LAUREN BELDI
radio reporter and producer
There are two ways my day can start: the ideal way, or the way it happens most of the time. In the ideal version, I wake up at 4am, have a cup of tea, turn on the news to keep myself awake, get dressed, put on make-up and head out the door. What usually ends up happening, though, is I snooze my 4am alarm to 4.15, then to 4.30. At 4.45am, I drag myself out of bed and pull on my clothing as I walk downstairs to my taxi (we have Cabcharges for early or late shifts) – no make-up, no tea, nothing. I hate waking up in general – I don't care whether it's 4am or midday, I hate it. Thankfully, there's a café at my work. My shifts go from 5am to 12.30pm. Our live radio program goes to air 1.5 hours after we get to work, which is nice, because there's a bit of time to take stock of everything, and I’ll usually have prepared the news bulletin the day before. When I get in, I work with the host to make sure there are no huge holes to fill, then I’ll finish up a news package (aka story) that maybe needs to be voiced or edited. After that, I’ll line up the guests and produce the show as it’s on air.
By the time it’s 10am, I feel like I’ve done so much – I’ve crushed it. Then when 12pm rolls around, I have this whole stretch of day to use however I want, whether that’s shopping, sleeping or sitting in a café for four hours. I can't call my friends because they’re working, so I get a solid block of me-time to watch Netflix and feel smug.
I try to have dinner around 6pm; otherwise, I’m too awake when I go to bed at eight. The amazing thing is that my partner cooks when he gets home. I think if I had to forage for my own food, I would have died by now. I’d like to say that I keep healthy by exercising regularly, but really, I just nap a lot. Over one weekend, I can completely destroy the sleeping habits I’ve built over the past week. I try not to rely on sleeping pills, but it’s helpful to know they’re there, too.
Early mornings feel like this secret time to be out. I pass a lot of weird people in the city and think, “What series of events occurred for you to be here, disco-dancing down the street to no music?” One time, I saw a fight club at 4am in the middle of the CBD. I assume it was a fight club, because there was a ring of dudes, then two guys in the middle, punching it out. It didn’t look spontaneous – I swear it was a fight club. I will stake my journalistic reputation on that.