prize. I asked Keir for the digital radio and he gave me a blank stare. Carol said it had "been ordered but hadn't arrived." For the purposes of the photograph I asked Keir to nip upstairs and borrow one from the MacAulay and Co production office. He dashed upstairs while the rest of us stood and waited. And waited. Ten minutes later he returned looking much the way Indiana Jones looked after that narrow escape from a rolling boulder. He held the digital radio aloft and we all cheered.
Time for a photograph. That's when some fool - I think it was me - suggested we go outside and take the photograph. Five of us then trooped through corridors , out the back door and found an appropriate setting next to the 'Welcome to 大象传媒 Scotland' sign.
All very simple really. Next week we plan to get together and discuss how to change a light bulb.
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More Spooky Stuff
Another meeting with our Head of Radio Drama, Patrick Rayner, this afternoon as we began to put flesh on the bones of our plans for a Halloween play to be staged in a real haunted house. Patrick was telling me that a few years ago he was recording in one of those underground closes in Edinburgh. When they got the tape back to the studio, there was a strange bit of interference on the recording which they asked a sound engineer to analyse. He listened and identified the sound as a human voice speaking Gaelic. They had the words translated and the voice turned out to be saying: "get out of here."
Meanwhile, I've yet to make contact with psychic investigator Innes Smith who has offered to check out the supposed ghost that is said to haunt the basement area beneath my office. I reckon we should organise an all-night vigil down there.
Anyone like to join us? I think there's safety in numbers.
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Haircut Five Hundred
I was out on my lunchtime walk today and found a little barber鈥檚 shop tucked in a side street in Woodlands, just ten minutes away from the 大象传媒. Some colleagues had recently hinted I needed a haircut. The hints were not subtle. There had been references to sheepdogs and floor mops which I won鈥檛 go into. So I looked through the window and applied my usual strict criteria for deciding if I should allow a complete stranger to run amok through my scalp with scissors and razors; there was no one waiting. I went in.
Now, I don鈥檛 know about you, but I鈥檓 not very good at coming up with small-talk in these situations. Someone should write a book of hints and tips on this subject and couple it with a list of amusing things to write when birthday cards get handed around the office. Luckily, Luigi, my new barber, was not in the mood for a two-way conversation and was content to snip away at my hair while sharing little snippets of information he鈥檇 picked up during a lifetime among the combs and mirrors. He told me that some people have strands of hair that are so sharp they can puncture the skin, especially the soft tissue between the fingers. It was no wonder, he continued, that the famous that had opened in Paisley was shutting down. No one wants to look at naked flesh while having a haircut, said Luigi, 鈥渢here鈥檚 a time and a place for everything鈥.
Luigi told me my own hair was 鈥渧ery fine鈥 and that he had to cut it carefully or it would stick up everywhere. I confirmed that I鈥檇 had those kinds of stick-up haircuts on many previous occasions and, as a result, my appearance had often been compared to Worzel Gummidge. Luigi nodded and it was clear he could see the resemblance.
On the way back to the 大象传媒 I tried to work out how many haircuts I鈥檝e had in my life. Assuming one cut every six weeks, multiplied by 43 years, but subtracting a figure for early childhood and that scruffy period as a student, I reckoned this had been by 500th haircut. If I had been allowed to collect all that cut hair, I might now have enough to stuff a sofa.
A bizarre thought. I think all this fresh air is going to my head.
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Mister Magnetic
Dougal Perman came in for a chat this afternon. He's the Programme Director at an internet radio station based in Glasgow that specialises in underground and alternative music. Dougal had been in the audience when I gave students a couple of weeks ago and he remembered that I'd thrown out an invitation to any of the students to pop in and see me if they wanted advice. Very few ever take up this offer, but Dougal was straight on the 'phone.
I was interested to hear how Dougal became involved in student radio and how, years ago, he anticipated the demand for on-demand media when he and his business partner launched Magnetic. The station has built a good reputation and is now moving into podcasting and, among other projects, is helping a primary school in East Dunbartonshire set up an internal radio station for pupils.
These certainly are interesting times for the radio business, with newspapers and magazines now offering an online audio or video service. Dougal, and others with traditional production experience, are well-placed to offer their expertise to all manner of businesses who want to get in on the act.
The key is finding a way to get these podcasts noticed. That's easy if you already have a well-known website like the 大象传媒 or , but I suggested to Dougal that he launch his own podcasting network which could offer advice and training to would-be podcasters. It would be useful if there was one site where, for example, you could find all podcasts relevant to Scotland. Perhaps that site could be funded by sponsorship.
Unless that already exists?
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Look Back in Hunger
In the car this morning, driving south of Edinburgh through Tranent and into Pentcaitland. This tiny village is home to the Castle Sound recording studios which is where our radio drama team produce so many of the plays you hear on Radio 4, Radio 3 and, more recently, Radio Scotland.
I arrived as the actors were gathered around a kitchen table having a read-through of John Osborne's famous play, Look Back In Anger. They were kind enough to let me sit in on the session. Suddenly, the actors became the characters and I found myself in the heart of the action, listening to the lines of dialogue ping across the table like bullets. If you can imagine wandering on to a stage during a dress-rehearsal, that's what it was like.
During the coffee break I did some exploring of the studios. All the props were in place in readiness for the recording session. I opened a few fake doors and pulled a fake curtain. Each made the required sound. Easy, really.
I was told that the remote location of the studio means the actors and technicians rarely get distracted. I can believe that. Pencaitland isn't anyone's idea of a bustling metropolis. In search of a lunchtime snack, I went into the newsagent's shop next door and had to make lots of obvious coughing noises before the manager emerged from a back room. The shop itself seemed to have enough stock to last an afternoon. Lots of crisps and instant noodles, but nothing I was allowed to eat on my diet.
