Ö÷²¥´óÐã

It's been one of those weeks when I feel as if I'm on some kind of 'round-Scotland charity event. In the space of three days I've been from Inverness to Glasgow then Edinburgh then Aberdeen and now I'm on the train and heading back to Glasgow again. Tomorrow afternoon I finally return home to Inverness and I expect the dog will go for my throat thinking I'm a stranger breaking and entering.

Team Briefings, you see. Part of the all-important communication process for a radio station where the production teams are spread across the country. It's a chance to review recent programmes and to share information about future plans. Yes I could do this with conference calls and video links, but I know that the staff like to see me in the flesh and confirm who has won the monthly bet about my weight-gain. I also invite the programme makers to ask me questions and that always throws up some surprises

In Edinburgh this morning, for example, we were reviewing the recent week of Adventures on the M8. Audience feedback has been very positive, the special website was incredibly popular but still, it seems, one vital question was left unanswered:

"Did we ever discover where salt 'n' sauce ends and where salt 'n' vinegar begins?"

To those of you unfamiliar with Scottish culture I should explain that this relates to the purchase of fish 'n' chips (or fish suppers) and is designed to seek information about the customer's preferred choice of condiments. Generally speaking salt n' vinegar is offered in the west and salt 'n' sauce in the east.

But where exactly is the dividing line? Perhaps you can help. Perhaps not.
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Meanwhile, in Aberdeen this afternoon, I was told that the people of the Granite City are firmly in the vinegar camp. The Team Briefing there, however, threatened to turn ugly when one brave soul vouchsafed the view that most gardeners are female and that female gardeners are most interested in growing flowers while men grow "useful" stuff like food. Outright violence was only avoided by the timely arrival of United Nations peacekeepers. Or maybe I just imagined that.

Finally - and just to prove that Ö÷²¥´óÐã senior management in Glasgow are not immune from such bizarre curiosity - I must tell you about a debate that emerged during a gathering of my senior colleagues last night. Somehow the conversation turned to the subject of those huge flat-screen television sets and what you call the room where you sit and watch the telly. The sitting room? The living room? The main room? The TV room?

I, of course, attempted to rise above the herd and declared that I didn't own such a vulgar device and that I have a radio in every room.

You could almost hear a jaw drop.

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• - What's this?

Here's a little story - a parable, if you like - which should serve as a warning to all eager young journalists. Let me cut to the chase.

The other morning I found myself at Stirling railway station. I was running along the platform at a speed guaranteed to spread fear and alarm among the waiting passengers. My face was bright red and my jacket was flapping in the wind like a loose mainsail on the Cutty Sark. I wasn't even trying to catch a train. I was, rather, trying to get in front of the train so that I could take a photograph of the shattered windscreen. The windscreen had been smashed by vandals the night before and I had been informed of this fact after boarding at Inverness.

"Apologies to passengers, " the guard had told us, "but anyone heading for King's Cross will have to change trains at Edinburgh. That's because the windscreen was damaged last night by vandals."

See, told you so.

I thought about this annoucement and it began to irk me. Why was it, I wondered, that the train was deemed safe to travel from Inverness to Edinbugh, but not safe to take people south of there to London? I imagined the driver peering through the cracked glass trying to make out the stations at Aviemore and Perth. Suppose a cow wandered on to the line. Might not the driver mistake it for a walking jigsaw puzzle? It sounded, to me, like a possible news story...if only I could get a photograph of the damage.

Regular blog readers will be aware that I carry my camera at all times. Also, I was due to change trains at Stirling en route to Glasgow. The trouble was, I was carrying my bulky laptop bag and trundling my wheely suitcase. Now we all know we're not allowed to leave luggage unattended on the platform, so how could I get to the front of the train in time to take the snap? I could have made my way through five carriages but that felt like an obstacle course of sliding doors and wandering infants.

