Rosalind Gibb

Last updated 11:47, Thursday, 02 October 2008

Who decided that the best way to wake up in the mornings is to have someone chattering away to you incessantly, making little or no sense, and using phrases like “quite literally” when it’s obviously nothing of the sort?

My MP3 player died recently, and I really missed listening to music, particularly on the train or walking to work.

I discovered my mobile phone has a radio so tried it out but soon wished I hadn’t.

As I kept retuning to try and get something to listen to, I realised breakfast radio consists of a ratio of one song to about 10 minutes of chat, about nothing and no-one, and of DJs trying hard to be off the wall but only succeeding in being irritating.

I had the misfortune to hear Chris Moyles on Radio One, banging on about something or other, I can’t remember what, then being humoured by pop star extraordinaire Rihanna, who must have been desperate for it to end.

Talk radio can be brilliant. Radio Four is often worth tuning into, then there is the BBC World Service, especially Outlook, which celebrates the weird and wonderful on this planet. The other night I couldn’t get to sleep, so tuned in. Who should be on but Sean Shannon, who’s just got into the Guinness Book of Records for being the fastest talker in the world, and he even recited Hamlet’s soliloquy to prove it, using around 12 words per second compared to an average of three. Now it’s not every day you hear that.

A mixture of talk and music is also great, when it works. Radcliffe and Maconie on Radio Two is a gem of a programme: fantastic music and warm repartee, a pleasure to listen to.

But I just can’t take any more of listening to pointless, inane chatter, not first thing in the morning. My walk to work will have to be to the tune of all those cars and lorries zooming along Victoria Viaduct instead.