So there’s the question….

How do you do a happy perky morning radio show when others are suffering in a very public fashion close at hand?

It was a weird one to start with – Ruth and I had been asked to do an extra hour on Thursday morning as Gerry had taken sick first thing and all of the usual potential replacements were unavailable. We’d chosen to take a fairly big chance and actually try to present a talk-style format instead of the easy option of playing lots of music back to back. Bit of adventure never hurt anyone is our unofficial motto 🙂

Most fun ever by the way… I’ve always wanted to do talk radio but never had the chance (one night presenting the Fanning Show earlier in the year was the closest I’ve ever come!) so to actually do it (loads of time to chat about the newspapers, an item and interview about the world kissing record contest etc etc and the hour was almost over) was a huge adrenalin rush for both of us even after having been on air for four hours at that stage. Not a problem 🙂

It was just after we came off though however that the first news filtered through on the “always tuned to Sky News” tv upstairs in the office that there was something amiss on the London Transport network. It’s all been rehashed in every media outlet extensively so there’s no point in adding to it here save to say that I can put all of my personal politics aside here and confidently say that an eye for an eye leaves all the world blind.

Innocent people on their way to work or wherever are never legitimate targets… ever.

The immediacy of the media coverage (the photos and videos taken by camera phones in the trains in particular) only added to the sinking feeling in my stomach yesterday and the horror at what those affected went through. It was always at the back of my mind throughout today’s show.

Omagh was a Saturday so I wasn’t on air that day but I was on the night of September 11th and trying to get some sort of tone right in the aftermath of something like this (particularly when your own feelings are involved) is always one of the most challenging things to do for a presenter…

It palls into insignificance in the shadow of those suffering from Thursday and those who worked in the emergency services there but…. Actually there is no but.

R

PS My longtime mentor (and he will be embarassed to be called that as he’s the same age as me!) Liam T has a similar meditation on the same subject on his blog CLICK HERE