I did, however, pick up a bit of local history. Apparently the building that now houses the studios was once the village school. Sure enough, there were various crests and emblems on the stonework to confirm this.
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450 Miles To Go
So I'm now officially under sixteen stone. I admit that doesn't merit a trumpet fanfare, but let's imagine a quick blast on the kazoo. I lost four pounds last week, thanks to some lengthy walks and the determination to resist all offers of chocolate and alcohol. Instead, I've become something of a fruit-junkie. I heard Tom Morton talking about rhubarb on his show this afternoon and I ran into the nearest shop and bought some. (Luckily I'd run into a supermarket). Oh, it brought back some memories, I can tell you. I can remember stealing rhubarb from a local field and then dipping it in brown bags of sugar. I'm also the only person in my family with a passion for pomegranates.
So, after six weeks of the Five Hundred Mile Diet, I've lost 12 pounds and now weigh in at 15 stone, 13 pounds. No sign of needing smaller clothes sizes yet, but I can now button the top collar of my shirt without going purple in the face.
That's got to be progress.
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Milking It
A good number of belly-laughs at the City Halls last night as we watched All The Milkman's Children perform in front of family and friends and, more importantly, a very trendy-looking C大象传媒 executive who had come up from London to watch the kids in action. I sat next to the grandmother of one of the teenagers who proudly boasted that his talent came from her side of the family.The acoustics in the Recital Room are perfect for piano recitals, but not so good for comedy. Every word seemed to bounce off the walls and ceiling. Afterwards, I went into a little side-room where our audio engineers were sitting surrounded by mixing desks and laptops. They let me hear what had been recorded, which sounded fine and a lot clearer than it had been for the live audience. It seems we might need some carpets and curtains if we're to use this room during the next month.
I was too late to grab a photograph of all four performers, but producer Margaret-Anne Docherty posed with the three boys and managed to keep her composure in the middle of the all the 'comedy faces'.
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All The Milkman's Children
I'm off to the City Halls in Glasgow tonight to see a group of talented teenagers audition for our colleagues at C大象传媒. They're a comedy troupe called All The Milkman's Children and we came across them a couple of years ago as part of the 大象传媒 Blast initiative.
They developed their writing and performing skills through the theatre group in Paisley and every time I've seen them in front of an audience they've been a big hit...mainly because they write material about the trials and tribulations of being a teenager in Scotland. One memorable sketch involved the kind of "smile and pretend you're happy" training that you get when you start work in a fast-food restaurant.
大象传媒 Radio Scotland captured them in action at the two years ago when we gave them a gig at the Spiegeltent. Such confidence...they even poked fun at 大象传媒 childrens' programmes.
So, tonight is an important one for ATMC and I'm going there to cheer them along in front of the TV cameras. Fingers crossed they'll soon be making it big on the small screen.
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Crash!
My home computer crashed at the weekend. That's a technical term, of course. It didn't decide to throw itself in front of a bus, although I was tempted to help it on its way. Why, after all these years, are home computers so unreliable? I mean, the PCs we use here at work are probably not much better, but at least we have a whole department of highly trained technicians who can come to your rescue. You want to see these guys in action. One phone call and they drop from the sky like members of the SAS. (Obviously I'm trying to butter them up, just in case my office machine decides to down tools in support of my domestic machine).
Why is it, though, that when you buy a PC you can't just take it home, switch it on and be guaranteed a few years of reliable service? Oh no, you've got to consider anti-virus software, firewalls, online support, warranties...you've got the picture.
Unlike, say, a radio. We have radio at home that we bought thirty years ago and it's still going strong. I'm sure diary readers out there can easily beat that record. In fact, it's very hard to kill a radio. Believe me, I've tried. I was forever exploring the gubbins inside transistor radios and wondering what would happen if you snipped this bit or pulled out that bit.
I once poured 3-in-1 oil into a radio and I could still pick up 大象传媒 Radio 1. Of course, that was in the era when most of the D.J.s sounded oily so it just added to the effect.
Anyway, a man is coming round the house this morning to either fix my home PC or condemn it to the skip. Mrs Z is fully briefed to ask all the right questions including the BIG ONE..."How much will this cost?".
So, that's my excuse for no postings over the weekend. And I had so much to tell you. Oh well, there's always tomorrow..
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The Whole Tooth
A nine o'clock appointment with the dentist this morning. Just a check-up. This is a sign of my new, improved and mature attitude towards dental health. Usually I go to the dentist after a fortnight of pain, having used the "hope-it-goes-away-by-itself" method and then dangerous doses of over-the-counter painkillers.
So this morning I was feeling a bit smug as I lay there on the reclining chair exchanging witty banter with the man in the white coat.
"Just give me a quick once-over, " I quipped, "but don't feel you have to look too hard."
Ho ho ho. Next thing he's talking to me about leaky fillings and I have to arrange two more appointments in the next week. That took the smile off my face. Well, that and the three fingers he had inside my mouth.
I have a long and terrible history with dentists. I had terrible teeth as a child. A calcium deficiency they say was to blame. I spent years going back and forth to the Glasgow Dental Hospital where various students used me as some kind of test-case. Other patients would be left unattended while a crowd gathered around my open mouth in open-mouthed amazement. They'd poke around my gums with fingers and mirrors and needles. After many months a consultant admitted there was very little they could do and told me to stop wasting everyone's time. I left the building before he had the chance to call security.
As the years passed I've waited for advances in dental science to offer me the chance of an Osmond smile. I want to munch into an apple and leave the perfect bite-shape, just like in the toothpaste adverts. Instead any apple I bite on looks like it's been smashed against a cheese grater. Many times I've suggested to my current dentist that he rip out what remains of my teeth and give me some shining artifical replacements.
"Everyone says that", he says, with a sigh, "but you'd just be exchanging one set of problems for another."
I suppose he's right and I reckon most dentists with ethics would say the same thing.
