Your body clock is set to the time you were born. It’s a theory I heard years ago. I was born at 10pm and tend to be more alert late in the evening. Getting up at 5.30am for work is absolutely not natural to me.
I refuse to even acknowledge that retirement is a word. Shirley Williams and Baroness Mary Warnock are in their 80s and 90s, and when I met them a few years ago they had brains like razors. That’s where I’m looking right now.
The smelliest place in the world was the factory where I worked packing slightly gone-off coley for cats. The fishermen’s wives who worked there were great. They would smoke in the toilets on their breaks, telling filthy jokes and howling with laughter. Life was tough, but they just got on with it.
I want to see how women run the world. Maybe we will make as much of a mess of it as men have, but for goodness sake give us a chance.
Health has been one of the most important subjects on Women’s Hour since it started in 1946. I announced my breast cancer treatment on air to listeners, as I couldn’t possibly hide it from an audience who I feel really close to. It’s important to share this information.
My dad was the nicest man on God’s earth, but he would return from work, come to the table when supper was ready, then go and sit down again by the fire. I didn’t think that was fair. When I first lived with my husband, he offered to iron my shirt while I was rushing to leave the house. I think that might have been the moment I fell in love with him.
Small portions are the answer to the obesity problem. I’ve lost seven or eight stone since I had an operation to remove part of my stomach last year. I can eat anything I like, just not too much of it. I feel fitter and more mobile than I have in a long time.
I’ve been trying to rationalise the Brexit vote. When I spent a year in Paris as a student, I had a blue passport but I got there without any kind of hassle; so maybe it’s not going to be quite so awful. As a child of people who lived through the Second World War, for me the EU was about unity. It breaks my heart that we’re narrowing things down rather than opening them up.
My mother and grandmother saw cooking wonderful food as a duty. If you didn’t eat everything on your plate, they were upset and disappointed. But that attitude can be dangerous.
If you tell me it’s 32C outside, or that somewhere is 10km away, I’ve got no idea what you mean. I am part of the generation that never quite accepted continental measurements and temperatures. I still prefer pounds, shillings and pence, which is a ridiculous thing to say.
The secret to a happy relationship is freedom. My parents had it: they did what they wanted to do, and spent their time together enjoyably. David and I have slept in separate beds since our first son was born and all we wanted was a good night’s sleep. It’s great. I was an only child and had always had my own room. There are other times of day when you can be romantic.
Woman’s Hour celebrates its 70th anniversary this year
