Essex,My Essex

Check out Radio 4 this Friday, February 28, at 11am for Essex, My Essex, by Ian Sansom, who grew up looking back in Ongar. Ian is now living in Northern Ireland, but returned to Essex to record a documentary on Britain's most iconic county. He interviewed me in the Secret Nuclear Bunker at Kelvedon Hatch and promises a host of other Essex ephemera…

Lav at Firstsite

Fifty four per cent of visitors to Colchester's Firstsite art gallery are only using the loos, claims an unofficial survey by Colchester residents. Though the gallery has responded by saying that even visiting the loo is a cultural experience as you have to walk past several works of art, including a Roman mosaic. I certainly enjoyed my visit there, described in The Joy of Essex, and can vouch for  the loos and the coffee as well as the art, which admittedly could be a bit more populist. Still, might not a quick visit to the toilet leave Essex folk flush with a potential for future, more aesthetic visits? With luck Firstsite could become Essex's answer to the Loo-vre.