As luck would have it, just as the train neared Stirling, I met a colleague from Inverness who had obviously been hiding from me until that point. Probably in an overhead luggage rack. As I stepped off the train I asked her to watch my bags and then I began my terrorising sprint up the platform. I got to the front of the train. I took a photograph and then another and then...and then I realised that the window was perfectly intact.

Perplexed, I sauntered back towards my colleague, tucking my shirt back into my trousers and ignoring the weird glances from people around me.

"Strange, " I said, "I couldn't see any damage."

"I know why, " said my colleague, "it's probably the windscreen on the back of the train that's been smashed. They'll be pulling that engine unit to Edinburgh just to be safe."

She was right. Just then the train whizzed past and sure enough there was the shattered windscreen at the rear.

And did I have my camera ready? Was there even a story? No and no again.

So what is the moral of this tale? What lesson does it offer to young journalists?

Well, it's always worth chasing the story but sometimes you have to accept that it simply doesn't exist.

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• - What's this?

I suppose it's only a matter of time before the top brass at the Ö÷²¥´óÐã discover that I'm having far too much fun in this job. The official warning is long overdue and any day now a uniformed security guard will over-power me at the front door, strip me of my identity card and disarm me of my BlackBerry. When that day comes I will regret all those missed opportunities I had to wander into radio studios and listen to fabulous live music.

No regrets tonight, however, because I joined a small and select audience in Studio 1 at Pacific Quay and watched a very fine ensemble of Scottish, Irish and American musicians. It was a live session for Mary Ann Kennedy's Global Gathering programme. The musicians are on tour as part of the Scottish Arts Council's Tune Up project and play under the banner of .

It really was a wonderful blend of tunes from the Old World and the New and each of the seven musicians (Kris Drever, Eamonn Coyne,Sarah McFadyen,Tim Matthew,Betse Ellis,Caleb Calder and Sammy Lind) took it in turn to introduce a piece and explain the story behind the music.

I also got the chance to meet some of them before and after the event and was particularly taken with Betse who, as an American, seems to have fallen in love with Scotland and told me she will have paid three visits here before the end of the year.

On the way out of the building I was still humming the melodies and clicking my fingers to the beat. The security guard gave me a wry smile.

He must know something I don't know.

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• - What's this?

Last week, before most of us had ever heard of swine flu, a team of experts arrived at Pacific Quay to help us take the temperature of Scotland. These were not, I hasten to add, men and women in decontamination suits. They were audience research bods who have already been working with Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 2 and, well, if you look at the success of that station you can see why I'm keen to tap into their know-how.

For this first meeting they had asked me and the station editors to come along with an object which we thought might represent contemporary Scotland. I considered turning up with a packet of shortbread or a tin of haggis. I could have made a legitimate case for both, but decided this was no time for irony. Instead I brought along a copy of the Grand Theft Auto game for the Playstation 3. This, I explained, was indicative of the multi-million pound games software industry in Dundee but also said something about our fascination with crime. A colleague came carrying a huge cardboard cut-out of our tennis champion Andy Murray. Reversing it he showed us a typical street ned wearing a hoodie and carrying a can of lager.

As the meeting progressed, a pattern began to emerge. Every story seemed to have two sides . We talked a lot about Scottish success stories but I'm afraid alcohol and crime were never far from our thoughts. The experts - mainly London-based - expressed surprise at the tone of our discussion. They suggested there was something very Scottish in the way that we seemed to care so much about the flip-side of society and pointed out how often we used the word 'we' instead of 'them'.

I wondered aloud if that was just the mind-set of bleeding heart media types but the experts assured me that our thinking was different from the media folk they has worked with elsewhere.

A few days later I decided to take the experiment a little further. I went onto Facebook and Twitter to ask the same question of my 159 "friends" and 57 "followers". I got about 25 responses and and here's a selection:

Susan Boyle, introspection & random violence, cappucino culture by day and mass drunkenness by night, neds & buckfast, David Tennant & GlasVegas, salt or sauce, STV & Weightwatchers, Celtic & Rangers, Music & Football, the Titian in the National Gallery of Scotland & Big Issue sellers on the street.

