So, it's New Year's Eve and I started to think back on this last year...
It's been a great year for Radio 1, some amazing events, great live sessions, superb guests and more listeners than ever. Personally, I've been lucky enough to be part of some great things this year. Covering Scott's show back in July will always stick in my mind as a big moment in 2008. It's a show I'd listened to religiously since Chris did it, and loved every second of it. Didn't think I'd get to do that this year. Radio 1 is an unpredictable place but that is what makes it so great.
The Big Weekend was an incredible event and I felt proud and priviledged to be there. Is that enough brown-nosing yet? I was able to do some great outside broadcasts in Mallorca with Judge Jules, Newquay with the Chris and the team, Plymouth recently for Karol-oke and of course the infamous show from Donnington Park service station at 4am.
And also, let's not forget about the University Tour that the bosses let me go on. Still can't believe I got away with that. Have a look back at all the bits from that amazing week.
And on a lighter note, as I was flicking back through the blog, this is perhaps my favourite because it is so stupid and something you'd only do when extrememly tired.
Have a great New Year's eve, thank you once again for reading and commenting all year, tell your friends and here's to a fun-filled 2009. Who knows what's going to happen next...
Brap brap, flash flash, welcome along etc.
Two of my comedy idols Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer will be on the show today. They'll be chatting about the revival of their incredible show 'Shooting Stars', which is on tonight on BBC2 at 10pm. Definately one to watch.
I have loads of little bits planned for them but knowing what they're like, it'll be part of the fun to not know what's going on. And it could be anarchy. In a good way.
It's possible that you don't know who they are if you're quite young, so have a little flick round You Tube to see what they're all about. For those of you who are grew up with them, you'll know what to expect. Here's a sneak preview of tonight's new show:
Me stalking Vic and Bob this afternoon. I look quite shifty (perhaps slimey). And there's the bad hair they were taking the mikey out of...
#
Have a listen again to the show here. They were on from 5-6pm and it was bizarre. Well worth a listen though!
This is now the official name for this week. Nothing really goes on, the grandparents are thinking about leaving your house, some people are back at work but their minds are only 50% there, actually maybe 30%, and you're already bored with your presents. But never fear, we at Radio 1 are still churning out the live entertainment. I'm back on today at 4pm with special guests, The Saturdays. Well, 2 of them anyway. (come on, give me a break, it's Christmas.) Kind of.
Speaking of Christmas, here's a shot from the webcam on Christmas Day when I was on air. What made me laugh about this was the rather grumpy looking Producer Neil standing up with his arms folded:
Merry Christmas from everyone's favourite grumpy Producer!

Hello all, I hope you're feeling well and that you had a great Christmas Day. Don't worry, it is OK to continue the festive celebrations for a few more days. I hate it when people say Christmas is over.
Anyway, I'm this afternoon with a load of guff and some more brill Wonder Years for you and the 'Biggest Floorfillers of 2008' from 6pm.
Here's another caption competition for you. If you're a little bit bored, try and come up with some witty caption for this beauty:

Wonder Years Tracklisting from today's show: 1993 - 2008
The Key The Secret - Urban Cookie Collective
Under The Bridge - Red Hot Chili Peppers
U Sure Do - Strike
Don't Stop Movin' - Livin' Joy
Tubthumping - Chumbawamba
Save Tonight - Eagle-Eye Cherry
The Real Slim Shady - Eminem
Freestyler - Bomfunk Mcs
Last Resort - Papa Roach
At Night - Shakedown
Be Faithful - Fatman Scoop/The Crooklyn ...
Toxic - Britney Spears
Juicebox - The Strokes
Patience - Take That
Shine - Booty Luv
A-Punk - Vampire Weekend
Happy downloading!
Last night I went to a listener's Christmas party in Hertford. I had a lovely time, played Greasy Twist and the 'picking up the cereal box off the floor with your teeth' game... here's the video highlights...
And I think this image sums up the night...

Hello and welcome along...
Here is a little festive treat from our BBC friends over at 5live. It is a video from Danny Baker's football phone in show '606' which is on Tuesday evenings. It is of a guy called Alex who has replaced the lyrics of Slade's 'Merry Christmas Everybody' with footballer's names. It is very clever.
Also, here's another caption competition for you.
Come up with a witty caption to this photograph: Best one wins nothing. Go on...Be funny.