Now where can I find the other kind?
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Boogie In The Afternoon
I walked up to George Street just in time to catch the end of the Scotland Live outside broadcast. Presenter Gary Robertson was asking if the people of Edinburgh had made the right decision in last year's referendum on congestion charging. There was a heated debate going on as I arrived, but my eyes were also drawn to the state of our camper van. This operates as a mobile studio but it's starting to look a little weather-beaten on the outside and someone described the interior to me as very Terry & June.
So it's being carted off soon for a new lick of paint and a redesign of our logo. Meanwhile we'll have to think about what we do with the inside. One of our senior producers in the music department, Barbara Wallace, suggested we get TV designers Colin & Justin to give it a makeover. Hmm, we'll see.
Meanwhile Gary introduced the one o'clock news just as the gun went off and we headed over to for a event for students there.
I chaired a discussion between Gary and the Forth One breakfast presenter "Boogie"- host of "Boogie in the Morning". The students were in good form with lots of great questions about the future of radio.Our finale was a quiz, devised by our producer Lizzy Clark, in which we reversed roles. Gary captained a team to answer questions about pop culture...Boogie's team had to answer questions about politics. It was a close-run thing, but Gary's in-depth research on Big Brother and Desperate Housewives paid off.
I have to say I was very impressed with Boogie who talked a lot of sense about the radio business and gave the students a real sense of what it takes to forge a career in commercial radio. Mind you, I don't think I can ever forgive him for pointing out that I didn't know the difference between Puff Daddy and P. Diddy.
But hey, I can name every member of McFly!
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Coffee With Colin
In Edinburgh again today and, after the staff briefing, I had arranged to meet Colin MacDonald in a little coffee shop on Holyrood Road. Colin was the writer of King of Hearts and we had a good chin-wag about the play and reaction to it. He told me how taxi drivers in Edinburgh had recognised him from last Saturday's front page story in the , but that he'd had more messages of congratulations for his appearance on Off The Ball than for the play itself.
Colin writes mainly for television these days. His credits include Sharpe and a forthcoming crime drama. He told me a few behind-the-scenes stories about television production, including how he'd once written a simple scene involving a piece of toast popping from a toaster and landing in a pan of milk. Simple enough on the page, but it involved a special effects man flown up from London and several hours of filming while they tried to make the toast land in the milk. Finally the cameraman had the bright idea of filming the toast popping up and then filmed another shot as they simply dropped the toast into the milk.
No wonder television costs so much. On radio you could simply have the character on the phone saying to a friend:
"I'm having dreadful trouble with that toaster.. bread popped up and landed in the milk again. Worse than that, I'm looking out of the window and three alien spaceships are zooming towards me."
Like we always say, on radio the pictures are better. And cheaper.
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Quote Unquote
I thought I was losing my mind this morning.
I received an e-mail from Colin Paterson, the programme director of the new talk station in Edinburgh, thanking me for the quote I'd given The Scotsman about his launch programmes. There was an article on page 12, apparently, but all I found there was an item about the new casino plan for Glasgow. It turns out I was reading the west coast edition of the paper. Sure enough, the journalist who had phoned me yesterday afternoon then sent me a . He'd interviewed two other radio station bosses in Scotland. My comments were probably the kindest. Boy, it's a dog-eat-dog world out there in the radio market.
Later I had a call for a reporter on a new industry magazine called Jam. I hadn't heard of this mag' before but happily droned on for five minutes with my views on speech radio, positioning, blah, blah, blah. Finally the poor reporter got a word in and told me he had everything he needed.
"It's only a thousand word article," he explained. The clear implication being that I'd already supplied three times that amount.
Note to self: must master the art of the snappy soundbite.
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The Spooky Basement
Despite my previous posting I have to admit I don't really believe in ghosts and have to doubt these stories about spooky goings-on in the basements of 大象传媒 buildings. Today I was sent this photograph of the stairs that lead underneath my own office and which, supposedly, was used as a mortuary in the late 19th century.
I'm told there is some sort of ghostly presence on the image but all I can see is the light shining off the stairs. Let me know what you think.
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Anyone Got A Spare Ghost?
It's been a day of drama. Our radio play, King of Hearts, went out this morning after much attention from the Press. It even made the front page of the . I locked myself in my office and ignored the phones so I could enjoy it. Which I did.
Then, at lunchtime, I turned my back on the various coffee shops of Byers Road and walked up towards Maryhill, cutting through all those tenement-lined streets which are named after Shakesperian characters. Hotspur Street, for example. It reminded me of a radio version of Macbeth I heard years ago. It was a 大象传媒 Scotland production which pioneered the use of binaural sound. This was a short-lived variation of stereo, the forerunner of Dolby surround sound, and gave the illusion of voices coming from behind you, instead of at either side. It made for a creepy experience if you listened to the murder of Duncan with headphones.
I've suggested to Patrick Rayner, our Head of Radio Drama, that we stage a radio play in a real haunted house. He reminded me that our old Queen Street studios in Edinburgh had its very own ghost. In fact, the old Gramophone Library in our Glasgow H.Q. is also supposed to be haunted. This particular ghost is said to be linked to the days when the building was used as a training hospital and the basement library was where they performed autopsies. Yikes.
So, here's a challenge for all diary readers. Can you suggest a suitable haunted house in Scotland? A place big enough to house a crew of actors and producers.
And of course, with a ghost that can supply the sound effects.
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Fat Chance
So five weeks without so much as a lager shandy and five or ten miles of walking every day. Last week the scales told me I was 16 stone and 2 pounds. This week I ought to have hit the 16 mark...maybe I would be 15 something!
In Inverness last week Jan, one of the producers, asked me why I had decided to lose weight. I told her that before Christmas I was squeezing into 40 inch waist trousers.