So let me extend the challenge to blog readers. Name two things that define contemporary Scotland. Anyone for swine flu?

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• - What's this?

A few weeks ago on this very blog I broke some disappointing news about my friend and colleague Gareth Hydes. He had, I discovered, decided to cut back on the pies and pinot noir so that he could train for the London Marathon.

I'm happy to report that his period of self-denial is at an end and he plans to rejoin the ranks of the chronically unhealthy just as soon as he can persuade his legs to carry him to the kebab shop.

Oh...and he also completed the Marathon (his first ever) in a time of 4 hrs and 27 minutes and and raised £2347 for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Children in Need. Apparently some of that cash came from blog readers who completely missed the point of my original entry.

Gareth can be quoted as saying: "Just wanted to say a massive "thank you" for all your support and generosity which helped me round the London Marathon course yesterday.

I managed the route in 4hr 27 mins - with no after effects except a couple of very stiff legs this morning! It was a terrific day, and thank you to everybody who turned up to support."

Let's hope he doesn't plan to run in New York.

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• - What's this?

Colleagues still tease me about the "inspirational" speech I once gave to a group of production trainees on their very first day at Ö÷²¥´óÐã Scotland. No sooner were they in the door than I appeared to be telling them to sling their hook. Of course that story has been taken out of context and I would like to put the record straight. I would also like to direct this blog posting to the hundreds of media students who, at this time of year, are entering the last few weeks of their college and university courses. I've heard from a few who would dearly love to work for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland...others are just hoping to find any work at all.

I have some advice, but first let me get back to that story about the production trainees.

I know it was November the fifth, but I forget which year. Probably 1998. The six trainees had been chosen from about five hundred applicants and after a rigorous selection process involving written submissions, interviews and role-playing. We'd chosen six people with very different personalities and skills because we wanted to place them in different departments. The main thing we were looking for was evidence of a creative imagination - the ability to come up with ideas day after day.

At the time, I was becoming frustrated by the kind of people who took their jobs for granted and had simply stopped trying to impress. You find those people in any organisation. The people who are always looking for something to moan about and who mock anyone around them who shows any kind of energy. At that time, as a relative newcomer to the Ö÷²¥´óÐã, I was, frankly, appalled by anyone who didn't think working for the Corporation was an absolute privilege. Compared to some of the other places I'd worked, the Ö÷²¥´óÐã was sheer paradise. I still think that.

So, with this in mind, I launched into my 'welcome' speech to the new trainees. I'm sure I told them about all the opportunities that would be open to them and I'm sure I talked about radio as being fun as well as being hard work. I can't swear to it, but I think I was even smiling.

Unfortunately, some of my senior colleagues arrived a little late and walked through the door just as a frown settled on my forehead and I was warning the new recruits about the dangers of contagious cynicism.

"Don't stay here until you are bitter and twisted, "I said, "If you don't like it here then please leave. For your own sake as well as ours. Just leave and find something else."

I now accept that might be seen as an unusual way of welcoming new employees. It's still true, though.

As for my advice to the students:

1. Get as much relevant experience as possible and that might include working in hospital or community radio, launching your own podcast, student newspapers, blogs etc.

2. Knock on as many doors as possible. There's a lot more to the Ö÷²¥´óÐã than its newsrooms, for example, so think about the arts programmes, comedy, religion, sport and so on.

3. Tell us what you can offer that no one else can. Perhaps you have a particular hobby or enthusiasm or have experience of a particular country, community or language. Turn that knowledge into potential programme ideas or news stories.

4. Make contact with people who can offer you advice or work. It shows gumption if you phone up and ask for a meeting. Personally, I'll meet with anyone if they buy the tea but I set the hounds on stalkers.

