Desert Island Discs finally available on iPlayer

The programme has been around for 67 years and yet only now is it available on the BBC's 'listen again' service - or, assuming one week online is a year in the old world, the equivalent of around 167 internet years.

For the uninitiated, Desert Island Discs sees famous people invited to Radio 4 to chat about their lives and choose a selection of music, a book and a pointless luxury to accompany them on a lonely sejour on a desert island. It's presented by Kirsty Young but the rights to the show still belong to the family of its erstwhile creator, Roy Plumley, who have now agreed a deal that allows licence payers to listen to repeats on the iPlayer and as a podcast. 

The first show online features Kirtsy chatting to Barry Manilow. And coming up, according to Radio 4 controller Mark Damazer, 'I still yearn for Bruce Springsteen, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Bill Clinton, George Bush, Barack Obama, Madonna, Arsene Wenger etc. etc. Stay tuned. We're trying.'

Listen to the first show this lunchtime. Here's Barry...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnmr

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40 ways to download free music

Good news (for the both of us in the country who give a damn): my favourite band, The Toy Dolls, are playing my favourite venue (in Paris) on Saturday 5 December: La Cigale.

Bad news is that with the spending power of our pound abroad taking another sewer-bound turn, the chances of me attending are as likely as my team, AFC Wimbledon, winning the Champions League my lifetime. 

Still, here's a great piece on 40 ways to download free music.

Definitely worth a read one lunchtime.

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Your rights if the bailiffs call

I'm lucky. I don't have debts. I did once. Now I don't. I wrote a book about it. This fact, however, doesn't stop companies hounding me for money I don't owe them. It's a pain in the timetable because each demand has to be dealt with and that's my time they're thieving, never mind the attempts to palm my cash using computer-generated hate mail. 

Now, if you are in debt and being hounded to pay it back, it can be a terrifying experience.

And poring over the statistics from money education charity Credit Action suggests that there are an awful lot of people in a parlous state of financial affairs. Each household owes more than £9,000 or £21,000 if you only include households with unsecured loans. If I don't owe £9,000 that can mean my neighbour owes £18,000 and so on. That 'advice' to beat credit card companies at their own game doesn't seem so smart now.

So this lunchtime if the money blues are foremost in your mind, I'd take a look at some of the advice out there, and particularly worth memorising are your rights and how to react if the bailiffs pop round for your prized stuff.

>> Your rights if the bailiffs call

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New flight comparison service, yeah I know another one, but this one's pretty good

I was in Belgium the other day and two things stick in my mind. One: Eurotunnel seemed quieter than I've ever seen any cross-Channel service in my years of hopping across to the Continent, and Two: until the prices come down, I don't think I'll bother again - 20 quid for moules frites in an Antwerp street caff and there wasn't even that many frites, or moules for that matter. Tsk.

So now that continental Europe is probably the most expensive place in the history of Earth, if you must go - and driving through the tunnel is not your thing - there's a new flights comparison service from the wonderful Travelzoo people. Here:

http://uk.fly.com/default.aspx

What I like it it's speed (even through our nuclear-proof proxy server) and the sliders on the lefthand side that allow you to filter time slots with moronic ease. It offers worldwide flights not just Europe.

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Autumn raspberry plants now on sale

Anyone who has taken the plunge into the latest allotment craze will realise that everything you grow arrives within a four-day window in August and there's only so many meals featuring 80 courgettes a human can tolerate.

The trick is to find fruit and veg that is ready at different times of the year and autumn raspberries are one of the great treats.

Autumn Bliss raspberries are 'fat, sweet, plentiful, juicy and easy to grow' and can still be picked in November - you need to plant them this autumn for a crop next year. Plants are starting to go on sale now.

You can get 10 plants here for £12.99, reduced from £16.99

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Reminder: how to cover school books

It's that time of year, folks. No, not winter - although it feels like it today - but covering school books with wallpaper season. If, like me, you dread it, don't. There is a very easy way that takes about a minute.

Check out:

How to cover school books without glue, tape, hassle, heartache or money

10 Philips Energy Saver Lightbulbs for £1 at Robert Dyas

Old lightbulbs are being phased out. Get over it! as an advertising slogan might put it. And where once they cost a fiver a pop, you can now pick them up for pence; 10 pence in fact at Robert Dyas. In store only.

Dyas store finder

Update: 10p bulbs now available online

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50 things to do on Google

As Google continues apace to become a global electronic library containing every piece of information ever published in the history of information (latest addition being books themselves), I thought it might be time to highlight some of the tools that Google lays over the top of all this information. Here's 50 or so of them on one handy page.

>> Google's things to do (in your lunchbreak)

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Shownar lets the Web tell you what to watch on telly

In case you were wondering whether to watch the long-running documentary set in a unlikely swear-free inner city location about very old people, featuring young people who also look very old, yeah I'm talking about EastEnders, then here's a new service designed especially for you.

Shownar.com is a Web toy from the BBC that measures how much online buzz there is about its shows and orders them into a chart to help you decide what's worth watching.

Ignoring the obvious flaw that EastEnders is likely to always be top, it's a pretty useful of seeing at-a-glance the hidden gems you may otherwise miss before they're wiped from the iPlayer.

Eventually it will list shows from other channels, including hopefully the brilliant American online TV service Hulu, which is due to launch in the UK next year.  

It's another step towards organising the mess that is the World Wide Web into something useful.

Definitely one to check out in your lunch break.

>> Shownar.com

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Ryanair: share your low-cost airline stories with Panorama

Everyone has a Ryanair story. Here's some about Ryanair's idea to charge for using the toilet. In my case, having learned to travel without baggage and ignoring the near-fisticuffs between an official ambassador for the British Moron Party and a fellow Italian passenger over a seat, my stories are largely positive. So what's your story?

It's a question BBC show Panarama is asking. It says:

'Panorama is planning a programme on Ryanair and its 'no frills' business model - and we'd like your help. Their take on low cost flying has been hugely successful - in terms of the number of scheduled international passengers carried it's now the world's biggest airline. 

'We're planning to run our programme next month when Ryanair goes over to 100% online ticketing.  Whilst some love the way the company has revolutionised the airline industry its customer service policy leaves others cold.

'What's your take on the Ryanair experience? If you're a Ryanair passenger, an employee, an airport operator or an aircraft manufacturer and you've got something you think we should know about Ryanair - good and bad, then please email panorama@bbc.co.ukand put 'Ryanair' in the subject heading.'

If you have a moment this lunchtime, you may want to get your experiences off your chest.

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Panorama website

This is Money forums

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Ryanair news archive
Including such classics as
    'Ryanair to make passengers to take luggage to the plane'
    'Now Ryanair wants to charge for check-in'
    'Sarkozy suing Ryanair over advert'

And finally...

How to get a Visa Electron to avoid Ryanair's payment charge