"When I first joined the 大象传媒, " I explained, "I had a 34 inch waist."
"Yes, and you were fat even then," said Jan, with the kind of brutal honesty that eats away at her Christmas card tally every year.
Then, in Glasgow, Caroline from the Radio Events team suggested I change the photo of me that appears at the top of this diary because it made me look fat. I called Anne Paterson, who looks after this website and she duly obliged, but added.
"I think this other photo makes you look even fatter."Charming.
So, determined to prove them all wrong I skipped onto the scales this morning and...and...I'm a pound heavier than I was last week. How can this be? Think. Think. Maybe, just maybe, it was the fried chicken I had in Edinburgh on Saturday. Or the basket of bread I hoovered up in a tapas restaurant in Glasgow.
Or that yummy big chocolate that came with the coffee in an Inverness cafe. And let's face it. Just five miles walking this week. Pathetic.So I return to my Five Hundred Mile diet with a new sense of purpose. I even jogged a little tonight. I'm gonna beat this blubber! This time next year I'll be tip-toeing across cattle grids in case I slip and go under.
Or else I could just ask Anne to do some digital jigger-pokery with my photo.
What say you, Anne?To read comments on this post, click here
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In The Wee Small Hours...
We launch Radio Scotland's new overnight service tonight. Rob Matheson will be on air through the wee small hours with a collection of music and archive programmes. It also means we add another fifty programmes a week to the 大象传媒 Radio Player, which is growing in popularity every month.
I'm very enthusiastic about night-time radio. There's something wonderful about lying in a darkened room listening to great music or a compelling story. You can lose yourself in the voices and the sounds. Unless, of course, you're working the night-shift and expected to operate heavy machinery.
As a former shift-worker myself, I remember the strange pattern of a nocturnal existence. I worked alone in an office from eleven at night until seven the next morning, seven nights a week. This was followed by four Rest days. The working nights were fine if you were busy. Time flew. Otherwise, time strolled. It sauntered. It ground to a halt. I'd find myself doing strange chores at four o'clock in the morning. Suddenly it would seem like a good idea to arrange telephone directories into north-south geographical order. Or write blistering letters of complaint to confectionery companies in the hope of securing some free chocolate. The Rest days could be equally strange. It took at least two days to get your body-clock back into order. You'd be off work during the week when everyone else was toiling. Gradually you came to live a weird half-life. You'd arrange trips to the cinema with friends and then fall asleep before the Kia-Ora advert. You'd wander through the supermarket forgetting what you wanted to buy and emerge with yet another six tins of cat food. Trying to rationalise your mistake you would head off to the pet shop to buy a cat. Of course, you'd emerge from that shop with a fish tank.
Yet being a creature of the night does have its advantages and listening to the radio overnight was something I discovered as a teenager. In those days very few domestic radio stations ran 24 hours a day. I'd tune, instead, to Short Wave services such as 大象传媒 World Service with the wonderfully dramatic "This is London" and the muffled strains of Lilliburlero. There was also Radio Moscow, Radio Prague and the Voice of America. In fact, I once won a quiz on Radio Prague. This was the era of Soviet rule so the quiz question was probably along the lines of "What is the name of the river that runs through Glasgow and can you supply details of any local military installations?" Anyway, I won a vinyl recording of Czechoslovakian folk music which I still treasure.
But they never did return my aerial photographs.
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Not Sure...Might Have Been The Low Road.
An eerie drive to Loch Lomond this afternoon, through mist and rain. We take the winding back road past Carbeth and through Balloch. The road has plenty of sudden dips and the Zedettes like to pretend they're on a roller-coaster. Mrs Z. was trying to listen to commentary of the Old Firm game from Ibrox. At one point her hand brushed against the radio and the commentary team seemed to have been replaced by unfamiliar voices. Then we realised we'd switched to 大象传媒 Five Live by mistake.We stopped off at Loch Lomond Shores. My, but this area has seen some change in recent years. In the year before we were married, I lived in a small farm cottage near Duck Bay Marina. I would usually do my shopping in Balloch. It's a town I like, but I always feel it can never make up its mind if it wants to be a tourist destination or a commuter village.
While the rest of the family went shopping, I took a walk along to see the Maid of the Loch. There was a notice on the gangway saying that they're about to begin work restoring this old paddle steamer. There's also some work going on at Drumkinnon Tower. This relatively new building is already being re-modelled as some kind of aquarium.
Not many vistors around today, mind you. Huge empty car parks. No doubt the damp and chilly weather is keeping people away. Or else they're all indoors listening to the football and the rugby.
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Family History Day
An early train to Edinburgh this morning to attend the 大象传媒 Family History Day at the General Register Office for Scotland. It was achingly cold, but I could see the queue as soon as I turned off Princes Street and this was a full hour before the doors opened. Inside, our Radio Events team was busy setting up stalls. One or two of them acknowledged my arrival with a nod, but they had no time for idle chit-chat.I'd brought the two Zedettes with me (they think train journeys are such a laugh) but Mrs Z was detained elsewhere (buying shoes at Braehead Shopping Centre). They had a better time than I'd imagined. They tasted old-fashioned biscuits, created their own coat of arms with felt-tip pens and used the computers to trawl the birth certificates of school friends.
I had a brief look at the online records of my Mother's side of the family. It was an emotional experience. I found my parents' marriage certificate, with my Mum's signature and her occupation in 1949 listed as "biscuit factory worker". I suddenly remembered her telling me how she got sickened by the smell of chocolate in the McFarlane Laing factory in Glasgow.
I went back a generation. There were my grandparents and great-grandparents. There was no record of the family before 1850. Was that when they had arrived from Ireland? More research was needed.
So many names, so many lives. Children, mostly girls, who had died in infancy. A great, great uncle whose death was recorded during the first world war. Some names wonderfully posh (Isabella) while others (Maggie) suggested informality.