5. Do unpaid or voluntary work if you think it's helping you build skills, but not to the point where you feel you are being exploited.

6. Be flexible. I started working for the Ö÷²¥´óÐã in Selkirk which meant moving from Glasgow. I seem to have been moving around Scotland ever since.

Finally, a word about that period when you leave college or university and haven't yet found a job. I know from speaking to many former students that this is the point where misery can kick in and where self confidence ebbs away. That's when you should look for opportunities to stay connected with the industry in some shape or form. Many Ö÷²¥´óÐã producers began their careers as runners for our Edinburgh Festival programmes...other sat at home writing sketches for our comedy shows. Eventually they got noticed.

Oh, and if you do end up at the Ö÷²¥´óÐã but don't like it here....well, you know what to do.

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• - What's this?

Tonight I found myself on the roof of the Ö÷²¥´óÐã H.Q. in Glasgow talking to a woman about infidelity. Well, the rooftop restaurant actually and the woman in question was my old friend Thea Newcomb, the founder of the incredibly popular website.

Thea has been running that website for almost ten years now and it was interesting to hear her describe how social networking sites such as Facebook and are contributing to the break-up of relationships as well as providing the opportunity to start new ones. It seems that online friendships are now so easy to start and, in some cases, one thing leads to another and people decide to ditch their existing life in the hope of finding something better. To be fair, sometimes they actually do!

Meanwhile Thea's movie based on her website is nearing completion and might see the light of day at a major international film festival later this year. Anticipating her future fame, I asked her to add me to her Twitter network and I promised to do the same.

We pulled out our BlackBerrys and thumbed away at a few keys until we both realised we had no idea how to do that.

That must count as a 21st Century faux pas.

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• - What's this?

Our week of programmes centred on the M8 has prompted an e-mail from Simon Aston who tells me how he and some friends took matters into their own hands to clean up one particular motorway eyesore. Simon is a member of the resurrected Livingston Round Table which he describes as "a social club with a social conscience and aims to make a positive difference to the local community".

Earlier this month they cleaned up the 'Welcome to Livingston' sign just off the westbound carriageway of the M8. It had become a bit grotty, blackened with exhaust emissions and generally weather-beaten. The clean-up operation had to be supervised by the local police who gave them permission to park their van on the hard shoulder.

During the transformation process - which you can see on the attached YouTube video - they got toots of encouragement from passing motorists.

Simon tells me the video has already had more than 152 hits (at time of writing) which, in a classic understatement he says is "not quite Susan Boyle...but we are trying".

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• - What's this?

The weekend of our Adventures on the M8 could best be described as Why on earth would Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland be devoting a week of programming to such an unpopular road? The Sunday Express, on the other hand, went to the other extreme by suggesting that this was a motorway that we should learn to love. That was my fault. I was being interviewed by their reporter and I got carried away when he started drawing parallels between the M8 and America's famous Route 66.

Reaction from listeners has also been interesting. John Thomson - a former colleague who now teaches journalism and writes a - told me how much he had enjoyed the weekend edition of Out of Doors because he felt he could walk outside and see what what the presenters were talking about.

Today I've been listening MacAulay & Co reporter Richard Cadey as he begins his walk across the Central Belt and comedian Susan Morrison took the slip road to Whitburn for her programme The Woman In the Middle of the Motorway. On the Book Cafe we've heard central belt commuters talk about the books they read on the train journey between Edinburgh and Glasgow and there's more to come with a special road-trip edition of Get It On tonight.

Oh and please have a look at the special Adventures on the M8 website which contains lots of archive material, facts and figures and specially produced videos including a behind-the-scenes interview with Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland's travel presenter Debbie Oates.

Two and a half million people live within striking distance of the M8 and a great many of them live in the towns and villages outside or between Glasgow and Edinburgh. Millions of people, hundreds of places, and thousands of stories.

