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This morning started like any other day. It’s the school holidays, so my teacher husband is off work. I woke to his snoring and the snuffling sounds of my three year old starting to come to.

A hurried dab of make-up (and dodging my daughter’s helpful fingers) later and I was dressed, making breakfast and slurping a cup of tea. And then I was out of the door, on my way to appear on BBC Radio 4′s Woman’s Hour, as you do.

My main concern about the whole thing was finding the unfamiliar BBC studios, 40 odd minutes from where we now live.

With my nose practically touching the car windscreen and my sat-nav turned up full blast, I focused on not getting lost. Not getting lost is a big priority when you’re the kind of person who gets lost regularly, even just going to the local shop. 

Amazingly, I made it to the studios without one wrong turn, but then realised I was embarrassingly early. Attempting to style it out, I moseyed on into the reception where I confidently told the lady I was booked for a slot that morning.

It was only when I looked above her head that I realised she was the receptionist for a chiropractic clinic in the same building. So much for cool. Sitting down, I then noticed my shirt had come unbuttoned to reveal my bright pink bra. Nice.

I sat around for a good half an hour, reading magazines and drinking tea (blissful – I highly recommend getting booked for Woman’s Hour even if it’s just for the excuse to sit down for 30 minutes). Once I was shown into the studio, I was left alone for another 15 minutes.

Snapshots from the studio

I was linking up live via ISDN (spot the radio geek) to London, so once the engineer had shown me through to the padded room studio I just sat and twiddled my thumbs for a bit, listening to the soothing tones of Radio 4. I imagined my boisterous diva throwing a tantrum at home, while my frazzled husband wished for the beginning of the school term so he could go back to work. I smiled.

And then I was on. It was all very quick. And fun – very fun. Despite being on the radio every day up until recently, I haven’t lost my enthusiasm for the medium. Plus, it’s Woman’s Hour, you know?

I think it went OK. I had enough texts and tweets afterwards to tell me I managed to speak English and put my words in the right order anyway. Plus (as one of my friends pointed out) I got a mention in for wine pre-11am, which surely wins me some kudos?

Anyway, if you’d like a listen then it’s on iPlayer – 13th August with the wonderful Jenni Murray. I was talking about camping, alongside Pheobe Smith editor of Wanderlust travel magazine and author of Extreme Sleeps: Adventures of a Wild Camper).

We discussed the merits of wild vs mild camping. I was in the wild camping camp, obviously. JOKES. Of course I wasn’t. Pillows and a toilet block all the way for me, thank you very much.