Who would have thought that these old documents could bring tears to the eyes?On the way out of the building we saw that the queue was now stretched around the block. Almost two hundred people were waiting patiently in the cold to find out more about their families.
I clutched my childrens' hands a little tighter as we scurried past. We were now in a hurry to have some more fun. After all, time flies, you know.
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King of Hearts
A few weeks ago I was having dinner with Vladimir Romanov, the controversial businessman who appears to enjoy chucking money at Hearts Football Club. He doesn't speak much English and my Lithuanian isn't what it ought to be, so most communication was done through the universal languages of gesture and mime. Not for the first time I cursed myself for leaving my puppets at home.
To be honest, this wasn't a dinner-for-two. It was at Radio Scotland's Off The Ball awards and among the other famous faces around the table were Alex Salmond, Tam Cowan and TV legend Arthur Montford (the nicest man in the world, by the way). Mr Romanov had brought an interpreter and Mr Cowan could not resist having some fun.
"Please translate for me," said Tam, "although I am only a humble interpreter...as soon as our eyes met I knew that I loved you." Luckily, the interpreter stopped himself mid-way through the translation.
Now, fast-forward a few days and I'm walking along a 大象传媒 corridor with Tom Connor, the Editor in charge of Radio Scotland's sports programmes. We're talking about the whole Hearts saga this season; signings, famous victories, sackings, resignations, defeats, transfers, rebellions.
"You couldn't make this up, " says Tom, "in fact we should make a drama out of this."
As if in a cartoon, two lightbulbs appear above our heads and I make a mental note to tell Services about the missing lampshades in that corridor. We then take Tom's suggestion to our Head of Radio Drama, Patrick Rayner. He, in turn, recruits producer David Neville and David, in turn, commissions a radio play from writer Colin MacDonald . Sorry about all the turns. You must be dizzy.
The end result can be heard this Tuesday morning when, at 11 o'clock, we broadcast King of Hearts - a funny Valentine's Day love story set against the backdrop of this roller-coaster season at Tynecastle. The script has been changing every day as the writer tries to keep pace with the frenetic world of Scottish football. In fact - and this is true - it's going to be so up-to-the minute that we have the actors on stand-by to perform live if Colin has some last-minute re-writes.
So, a bit of a first for us at Radio Scotland. A collaboration between Drama and Sport, a topical and evolving script and possibly a live performance. If you miss it on Tuesday you can hear it on our Listen Again service.
At rehearsals this week, the actors, including leading man Paul Young, and Jenny Ryan (pictured below) told Colin they loved the story and the dialogue and that he really seemed to be able to inhabit the mind of a die-hard Hearts fan.
Praise indeed, considering Colin is a devotee of Hibs.
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On The Fiddle
On the train back to Glasgow tonight I was standing in the buffet car, handing over a zillion pounds for a cup of brown liquid, when I heard a familiar voice call my name. It was Bruce McGregor, founding member of who told me he was heading to the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas. He described it as a great "selling opportunity". Well, it seems traditional music has come a long way since strolling players would earn a miserable crust roaming from village-to-village hoping simple folk would look kindly upon tuneful strangers. Or, at the very least, not use their arrival to organise a village stoning contest.I last saw Bruce in December at the in Edinburgh. He was on stage at the Queen's Hall picking up two gongs and telling the audience a very funny story about his apperance at the same event the year before. Apparently he and the band had left the stage and made their way through a side door. Only then did they discover it was some kind of broom cupboard. Too embarrassed to admit their mistake, they stayed in the cupboard until the interval.
Ah, but I have a soft spot for Bruce and it all goes back to the day, more than ten years ago, when my daughter was born. That night a crowd of us were celebrating this happy event in the Phoenix Bar in Inverness. Bruce arrived, fiddle in hand, and played the most beautiful piece of music in honour of the occasion. I decided there and then I would pay tribute to Bruce and name my first-born child...Fidelma. Happily, come the next morning, I had no recollection of this absurd idea. In fact, it has only just come back to me.
Anyway, I had noticed that the cover of new Blazin' Fiddles CD (Magnificent Seven) has a photograph of the band, but there is not one fiddle in sight.
"Well yes," Bruce explained, "We try to keep quiet about that."
Clearly the world of marketing is alien to me. Now, where can I get a miserable crust at this time of night? Do they deliver?
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Inverness -Then and Now
I'm in Inverness today, talking to the production team here about, well, the future. We're linking up with Highland 2007 at the turn of the year and have ambitious plans involving all the secondary schools in the area. We've also had some good audience feedback to the Inverness-produced Action Scotland series and the various conversation programmes we run at eleven o'clock each morning.
At lunchtime I went for a little walk around town and popped in to the Museum and Art Gallery. They have a great exhibition of watercolours at the moment, all painted in the sixties by William Glashen. Glashen was an architect and his paintings provide a glimpse of Inverness before progress and planners resulted in the demolition of so many buildings.My favourite was a painting of "High Street before Woolworths" which shows you how the main shopping street looked before a hideously bland monstrosity was slotted between the neo-classical and traditional architecture.
I spoke to one of the museum attendants and said I had heard rumours that some of the worst office blocks on the banks of the Ness have been earmarked for demolition. She wasn't sure this was the case and, in any case, nominated the museum itself as another candidate for the bulldozer of good taste.
"Mind you," she whispered, with typical Highland wit, "they'll probably spend a million pounds renovating the building and then decide to pull it down."
Anyway, a great exhibition and it runs until March so worth having a look.
Later I ran into comedian Bruce Morton who has just relocated to Inverness and told me he wishes he had done so years ago. He's clearly in love with the place and is one of the few Glaswegians who openly shares my enthusiasm for this city.
He's trying to get some comedy projects off the ground and I told him we'd been keen to support a Highland Comedy Cup if that would be useful.
