You know, the one that Michael Moseley investigated for a recent episode of Horizon? It's meant to be incredibly good for you, reducing cholesterol, extending your life, losing you weight and generally increasing your health. Some call it 'intermittent fasting', others the 5:2 diet - whatever it's called the basic principle is the same. On your 'fast' days you eat only 500 calories if you're a girl, 600 if you're a man, but at least you know the next day, you can eat totally normally. (Because the two fast days do not have to be consecutive)

Michael Moseley told me today that his fast days were Mondays and Thursdays - and he recommended doing with a 'dieting buddy'. So me and Producer John are teaming up to do it together - from this week. He's already on his second fast day - this is my first. Then we can eat normally over the weekend, and keep each other going through Monday together.

I reckon I can do it. Surely any of us can stick to a mere 500 calories one day, at least if you know you don't have to do it the following day...

So instead of my usual 'sins' this morning (a bag of crisps and often a chocolate biscuit, too) I've brought in, and been munching quite happily, a box of carrots and a banana. Producer John is saving his calories for a big pile of broccoli later on, as he's already had three scrambled eggs on a piece of toast for breakfast!

Join in with us if you like. I'll keep you posted every week to tell you how we're doing. And if you need to know more, you may still be able to watch clips of that Horizon online plus Michael Moseley has even written a book about it.

Good luck to us all. Munch munch.

I remember meeting him way back when. I met him, not because I was doing a serious political interview, but because he was with his wife Mary, who was quite a character in her own right, and I was chatting to her for tv!

Back at the turn of the 1970s, Mary Wilson was not only married to the Leader of the Labour Party, but was also one of the best-selling poets in the country, up there with the likes of Marc Bolan and Bob Dylan. She was a bit of a Pam Ayres of her day, if you like - and was a bestseller. Her 1970 book, "Selected Poems" sold an extraordinary 75,000 copies (now out of print). I even remember reciting one at school - this example which I thought was pretty cool at the time:

After the Bomb After the Bomb had fallen, After the last sad cry When the Earth was a burnt-out cinder Drifting across the sky,

Came Lucifer, Son of the Morning,
With his fallen-angel band,
Silent and swift as a vulture
On a mountain-top to stand.

And he looked, as he stood on the mountain
With his scarlet wings unfurled,
At the charnel-house of London
And the cities of the world.

And he laughed..........

And as that mocking laughter
Across the heavens ran,
He cried 'Look!' to the fallen angels -
'This is the work of Man
Who was made in the image of God!'

Now I can only look at properties with an extra living room, playroom or (heated) conservatory because I need space for my layout - and I have learned over the past few months that I don't like to be stuck out in the cold, in an empty garage, or draughty attic. I am a warm-weather railway modeller. I need to sit on my bar stool (that's the right height for modelling) in homely comfort, with central heating, plasma TV and internet connectability.

I saw a house the other day with an 'orangery' which I thought sounded just right - but it turned out to be a cold conservatory!

My model railway has totally changed my idea of the ultimate des res.

A real challenge for local estate agents!

Apparently it all started as a bit of a throwaway comment from a spokesman for the Environment Agency - that compacted, heaped-up snow melts more slowly than even-lying snow, like when you build a snowman!

Then suddenly the Agency found that all the newspapers had picked up on that line and turned it into "Save Britain from Flooding and Build A Snowman".

Their official line: "While building snowmen is great fun, sadly it is unlikely to make a significant difference to the overall rate at which the snow melts across the country and won't protect your home from flooding..."

Well, yes, we get that. But is it true that it could help?

Well, I had to know. So I found me a snow physicist - yes there is one at the University of Reading, Mel Sandells.

She said said while there was some "logic" to the agency's advice it would only work for a "very short time". "It comes down to the rate of heat transfer and energy that can pass through air bubbles in the snow. The more compact they are the slower the snow will thaw but really as long as heat is coming from the sun and the temperature is well above freezing the thawing process will be undeterred."

So now you can make up your own mind.

It seems that Britain has been reeling in shock and disgust today at the revelation that there's been horsemeat in some of a top supermarket's "Value" beefburgers.

Of course that's bad - because meat sold as beef should be nothing but.

But, speaking as a veggie, I do wonder why everyone's so up tight about eating horse. If you're a carnivore, why is it any different really from eating beef, lamb or pork.
Stick to veggies, I say. When you look at an asparagus, you know exactly what it is.