* This is not a competition at all, it's just for fun to make me laugh
Hello you dirty little bloggers - welcome along to a new week. I had a brilliant lie in this morning. 8:15! I know, incredible. Was woken up by a the bloke from downstairs knocking on my door relentlessly - my flat is leaking water in to his flat it seems. It dripped on his wife's head this morning apparently. I think he was being a bit over dramatic. So, i've left the plumber in my flat to fix whatever is wrong and hopefully it'll be sorted by later and nothing will have been nicked.
On my way in to work, I spotted the perfect inadvertent antidote to Chrismas. It's a reindeer but it looks like it's been put in a field, and set on fire. For this is what they look like:

The burnt remains of a reindeer. I don't think these are the most cheerful looking fellas. Do you? Merry Christmas.
Anyway, just sorting out bits for covering Scott's show this afternoon - it's nice to be on at a more earthly hour! That's all for now.
Also, just been looking around on the 'news pages of Radio 1 Online' and saw this photo of X Factor's Eoghan and it made me laugh for some reason. Let's do a caption competition*. Best answer will win absolutely nothing.

Post your captions below...Go on, you've got nothing else to do.
* This is not a competition at all, it's just for fun to make me laugh.
Yo, yo, yo...
Thank you for your messages etc this morning...much appreciated. It was a fun old show this morning, have a listen again on the
iPlayer. I treated it as a Friday because I'm having a couple of sneaky days off before the Christmas rush. There was a good edition of Free-For-All Wednesday today. Rod McKenzie, the big boss of Newsbeat read the bulletin at 5:30 this morning as a special treat. Rod is a news legend and doesn't do bulletins anymore because he is too important. However, he kindly agreed to do one today and even adhered to the new '
costume guidelines' I've put in place for my newsreaders on a Friday.
He does look good in a tux. Find out more about our Rod
here.
Have a great rest of the week and weekend. Back on Monday doing Scott's show...Bye for now!
Just bumped into Edith on the Tube as I went home. She was off to see Coldplay tonight at The O2 with her other half Tom, from Editors, and a load of her mates. It was a strange encounter because as Edith shouted at me to get my attention, I was getting out my MP3 player and remembered I was in the middle of listening to Editors' first album, The Back Room. I didn't want to say this to him because it is a fairly unremarkable story and would perhaps have been awkward as I haven't met him before. Plus the train was busy and noisy.
This is what could have happened:
"I'm listening to your album"
"What?"
"I said, I'm listening to your album"
"Malcolm?"
"Album"
"OK, this is my stop. Bye."
I'm mostly going to be watching the new feature length episode of 24 tonight. Fingers crossed it'll be a good one.
Have a good evening/morning/night/whatever, depending on where you are in the world.
Brap.
I got home from a little Christmas drinks 'do' yesterday and popped online to start working on the Wonder Years for when I'm covering Scott's show in a week or so and I stumbled across this amazing video.
Click here to see the full video
I've just heard an incredible rumour...
Read the rest of this entry
If you're not feeling Christmassy, then you should force it out.
Christmas is very much around the corner now and I think I'm getting in the festive mood. I love this time of year so much, but I think I used to love it more when I was at school and Uni because term ended around about now and no one cared about anything and we were all on the 'wind-down'! Plus many parties.
I also keep singing that
Geraldine song that Chris Moyles keeps playing which although is disgustingly catchy, I actually quite like it for some reason. It does sound festive, I suppose. Over and over and over again...
It's been a great week though, absolutely exhausted from it but that's not a moan because it's been a lot of fun. Had a brilliant time on Wednesday/Thursday with the Moyles team in Plymouth at the
Carol-oke. It's always fun to spend some time with them all because although I see them every morning, I'm busy doing my show, then obviously they come on at 6:30 and we're rarely all of us together. This was put right on Wednesday!
Have a flamin' marvellous weekend oh faithful blog readers. Thank you once again for having a read of all these rambles from my jumbled up head, it is, as always, much appreciated. For your information, I'm currently sitting in bed eating back to back mince pies whilst writing this. I'm on my 4th.
Brap.
P.S. Have a look at my beautiful newsreaders all dressed up with no where to go. It was, of course, 'Dress up Friday' for Newsbeat where they all have to dress up in posh clothes. Here's my
brand new gallery of newsreaders looking how they should do everyday.
Also, just got a load of photos off my phone from the last few days.
Thought you'd like to see them:
Chris Moyles on air in Devon:
The sun rising over the sea as I travelled back to London after Early Breakfast live from BBC Devon:
And a taster of the Kings Of Leon gig last night in London's O2 Arena. A brilliant music venue.
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There are many videos knocking about the internet which aren't worth shouting about. We've all seen the 'hilarious' "man falling off a horse" and "grandma falling over in the snow" videos, but this one is in a class of its own.
If you ever wondered what Howard Brown from the Halifax adverts was up to in the age of the credit crunch, here's your answer blooper fans!
This was sent in by a guy called Craig who has a little bit too much time on his hands. I love it though.
It's the next obvious step for the Chappers and Dave song which you can download for your phone by texting the word "mobile" and sending it to 81199.
I've just washed all my socks and for the first time ever, there wasn't an odd one at the end. Does life get any better?
I was having a little clear out of my phone yesterday and found a load of old photos on there that I thought you'd enjoy.
I saw Tower Bridge was having some work done to it. It looks quite sad, I think. Also, you'd be a bit annoyed if you came over for a holiday and this is what it looked like.

