I still enjoy Today, but I hate the newsroom-speak. "The government is set to announce its policy on . . ." Nobody actually speaks like that. What's wrong with "about to"?
Just about the only comforting thought at this time of the year, mitigating our general feeling of wintry gloom, is that: a) the shortest day is behind us and b) it's perfectly OK to feel low, because lots of others do, too. The latest confirmation of what we used to called seasonal affective disorder, and now call winter blues, came a couple of weeks ago from the mental health charity Mind, which told us that at least 50 per cent of us are sufferers.
Just before Christmas, I cheered myself up by taking the Piccadilly Line as far north as it goes - to Cockfosters, via stations like Bounds Green and Arnos Grove, which before had been only exotic names on my London Tube map. Finally emerging just after noon on a dank December day, and uncertain of my exact route, I asked the man at the ticket booth if he knew where the Chicken Shed Theatre was. Of course he did - turn left, past the shops, cross over the roundabout and keep going - you can't miss it. It's an encouraging sign if the ticket man knows where the local kids' theatre is. And the Chicken Shed Theatre - founded almost 30 years ago - is a remarkable enterprise. They put on shows all through the year but their Christmas panto, which continues into January, is special. Around one in five of the children on stage is handicapped in some way - "special needs" is the modern phrase - but they blend in by taking part and seem to be having the time of their lives. Some are in wheelchairs and get bowled along by other young members of the cast. This year's show, The Nutcracker and the Mouse King, is as noisy, colourful, tuneful as its predecessors, and the local audience, mostly school kids, joined in and gave the whole thing their loud approval. After some of the slicker and certainly ruder offerings down in the West End, this was traditional panto at its delightful best.
Longer, darker mornings give former Today presenters a delicious chance to stay in bed until a more decent hour. Which means I regularly enjoy listening to my old programme from a less-than-vertical position. I still miss it madly, though not the dreadful pre-dawn reveille. I love the ding-dongs with politicians, grouch at my radio when they won't answer the question and grump even more loudly when someone's not allowed to finish a sentence. I still can't fathom what the weather's going to be like after listening really hard to each forecast, and I'm maddened by "newsroom-speak" in the bulletins: "The government is set to announce its new policy on . . ." or "Fifteen thousand Scottish homes are set to regain water". What's wrong with "about to" or "expected to"? Nobody actually speaks like that, as one of my old bosses used to remind me when I was a junior reporter, ticking me off for some verbal infelicity in a script. He'd be revolving in his grave listening to some of what still gets by eagle-eyed editors.
Still, those beefs aside, Today sounds in good nick and has been having fun with its "One In, One Out" poll. My own choices, for what they're worth, would have been for Robert Mugabe to come here (so that he can stop his ruinous policies in Zimbabwe) and for Harry Potter to emigrate. No disrespect to J K Rowling, but enough already of the ubiquitous whizz-kid.
The universities are churning out graduates with useless degrees, we're told, and you can't get a plumber. A well-qualified plumber can earn a lot of money these days: considerably more than many a qualified media studies graduate, but not enough people want to go through the hassle of a long apprenticeship. And women doing the job are rare. Andy, my plumber, rescuing me from a cold radiator on Christmas Eve, told me he'd seen only one woman plumber in 20 years' experience. But maybe the pendulum's begun to swing. At the prize-giving ceremony at one of our most academically successful girls' schools the other day, I met a young woman who's rejected the university place to which her starred A-levels entitled her so that she can become a plumber instead. She's doing the proper apprenticeship. She gets some funny looks, she says, when the lads notice she's reading a contemporary history of the Roman Caesars in her lunch break, but she enjoys the work. I can promise her that when she's fully qualified, those of us battling with other people's botched jobs (no, Andy, I am not referring to you, I promise) will keep her in work for as long as she likes.
Trying to find the next British city to be awarded the title European Capital of Culture (Glasgow was the last, in 1990) was one of my most pleasurable tasks of last year. We're still deciding: the winner won't be announced till the early summer. One of my personal beauty tests for any city is how good it looks at night. Paris is hard to beat, but London (not an entry for the culture title) is threatening to overtake it. The other evening, I finally got round to a trip on the London Eye on the South Bank. A couple of dozen of us filled up a pod after dark and spent a magical half-hour oohing and aahing at the majesty of the floodlit city. It felt as if we were suspended in a gently hovering spaceship. Even Norman Foster's Erotic Gherkin took on a pleasantly festive green glow, viewed from 300 feet up. A perfect time-stopping vantage point, somehow, before the reality of a nervous New Year kicked in. Have a happy one, if you can.
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