Not even goldfish

Love-life issues aside (they're too interesting to get into at the moment: it would take over my blog), tomorrow I find out whether or not I am through to the next round of Hertbeat Apprentice, and on Tuesday - at some time between 6 and 9am - I have to do something on air to celebrate National Bike Week (apparently bikes get their own week too, these days. When I was working in PR, it was a well known fact that there are at least three allocated concepts/brands for every day in the year: it's the most obvious way to try and get free promotion).

6 and 9am. It's not a time I'm used to, to be honest. I've been out of solid work for nearly a year now, and so the hours of 6am until 9am in the morning have become a distant memory: much like not seeing a '-' sign before my bank balance. That's issue number one. Issue number two is that I'm working at 9am that day, so whatever I plan to do is going to have to fall in the earlier slots. Issue number three is that I am ridiculously unfit, and issue number four is: every time I get on a bike, I manage to fall off it. 

It doesn't bode well. If I get to Tuesday - and am not 'sacked' for my desperate bribery jam-tart attempts - I fear that lying in the middle of the road and being hit by the number 36 bus might hamper my employment opportunities, whether on radio or not. And it's what will happen: mark my words. After ten minutes of huffing and puffing and swearing up a hill, the blood will rush to my head (probably when I'm sitting on a bench with my face clamped between my knees) and I'll end up lying with my face against the tarmac. Which is - I suppose - entertaining for listeners, even if it means that Raleigh won't be sponsoring my travel efforts at any stage in the near future.

So, I've decided that if I'm going to humiliate myself (again), I might as well do it properly (again). I'm going to do a lap of Hatfield before work, which is roughly 7 miles. It takes 40 minutes, apparently, so I'll start at 6.00am and just hope - desperately - that I'm finished by the time my typing shift starts at 9. And I'll chat to the radio at intervals throughout: if I can breathe, obviously.

Holly, my friend emailed me on Friday evening. What's this radio thing? What the hell are you doing this time?? Are you turning into one of those little old ladies who enters every competition and crossword puzzle in the newspapers in the hope of winning something?

I growled at the screen, made a face he couldn't see and then typed back:

Cheeky sod. All the things I'm going for you have to win on the back of ability, you know.

There was a half an hour gap, and then my friend sent:

And what's the next task?

Biking around Hatfield, I wrote sulkily.

Mmm, yeah. Can see your point, he replied. Lots of skill needed for that one.

Sod off, I replied, but point acknowledged. 

You're turning into Bridget Jones, you know that? he said. But with smaller knickers.

Mmm, I replied, thinking: not much, mate. Not much.

I simply don't care anymore. I never won a raffle when I was a kid: not a goldfish, not a teddy bear, not a chipped porcelain plate donated by the vicar's wife. Nada. I won nothing. So even if one day I end up with a branded t-shirt from all of my endeavours, I think I'll be pretty chuffed with myself. There are different kinds of winning, after all.