Shameless Plug!

I had a brief catch-up this evening with the Reverend Richard Coles, who was at the Chorleywood Literary Festival to talk about the second volume of his autobiography "Bringing in the Sheaves", which has just been released.

I worked with Richard for many years at the BBC, first on Radio 3 where he presented an arts and culture programme called "Night Waves" and latterly on Radio 4's "Saturday Live" for the last 5 years or so of my career as a Studio Manager (sound engineer). He has always been an absolute joy in the studio, and I loved doing "Saturday Live" so much that I willingly worked on it most weekends despite the 0700 starts to prepare for the live transmission. It's one of the programmes I most miss being involved with since retiring. It was very sweet of Richard to mention that I was in the audience when he spoke about his radio career tonight.

This evening's conversation was very nicely handled by the author and journalist Wendy Holden, and was both funny and thought-provoking by turns. I was particularly interested to hear Richard talking about his own journey of faith and how he was drawn - almost in spite of himself - to the possibility of light and joy that living as a Christian offers. It really struck a chord with me, and I found myself nodding a lot during that part of the conversation.

A hugely enjoyable evening, and I'm really looking forward to reading the book now. I suppose I should have taken a selfie of me with Richard, but old habits of not bothering people at work in that way die hard I'm afraid, so just a couple of photos of the book (shameless plug) and a quick snap on the iPhone of Richard and Wendy will have to do.