Tim Vine, walking down Great Portland Street at 9.20am this morning, looking a little worried. And looking at me in a worried way, and I looked at him, wondering who he was and whether I was supposed to know who he was and acknowledge his existence. I decided not to. That was the right decision.

Apparently I’m not allowed to claim Hardeep Singh Kohli, who I saw walking into BBC White City, since he was on BBC soil. Similarly, I can’t also claim the BBC News 24 reporter who looks a bit like John Stapleton but isn’t, since I saw him walk into the BBC staff-only WHSmiths inside Television Centre. But at least I get to claim one new celeb signing.

Just to update you of other potentially exciting celebrity sightings: in my final week at Virgin, I saw Stephen Twigg on his mobile in Golden Square, who I nodded to and mouthed ‘hello’, and he mouthed ‘hello’ back again, and it was only then that I realised who he was and that no, I’d never talked to him longer than about five seconds. And, on going for my job interview at BBC White City, I spotted coming out of the little cafe none other than Captain Slow James May (again on BBC soil so it doesn’t count).

I also bumped into Media UK celebrity Martin Deutsch today, not on BBC soil, but he’s not a real celebrity and I ended up buying him a beer at the fiercely non-subsidised BBC Club in Television Centre, so that doesn’t count either. (It does serve real ale, though - three beers on draft, including Directors and Brakspear. I don’t know whether this counts as commercially-sensitive information. I’m hoping not).

In other news: I today learnt how the radio works in the office, and so spent an enjoyable couple of hours listening to BBC Radio 2 until someone doubtless noticed and switched it off again. I also learnt that there’s a stationery cupboard “over there” on our floor, but I wasn’t looking at the time and missed where “over there” was. (It wasn’t me that was being shown it, I just overheard the conversation).

Finally, today I was described, successfully, as “a tall bloke with a stripey shirt”.

It’s all go, let me tell you.

(PS: Old colleagues might like to know that the digital radio in the office was found tuned to Virgin Radio, before I tuned it over to Radio 2. I heard a Kaiser Chiefs song today and quite liked it, so I’m on the way to a cure.)

Photo: Xerones @ Flickr, cc licenced

Watching the stories about the floods in Yorkshire, it’s been interesting to switch between Sky News and BBC News 24.

BBC News 24 is talking to journalists, rescue workers, firemen, policemen, etc. The questions from the studio are the standard “What’s the latest where you are?”.

Sky News - Anna Botting, who is live on-air - is talking directly to people who are trapped. People stuck upstairs, workmen who are ‘really quite cold now’ in their warehouses, people stuck in their cars. The journalist’s questions are sympathetic, interesting, warm.

Which do you think is the most interesting?

Clue: it’s not what the BBC is doing.