Watch this space.
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I Owe It All to Nelson Pipsqueak
I was at Glasgow University today, giving a talk about radio as part of the Uni's annual . A good turnout of 25 -30 students and they seemed to appreciate my fantastic giveaways (River City Soap, Radio Scotland balloons etc). Well, they didn't throw them back at me anyway.Students are always looking for advice on how to break into radio. I told them the story of Nelson S. Pipsqueak the New York 'Private Eye' whose main character flaw was cowardice. When being threatened by Mafia heavies who wanted him to squeal on his informants, Nelson didn't take too much persuading.
"Suddenly my lips were flapping faster than a shutter on a stormy night and I was spilling more beans than a cowboy with the shakes."
I was very proud of that line. You see, Nelson was a comic character I created in a series of short stories I sent to a local radio station in 1981. A spoof on Philip Marlowe. The stories were read out between 3 and 4 in the morning, with me at home pressing the record button on my Buccaneer cassette recorder.
Many years later, Nelson came to my rescue when I applied for the post-graduate course in journalism at University College, Cardiff. I went down for the selection interview and found myself in a room full of Oxbridge graduates some of whom had fathers who owned newspapers. And I don't mean they owned one copy of a newspaper.
The course selectors wanted evidence of an interest in radio, and I recalled my Pipsqueak stories. They had been broadcast on an actual, genuine radio station. No matter that it had been the middle of the night and I hadn't been paid, they had still gone out on the air. It swung it for me in the interview and a year later I got my Diploma and then my first paid job in radio.
The moral of this tale, if there is one, is to gather and use any kind of relevant experience. I know I always look for that when we're recruiting programme teams.
So, I ended my talk to polite applause and bumped into Greg Hemphill who was on the way in. Of course, his session on comedy was a sell-out. Students were hanging from the rafters.
But hey, he didn't even have any balloons.
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Belfast
I write this from Belfast City Airport, where I am hunched over a coin-operated internet terminal. I've been meeting Susan Lovell, my counterpart at 大象传媒 Radio Ulster. A good day and I observed a real sense of team spirit among Susan's team who have been cheered by some astounding audience figures in the recent Rajar report.On the taxi journey from the airport this morning I had noticed striking postal workers lining the middle of the road, protesting at the alleged unfair treatment of colleagues. This story was being pursued by Stephen Nolan during his hugely popular phone-in programme. I watched the show from a web-cam in the 大象传媒 Northern Ireland reception area and then later from the studio cubicle. Stephen has an easy familiarity with his callers and speaks to them like old friends, even telling a couple to "shut-up" when the debate became heated to the point of incomprehension.
As was the case with my last visit to Belfast a year ago, an invitation to have a coffee involves leaving the building and a short walk along the street to an old-fashioned gents clothing store, where we climbed a flight of stairs to a secret cafe. I keep wondering how bad the coffee must be in the 大象传媒 canteen.
At lunch we were joined by Susan's boss, Peter Johnston who told me that many Radio Ulster presenters also have a presence on television and this helps build their profile with the audience. It's a bit like Tam Cowan who presents Off The Ball for Radio Scotland and Offside for 大象传媒 Television. We also discussed the idea of having a Northern Ireland/Scotland week on both stations during November.
In the afternoon I met Susan's senior team and described some of the recent changes to the Radio Scotland schedule and our plans for the future, including the new overnight service. They seemed amused by the idea of this diary, but clearly thought I was insane when I later asked Susan's P.A., Emer, to take a of photograph of me so I would have evidence of my visit.
Yes, I may be a little loopy, but at least I stay in the building when I go for coffee.To read comments on this post, click here
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470 Miles To Go
Weigh-in day for my 500 Mile Diet. Another two pounds lost which brings my total loss in four week to nine pounds.
My decision to give up alcohol is fuelling a few rumours. At yesterday's senior staff meeting one colleague asked me if I was now teetotal
"Yes, but not forever," I insisted, just in case someone asks me to make it legally binding.
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The Night Shift
When I started this diary I promised sneak previews of forthcoming programmes. Well, here's a scoop for all diary readers; The Night Shift.
That's what we're calling our new through-the-night service which we're launching on Monday 13th February. (It's actually the early hours of the 14th, now I come to think about it.)
From 0100 until 0600 you'll hear Rob Matheson or Tony Currie present a selection of music, features and entertainment shows. There will be a few competitions and e-mails from listeners too. The music will be drawn from the library of some of our best-known programmes, such as Celtic Connections and Brand New Country.
The feature programmes will mainly be half-hour documentaries such as The Book I've Yet to Write, Trip Off The Tongue and the return of one Radio Scotland's most requested series, Scotland's Century.
This is all a bit of an experiment, but it has the bonus of adding many more programmes to the 大象传媒 Radio Player, so there will be more choice for those listeners who don't suffer from insomnia.
We'll run in on MW, digital radio, digitial television and online, while Radio Five Live will stay as our sustaining service on FM.
It also offers listeners a chance to shape the overnight schedule by suggesting music and programmes. So, if you have any comments, don't wait until the 13th.
Let's hear them now.To read comments on this post, click here
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What Gives You the Rights?
At our senior staff meeting today we had a very interesting talk from James Lancaster, who is the 大象传媒's Head of Rights. He's the man trying to negotiate deals with rights-holders as the 大象传媒 maps out the future of on-demand services, podcasting and giving viewers and listeners access to the 大象传媒's archive of programmes.
I'm afraid I bombarded him with questions because this in an area that interests me a lot. At the moment we can't podcast music programmes because we don't have the right to use commercial music, unlike on radio where the 大象传媒 has negotiated a buy-out of music rights. Similarly, when it comes to comedy, the cost of repeating a programme is so expensive that it almost works out cheaper to commission a completely new programme.