That's what this adventure is all about.

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• - What's this?

So, this week, I finally got to grips with Yes, I know, I'm way behind everyone else on this but I've always been a Johnny-Come-Lately with this social media stuff. I was just finding my way around when everyone else moved on to . Now all the cool kids are on Twitter...or at least they were until I arrived. I feel like I keep turning up at parties just as things are winding down and am left sipping from lukewarm cans of lager with cigarette ends floating to the surface. Metaphorically.

This week I also found my way to which is a great site if you're interested in following the work of individual reporters or looking for the latest articles on particular subjects. Hey, even this blog gets included, but there's lots of good reading there too.

Here at Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland our production teams are keen to connect with audiences using every nook and cranny of the internet. We have a couple of workshops lined up so that we can find out more about the possibilities and the pitfalls. That's why I signed up to Twitter and have been sending out tweet after tweet. I want the staff to think I know what I'm talking about. For a change.

If none of this makes much sense I should explain that Twitter is a micro-blogging site where you update your status using no more than 140 characters. You can imagine that's quite a challenge for a wittering windbag like me.

If, however, you want to "follow me" or have me "follow you" then I'm @jeffzycinski.

See you there.

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• - What's this?

Having finally exhausted the hospitality of family and friends, I woke up in a hotel room in Glasgow this morning, peered out of the window and discovered that the whole building was surrounded by police. There were officers on horseback, on bikes, in speedboats and on foot. Some of them even had guns.

Well, naturally, I began a mental inventory of my past crimes; overdue library books, littering without due care and attention and, of course, driving while under the influence of Annie McGuire.

You're way ahead of me, no doubt, and have realised that I was staying in a hotel on the banks of the Clyde not a stone's throw from where the British Cabinet were having their first since nineteen oatcake or some such thing. That explains the heavy police presence but not why I had to race two constables to the breakfast buffet in order to secure the last banana.

In the afternoon I took a wander out of the office so that I could file an exclusive blog report on the clashes between police and protestors. I walked across Bell's Bridge and had a very nice chat with an unarmed WPC and we both agreed that the weather had taken a turn for the better. I'm revealing the details of that conversation because I believe it to be in the public interest.

In front of the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre there were small children stroking the police horses while Mums and Dads sat on the grass munching picnic snacks. It was all very ugly. Crumbs falling out of mouths, the lot.

Finally I took this photograph of the Prime Minister while the rest of the Press Pack were waiting from him to emerge from a side door. Those fools.

Just call me 'scoop'.

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• - What's this?

How would you describe Aberdeen to a Polish person living in Edinburgh?

"It's a bit like Dundee, only further away."

So says Billy the Dundonian bus driver who is one of the two lead characters in Love In The Bus Lane. It's a new comedy-drama written by D. C. Jackson and is part of our week-long Adventures on the M8.

It's a romance set on the bus-route between Glasgow and Edinburgh but a lot of the action takes place at Harthill Services, that well-known romantic hot-spot. Fans of 'eighties Scottish bands will enjoy the musical soundtrack from the likes of Orange Juice, Aztec Camera and The Blue Nile.

It's a great play. I've just been listening to a preview copy on CD and it had me laughing out loud on the train journey from Inverness. The dialogue is stuffed with witty one-liners and I urge you not to miss it. It will air at 1130 on Friday 24th April and will then be available on the Ö÷²¥´óÐã iPlayer.

Don't say I haven't warned you.

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• - What's this?

Our top trails producer, Ken Lindsay, has outed himself as a bit of a poet. When he first let me hear the rough version of his Adventures on the M8 promotion I'm afraid I asked him a very insulting question:

"That's great, " I said, "who wrote it?"

Now Ken, I should explain, is one of the most modest men working in the Ö÷²¥´óÐã so you can imagine the emotional backflips he must have performed before pointing to himself and telling me that he, himself, had penned this little classic.

