Today I was listening to Radio 1 on the web — research purposes only, of course — and a caller managed to break through the hurried sheen of the Colin and Edith program with a heartfelt message to her boyfriend, who not only made her feel like a queen, taking her out constantly, etc., but — and here the caller’s voice cracked a little, stumbled, collected itself and went on stronger — had stood with her during family troubles, and his support meant the world. That the caller sounded like the kind of superficial babbler you might avoid at a party made the sincerity in her voice the more striking. It’s a common phenomenon — that, talking blindly down the phone to an audience of thousands of absolute strangers, people find something noble inside they never realized they had — and DJs and program directors are only too eager to tap into it, especially since it’s free minus the cost of the phone banks. Colin appreciated it too — “That was a good ‘Lunchtime Lovers’, Sarah,” he said, collegially referring to the name of the segment. And we moved on.