Now this might be a good thing if you think the 大象传媒 should only be in the business of broadcasting original programmes, but comedy does take time to be noticed and appreciated by an audience. Very often a comedy won't build a following until it has been repeated.
James explained the complexities of all of this, but agreed with me that, while the 大象传媒 has to be seen to be treating artists and writers fairly, other organisations and individuals don't seem so worried about the legal niceties.
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Radio Comedy
Mrs Z. and I were out on the town last night, attending the 10th birthday party for the , the Glasgow-based production company behind such hits as Rab C. Nesbit, Still Game and Radio Scotland's own Watson's Wind-Up.It was strange to be surrounded by so many famous faces. We saw Gregor Fisher, Greg Hemphill, Ford Kiernan and Jonathan Watson and there was a very funny speech from the Comedy Unit's top man, Colin Gilbert. Of course he fed the paranoia that haunts all of us who work in radio by talking about his company's television triumphs with no mention that so many of those programmes and performers began life on the wireless. I would have gone home in a huff, but then Mrs Z. reminded me we'd brought the car.
Anyway, congratulations Comedy Unit and well done on the party. It was a lavish affair in the upstairs function suite at Oran Mor . We met Nick Lowe from productions who joked that his company's tenth birthday was a more modest 'do' with a table-booking in a local restaurant. Nick's company makes a lot of the new comedy for Radio Scotland, including Sabotage, which you can see live at next month's .
We also met , one of the stars of The Why Front, which will also be live at the festival. Elaine is one of Scotland's best comedy actresses and I'm sure it's only a matter of time before the rest of the world wakes up to her talent. You read it here first!
We had a good natter with Louise Beattie, former star of Emmerdale, who has given up acting to pursue a career in law. We'd both watched the recent series about Glasgow's Sheriff Court and we agreed that the most memorable moment was when the teenage girl is sitting in a holding cell and other jailbirds are trying to cheer her up by telling her that prison isn't so bad because "everything there is organised for you."
Sneaking down the stairs at eleven o'clock (babysitters await) we get caught by John McCormick, my old boss and former controller of 大象传媒 Scotland. He tells me he's been enjoying the new programmes on Radio Scotland and asks me if my recent job-swap with the Headmaster of Elgin High School was more job-shadowing or job-swapping. I tell him it was more like shadowing.
"Of course," he says, "because you don't know how to run a school and he wouldn't know how to run Radio Scotland."At least, I think he said that. It might have been the other way around.
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The Food of Love
We have a few treats in store this coming Valentine's Day on Radio Scotland, but I see that some Glasgow restaurants are preparing for the big day with a mixture of romance and reality. I spotted this outside a hostelry at the bottom of Byres Road.
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Walking the West Highland Way (Sort Of)
My radio alarm woke me to the merry banter of Out of Doors this morning. In fact, I was awake in time to hear the presenters make a little joke at my expense. With an evil smile I logged the offence in my Big Bad Book of Retribution. Roll on, my next visit to Aberdeen!The programme inspired me to leap out of bed and embark on a walk to Milngaive. I let the rest of the family enjoy an extended slumber while I crashed about downstairs, shovelling instant porridge down my throat and pulling on a wooly jumper. I didn't even both to shave - that's how rugged I was. Och aye.
I tell you, this walking lark is getting easier, but I'll need to accumulate more miles if I'm to succeed in my Five Hundred Mile Diet before the end of the year.
Nevertheless, I clocked up three miles on the round-trip to Milngavie and it was good to be out enjoying the fresh air on such a crisp day.I felt a bit of a fraud, mind you, when a friendly stranger offered to take my photograph next to the needle. I thanked him and he wished me well on my journey. I didn't reveal that the next stage of my "journey" would take me to the baker's shop five steps away and, technically, I have now completed a stretch of the famous route. A 20 foot stretch, true, but that still counts.
Now, it may be just my weird sense of humour, but I laughed when I saw this sign in the baker's window.
I could just imagine the shop staff, fed up to their back teeth with customers popping their heads 'round the door to ask about the flavour of the soup. Or maybe I'm missing the point. Maybe the Chicken Noodle announcement is a cause for local celebration. If I had stayed longer I might have seen them roll out the bunting.
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Tape Mates International
The closure of this week reminded me of the music paper I used to buy as a teenager. Superpop. I know, I know...so uncool. I was never one of the cool kids. Let's face it; I played baritone horn in the school brass band and I can't recall being at a party where girls said "Hey, Jeff, get out your baritone and give us some of that crazy oompah music!" No, it just didn't happen.But Superpop attracted me for one good reason; if offered free classified advertising on the inside back page. Mainly it was readers selling guitars and record collections and others looking for pen-pals. That's what gave me my first ever get-rich-quick idea - Tape Mates.
I can even recall the ad I wrote:
Pen Pals are dead! Why not join my Tape Mates club and exchange cassettes with friends all over the world. Why write when you can speak? Send 拢1 to...
In a matter of days I was receiving cassettes from people all over the U.K, some with postal orders and others with loose change. I was so convinced I was on to something big I registered the name Tapes Mates International (sole trader) with the Registry of Companies in Edinburgh. Not bad for a 13 year old.
Just one problem; I had to match all these would-be tape-mates and that meant listening to hours of badly-recorded monologues from squeaky-voiced teenagers. I have a vivid memory of one recording in which a nice young chap explained how he hoped the Tape Mates club would help improve his voice technique so he could realise his ambition to become a bingo-caller. Fair enough, but most of the subscribers came from boys seeking girls and that was the snag. How many teenage girls do you know who would be daft enough join such a scheme. Let me tell you; one. One girl...and she wanted another girl as her tape-mate.
Pretty soon I was putting the cassettes back into envelopes and refunding the money. I finally lost 拢20 on the scheme.