See if you can spot the last-minute change he made from the original script to what finally made it on air:

This is the M8 crossing the nation,

Speeding commuters to their destination.

Four by Four the rich, busses for the poor,

Artics fat with ready meals, tankers plump with fuel.

Through leafy Lothian they rise, a steady climb,

The bleak fields of Shotts... and then the decline,

To blast through Glasgow on concrete stilts,

Past off-ramps to nowhere and dreams half built,

A sixty mile snake of noise and emission,

The Central Belt's sunlit sixties vision...

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• - What's this?

I'm not sure why the Grim Reaper did not call for me last night. Perhaps the credit crunch extends even to the Netherworld and the Big 'D' no longer does house calls. Perhaps soul-collecting has been outsourced to a private company and they went to the wrong street. Either way, I'm still here but if you'd seen the amount of blood in my bathroom last night you wouldn't have put money on that. It was like a scene from that CSI show. The place should have been cordoned off with yellow tape.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. I need to explain why I've been absent from this blog for so long. It all started last Sunday when Mrs Zed set off for a few days in Glasgow while I took a couple of days off work so I could spend some quality time with our two children and a collection of takeaway menus from various Inverness eateries. Oh, don't worry, we did healthy stuff too. We went down to Whin Park, for instance, and hired rowboats. Then we went to the snack bar for ice cream. Stuff like that.

Somewhere, during those days, I picked up a bit of a bug and by the time Mrs Zed returned home my nose was running so fast you could have sponsored it for charity. Then came the chesty cough and the headaches and then the fever. On Wednesday I was due to be in Glasgow but instead I was in my bed making incoherent phone calls and cancelling appointments. It was the same on Thursday and Friday. I have a vague recollection of phoning Edi Stark to congratulate her on her . I also remember speaking to Roy Templeton in our Press Office about a Government suggestion that we have quotas for the amount of Scottish music on the radio. I thought I might have imagined that last call, but no, there it was in this morning's . It all seems so hazy but you have to remember I was coming in and out of consciousness and was using drugs with a street value of seventy-nine pence (supermarket own-brand).

Last night, however, Mrs Zed had had enough of this nonsense. She reasoned that if I was well enough to talk to folk from the Ö÷²¥´óÐã then I was well enough to undertake a few light chores in the garden. Besides it was now Good Friday - a public holiday - and a traditional time for religious observance, chocolate gluttony and D.I.Y.

"The fresh air will do you good," she assured me, "now go and fix that fence."

An hour later and I was standing back to admire my handiwork while absent-mindedly loosening a rusty screw from a leftover plank of wood. That's when the screwdriver suddenly ran amok and inserted itself into the fleshy part of my palm just below my left thumb. It didn't stay there long. As I yanked it out it somehow managed to scrape across my bottom lip.

Naturally I remained calm. I walked - not ran - to the bathroom, washed my wounds and utilised so many bandages as to make an Egyptian mummy feel underdressed. Then, as one does these days, I went on the internet to investigate the so that I could lie awake until the early hours waiting for each one to manifest itself; lockjaw, blood poisoning, heart failure and death.

But, as I said, the Reaper did not come knocking. Maybe, like me, he's off the clock until Tuesday.

Maybe.

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• - What's this?

I've been trying to impress our Sportsound team with my inside knowledge of Scottish football. Most of this information is provided by my wife and son who talk to me about the game the way you might imagine a NASA scientist would talk to infants. Our Sports team talk to me like that too.

Today, however, I was convinced I had the scoop on Inverness Caledonian Thistle because Mrs Zed and Zed-son actually met the Caley Thistle manager last night. They were part of a reception for new season-ticket holders and got to hear Terry Butcher talk about his first few weeks in charge of the club and quiz him about team tactics and so on.

"All the players must wear flip-flops in the changing room," he revealed, "and are fined fifty pounds if they are caught in their bare feet."

