A good face for radio

It's true.  I do have a good face for radio.  This morning my voice (well I think it was my voice because you never sound the same as you do to yourself) was on Radio 4.
Listen here :The Kitchen Cabinet from Maldon

The Kitchen Cabinet programme was recorded in Maldon last Tuesday evening and my friend managed to get free tickets to go.  She said, "You've got to think of a question."  and because I'm a compliant goody-goody  I did.  My insecure childish brain said, "You'd better think of a good one, she's only invited you to ask a question, she wouldn't have invited you otherwise."

I have been on the radio before.  When I was a teenager I used to write (under pseudonym) to Terry Wogan and the Hairy Eyeball Show and my letters were read out.  I liked to write about things that I thought would make people laugh (nothing much has changed) and then our Young Enterprise group (do they still do Young Enterprise?) were on local radio to promote our business.  We made wooden toy blocks, which wasn't very exciting or original but we were 6th formers who had to do something.  When we were there they asked us if we'd brought them with us and I said, "No, it's radio, no one can see them!"  The presenter was quite put out and insisted that he hadn't got to the level he had without being able to describe a boring wooden block.  With these things in mind I devised my question.

There is nothing that makes people laugh more than ginormous veg, especially if it is oddly shaped or has the potential for innuendo. I've had a good year for beetroot and despite eating beetroot every day since June they are still going and getting quite large.  So I dug up one of the biggest, put it in a bag and took it with me.

A bag of beetroot

When we got there we were given a questionnaire to complete about what food we eat with the rolling autumnal mists (or something) and a sheet to write questions on.  I was beginning to think that the whole asking a question thing might be a bad idea.  Did I really want to be on this programme?  I looked at my friend and thought, "that's why she brought you, don't be such a wimp." I was encouraged by the fact that lots of people wrote questions and that at the bottom of the form it said that they would be taking questions on salt, oysters and whitebait.  I told myself that it was fine, my question wouldn't be chosen, so I wrote it down.

Ginormous Veg Question

Just before the show started the production team came out and told us that when Jay Rayner (the host of the show) came out he would call out the people whose questions had been chosen, who would then have to sit at the front on the reserved seating for the recording of the show.  After five people were called out I relaxed, then someone was called out that had a similar name to mine.  Julie.  Who was this Julie?  Oh, it was me.  I shouldn't have been surprised, no one ever gets my name right.

So, I sat at the front, Julie-no-mates, trembling and fretting, while my friends sat together enjoying the show.  I did have a good view and could actually witness the woman who was forced to eat a raw oyster retching but I'm not sure I listened very well to everything else. I had to wait for almost everyone else to ask their question first.  By the time the furry thing was shoved under my nose and I had to read out my question I was a sweaty mess.  "Would you like to see it?" I teased.

Punk Baby's Head Beetroot.

 "My, that's a big one!" they replied.  When the show was over people were having their photos taken with the presenters.  "Shall I take yours?" my friend asked, "It would be good for your blog." I couldn't wait to leave and learn how to breathe again.

Over the last few days I have worried about how it would sound, secretly hoping that my question would get cut but also worrying that it would be cut because my voice is just too awful for radio.  This morning I had the radio on in the kitchen, as usual and the first person to ask a question was me.  I sounded as shocked to have been asked the first question as I was to hear my voice coming out of the radio.  I knew that there was a possibility that I wouldn't be cut but it never occurred to me that they'd edit it to put my question first.  I still didn't listen and so still don't know what to do with my enormous 'baby punk head' beetroot but as I didn't really want to know the answer as it's not my last beetroot and couldn't care less if I make it special or just boil it and eat it with spinach and goats cheese as usual it doesn't matter.  I've never believed that you should let the truth stand in the way of a good story (luckily this is something that my would-be-journalist daughter gets very irritated by).

People have commented that I sounded posh, that hearing my voice was distracting and my son said, "I'm glad I was in the kitchen then, that's the funniest thing I've heard in ages."  The trouble is, I don't think he meant that I'd thought of a funny, witty question, just that hearing his mother on the radio was odd.