This story came back to me when I was sitting in the 大象传媒 canteen on Wednesday with Andy Simpson from Elgin High School. We were joined by Doreen Wood, our programme Editor in Aberdeen who told us she was developing some ideas using archive recording from listeners' attics. Andy was enthusiastic about this because he knew so many people who had exchanged cassette recordings from overseas, in the days when long-distance phone calls were so expensive.
So the hunt is on for those Tapes Mates of the seventies and eighties. Do let us us know if you have any recordings hiding away at home. New technology will allow us to clean up the sound and it should make for a great programme.
Meanwhile, some oompah sounds anyone?
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Who The Heck Do You Think You Are?
Our Radio Events team is based four floors above me in an office at the other side of the building. I reckon I've saved myself a fortune in gym membership fees just climbing the stairs each day to visit them. I tend not to say much when I get there. I gesture for the oxygen mask and have a wee lie down.
At the moment the team is planning a whole series of activities, including a special event linked to the 大象传媒 TV series Who Do You Think You Are? It's one of the few TV programmes that Mrs Z and myself watch together. It's also prompted thousands of people to trace their own family trees. So on the 11th of February Radio Scotland will be live at New Register House in Edinburgh, working with the experts there to help people trace their ancestors. Do pop along. I'm told there will also be some authentic 19th Century Food which must be well past it's sell-by date (ho ho).
Anyway, back to the Events Team and, in particular, Jennifer Allan who is organising the Family History Day in Edinburgh. Jen, as we call her, has been tracing her own ancestry and tells me she is descended from a character by the name of Moses Jackson. She's thrilled but, lacking any further information, has simply imagined who this character might have been. No doubt she thinks of Moses and envisgaes some bearded guru, a leader in his community, a man to be feared and respected, a man of wisdom.
I, on the other hand, immediately make the connection with Michael Jackson and imagine something completely different.
Tracing the Zycinski family tree might be a litle tricky. My Dad, who is eighty-five, can supply the details of his parents and grandparents and I know that we come from a south of Lodz. The rest will have to wait until I get a cheap flight to Poland.
But I'm always reminded of the time I visted one of those Clan History Centres on "Royal Deeside". They promised they could locate the clan history of anyone in Scotland using the sophisticated shop-counter computer. I was going to give them my Mother's maiden name but then decided to test the system.
"What's your name, Sir?"
"Zycinski."
"Just a moment..."Sure enough, a few taps on the keyboard and the Zycinski Clan was located, complete with a recommended shopping list of the various tartans and crests I
was now qualified to purchase. There was even a sporran.In the event, I just didn't buy it.
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Rajar Day
Anyone who runs a radio station in the U.K. will tell you that there are four days every year when you can face a rollercoaster ride of emotions; Rajar days.
is the organisation that researches audience numbers for the 大象传媒 and commercial radio, and every three months they provide a report that goes out to all stations. As a station manager you are sent a secure website link which is activated at 5.30pm on the dot. You then download a file and within minutes you're looking at the data. The latest figures came out last night but you're not allowed to go public with them until seven o'clock the next morning.
So there I was at 5.30 last night, hunched over my PC and trying to ignore the happy chatter coming from a birthday celebration happening in the office next to mine. Then, as if I wasn't nervous enough, my boss came in and looked over my shoulder as I downloaded the information. To be fair, she was there to offer support, but if the figures had been bad I would have needed a few moments alone to wipe away the tears and re-do my make-up.
As it was, we were over the magic million mark and had gained about fifty thousand listeners since the last report. Phew.
But spare a thought for my colleagues in television. They get figures within hours of any broadcast. That means they could go through this kind of stress every night. I wonder if they get used to it.
There are moves afoot to change the way we measure radio audiences and new high-tech devices might give us more meaningful and up-to-date information about our programming decisions. I wonder if that will lead us down a path of reacting too quickly when a programme seems to be doing badly. In radio, new formats often take a year to get noticed and be accepted by listeners.
And for the 大象传媒, which aims to provide a wide variety of programmes, raw listening figures tell you very little about how a programme might be valued by the audience.
I'm struck, for example, by the e-mails we've been receiving in response to our Write Here, Right Now project. Many people are telling us how much they value the support and encouragement they are receiving as they attempt, finally, to write the novel they've been putting off for years.
That kind of real contact with real people can never replace charts and statistics.
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Say Cheezers
It was round two of the job swap today, when Andy Simpson arrived from Elgin High School to take charge of Radio Scotland. So, after all these years, I finally get the chance to tell a headmaster to come to my office!Except, of course, Andy was actually in the office before I arrived and he would have been justified in asking me to sign the Late Book and then sending a note home to my parents.
As I expected, Andy saw a lot of similarities between our two jobs. Whereas he is under pressure to achieve exam results, I only have to worry about the Rajar listening figures which were due out at half past five.
So we toured a few radio studios, went to a meeting with the Controller of 大象传媒 Scotland, Ken MacQuarrie and Andy sat in on our monthly creative meeting. Top of the agenda was the future of our SoundTown project. As the headmaster of our current SoundTown school, it was heartening to hear Andy talk about how the 大象传媒's work within the school had built the skills and confidence of many of his pupils. He also said there was a growing awareness of SoundTown in the local community and that many local people were still talking about the day that 90 Minutes staged an outside broadcast from the school.
Only low point of the day was when Steve Gibson arrived to take photographs for the 大象传媒 in-house newspaper, Ariel. He led us out into the street so he could use the 大象传媒 building as a backdrop. Just then a crowd of, (how shall I put it?) local ruffians (not allowed to say 'neds') arrived on the scene to shout abuse at us.
"Look at the cheezers on those guys!" was among the less colourful banter we heard being bandied in our direction.
I'm assuming they were remarking upon the charming smiles we were wearing for the camera.
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- Jeff Zycinski, Head of Radio at 大象传媒 Scotland, on the highs and lows of his work/life balancing act.
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