This is a hygiene measure to prevent the spread of infection because, apparently, "a player's feet are his life."

So, today in Glasgow, I was sharing this amazing fact with key members of our sports team but no one seemed too impressed. I then went on to reveal the big secret: apparently there's a wheelie bin outside the Caley dressing room which is filled with ice after the game. Some players like to immerse themselves in it to prevent the leakage of lactic acid from their muscles.

"Just think of that, "I told our sports guys, "a whole wheelie bin full of ice."

One of our most famous presenters made the observation that some of the Scotland squad also use that technique

"But," he continued "they like to add gin, tonic and slices of lemon."

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• - What's this?

So I'm in the queue at the supermarket checkout last night and a woman starts telling me about her addiction to online bingo.

"I don't smoke or drink, " she says, "so I'm allowed my wee bit of fun."

I don't like to ask how much she spends on this wee bit of fun so, instead, I ask how much it costs her in time. She makes a face.

"Well I started playing at eleven o'clock last night and when I looked at the clock it was half past three in the morning."

She goes on to tell me how her husband had banned her from using the main home computer because he uses that for his work and he's afraid that the online bingo site will be riddled with viruses. So now she uses a laptop, or tries to, but that wont work because all registration details are linked to the big PC so she sneaks down at night to use that.

"You can win about £300, " she tells me, "but I've never won that much. I've not lost that much either so it all works out."

This is the kind of stuff you find out if you ignore everything your parents ever told you and start talking to strangers.

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• - What's this?

Yesterday, sitting at my desk in Glasgow, I was suddenly consumed by a horrible feeling of guilt and hypocrisy. It happened just as our presenter Graham Stewart walked past while giving two journalism students a tour of our Pacific Quay H.Q. I recognised both of them - and Amy Ferguson - because they'd been in the audience when I'd given a talk at Glasgow Caledonian University last month.

I recalled telling them about being curious about everything and everybody and how it was important to get out of your comfort zone as often as possible and meet new people. I'd also been banging on about this last week in Wales when I was talking to students at the Celtic Media Festival.

But then, seeing the two Amys yesterday, I wondered if I actually practised what I preached.
How many new people do I actually meet in an average week? Have I taken a long-term lease inside my own comfort zone? Are there cushions in there now?

Well, I've decided to do something about it and make it my ambition to meet at least one new person every week and to strike up conversations with strangers even at the risk of personal embarassment and possible arrest. At least one a week between now and this time next year. Fifty-two new people.

I'm off to a good start. Last night on the train to Inverness there was a woman sitting opposite me who was very particular about the slice of fruitcake she was buying from the catering trolley. She returned one piece because it had too many raisins and not enough cherries. This led to some laughter and then a lively conversation in which I discovered that both she and her husband had been made redundant from their jobs in a bank but had now found new jobs which they both enjoyed.

I wont go into too much detail, because, although we exchanged business cards, I don't have her permission to name her or write about everything she said, but her story gave me a real insight into the things that people go through when they are faced with redundancy. Something so many of our listeners are going through at this very moment.

So, one meeting down and fifty-one to go. I'll keep you posted.

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• - What's this?

Two thousand schoolchildren in Clackmananshire can now claim they've had a number one hit record. Yes, I've just received news that 'The Haggis' has hit top spot in the official Scottish chart. In case you're still confused I should explain that this song was written by teachers at Alva Academy - this year's Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland SoundTown school - and is being sold in aid of Comic Relief.

In addition to the Academy pupils, six primary schools also took part: Tillicoutry, Strathdevon, Muchart, Menstrie, Alva and Coalsnaughton.

Our SoundTown Co-ordinator, Lee-Ann Howieson, has been keeping me up to date with the sales figures and chart positions. Yesterday, for example, 'The Haggis' was number one in the official Radio 1 indie chart.

"That was ahead of Oasis, " said Lee-Ann, with a look I can only describe as chuffed.

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