This was taken in Northern Ireland on 1st November (obviously) and was just before I played in front of literally tens of people. If I ever recorded an album, this would be the cover shot.

I saw this months ago in front of a building site. I didn't really understand it but instantly loved it.

This is of my musings during the show. I was compiling a list of nicknames for Nick Grimshaw.

I'll explain them all...
Grimmy (obvious)
Grinnw (predictive text version of Grimmy)
Girmy (mis-spelt name in an internal BBC email)
Grimey (Chappers and Dave's creation)
Grimly (an un-named BBC source)
Enjoy boring Monday. I hate Mondays so much. Nothing good happens on a Monday. No one can be bothered to do anything good.
The new rule on Fridays is that the news readers have to dress up. I don't know why really but it keeps me amused. It always makes me laugh to see the funny little news people making an effort for no particular reason. Here's another couple:
Their effort is very welcome along and for that, they are news legends.
Matt Cole took it to a whole new level with this little number:

And Greg Dawson came up with this outfit:

Welcome along one and all to the final day of the working week for some people. A day we all look forward to straight after the last one finishes. It's a bit sad really that we all kind of wish our lives away every week.. 'Oh, can't wait 'till Friday' - 'Yey! It's Friday' - 'Oh, boring Monday again' - 'Oh. can't wait 'till Friday'...And so on.
Anyways, had a nice busy day yesterday, slightly ill-timed though due to it being straight after the Christmas Party which I'm sure you're all sick of heaing about now. However, I was invited along to BBC Switch's 5:19 Show last night to be a guest on there. It's a very fun, daily show presented by Tom Deacon which is broadcast on the internet every day at 5:19pm. It's worth a watch one day, and why not start off with the one I'm on? Makes sense eh? Click HERE to watch last night's episode.
I had to put as many pegs as possible on my head in 30 seconds:
Peg James, there:

I'm feeling like dog dirt today. Without wanting to be too graphic, I went out to meet an old school mate last night and called it a day fairly early due to me feeling totally ill. Went home and didn't manage to keep my dinner down if you know what I mean. Horrible. I think it was due to a combination of not enough sleep this week, working hard (as always by the way!), not eating very well and having one too many frothy bevvies midweek which I said I would cut down on. Possibly a little bug lurking around somewhere too. Am supposed to be going out tonight but it could be quiet one in and lights out at 7pm. Coooool.
If you're looking for something to watch tonight on TV, apart from the marvellous 5:19 Show, tune in to BBC1 at 10:35pm to watch Live At The Apollo tonight with this week's Early Breakfast guest - Russell Kane (he's very good) .
I thought everything in my new flat was sorted. That was until I had a shower earlier this afternoon and the pump blew up. The water stopped very suddenly and there I was standing like a div with shampoo in my hair. No hot water, no cold water. Nothing. I literally didn't know what to do. Picture these images of what happened next. I decided to rub the suds off my head with a towel, put some clothes on and went to the shops and bought some bottled water like your mum might do if you're on holiday in somewhere where she doesn't like you drinking the 'foreign water'. I then rinsed my head over the bath with the bottled water. One can only imagine what that looked like. A half asleep mess bent over the bath (
ooo matron) spilling water everywhere. Big idiot.
Anyway, the landlord has had to come round again to fix it so hopefully it'll be fixed asap. If not, I'll be smelling like a bin bag for the rest of the week which is not great considering it's the Radio 1 Christmas Party tomorrow night. 'Hi Fearne, ignore that smell, can I buy you a drink?' Not that I'm trying to crack on to Fearne, but you know what I mean.
...And it's flippin amazing. The complete Stone Roses debut album in full. Never heard it before, but I'm enjoying it a lot.
Going to bed straight after this. Fairly tired but this is too good to miss.
P.S. I've just downloaded the whole album so I can lie around and listen to it again. The power of Radio 1 eh?!
I have a problem, my alarm didn't go off and I've only just woken up. The plumber came round to fix up my pipes (so to speak) so I nodded off when he left at about 10:00. It's bad when you sleep through most of the daytime shows. No Sara, no Edith, and the first bit of Scott. If I wake up and Scott's on, I know I've blundered.
I missed a voiceover too. Oops. Probably in trouble for that one.