‘My New Year’s resolution? To get a tattoo!’

For Today programme presenter MARTHA KEARNEY, Scottish dancing with friends makes for the perfect celebration. But this year, she’s getting an early night!

This New Year’s Eve I’ll be tucked up in bed by 8pm with earplugs and an eye mask. It’ll feel very peculiar, but I’m working on the Today programme on New Year’s Day so I need an early night. I’d usually be off with a group of friends Scottish dancing – after years of screaming at them, they can now do Strip The Willow and Gay Gordons. We usually have haggis and listen to Radio 4 at midnight to hear the chimes, but I’ll have to make up for it by celebrating in the new year.

When I joined the Today programme, I was too nervous to think about celebrating as I felt it would be a little presumptuous, but having been there for a while now, it does feel like there’s something to celebrate. I’m enjoying it hugely. I’d been on World At One for 11 years and I needed a different challenge. It’s such a mixture of stories. I’ve done outside broadcasts with Sir David Attenborough at Kew Gardens, been to Jerusalem and hunted for adders in north Norfolk, which was a personal challenge for me because I hate snakes!

I love bees, so 2019 will be the year I get a bee tattoo. I’ve been dithering over what design to get on the inside of my wrist, but I’ve been collecting ideas on Pinterest and doing lots of research. Do you have it monochrome or colour? There are so many decisions. I’ve got so much bee clothing, handbags and jewellery and I need to go one step further. I’m going to a fundraiser in June for the Bees For Development charity, which I’m a patron of, so it’ll be done by then!

Getting fit is also on my to-do list for 2019. I love walking holidays, but I feel I’m never quite fit enough. I used to cycle to work, but now my car arrives at 3:40am and I have to read the newspapers on the way in. Another resolution would be to learn more Italian. I’ve been going to classes and listening to the News In Slow Italian podcast, so I feel more confident that I could keep that one up.

On a wider note, I hope that as a country in 2019 we can learn to have our political debates in a more civilised fashion. I think that’s one of the things I regret that’s changed in the course of my career – the way people are polarised on a lot of different subjects. It’s fine for people to feel passionate, but I think more level debate would be better. ◆

GETTING FIT WILL BE ON MY TO-DO LIST FOR 2019

Martha presents the Today programme on Radio 4, weekdays 6-9am; Saturdays 7-9am