After preparing dozens of ideas for my site for Valentine’s Day (take a look here if you missed them), I didn’t actually celebrate the day, being 3700 miles away from my husband (and children, for that matter). Luckily I’d planned ahead, ordering an EyeMax wind-up radio for him from www.freeplayenergy.com. We listen to the Today Programme of a morning but our bathroom radio was gobbling D batteries like an insatiable beast. The cute EyeMax gets power from winding – and its own little solar panel. It gets great reception and it’s easy to wind; just 30 seconds gives about 35 minutes of music – or John Humphrys. And if you wind long enough to top up the internal battery completely, you’ll have around 25 hours of playtime.

 

I wish more appliances and devices could be human-powered. We could cure our couch potato culture with tellies fuelled by exercise bikes – real pedal power. At one point in my Miami years, I joined The Downtown Athletic Club, a gym located atop a skyscraper. Every evening I’d take the lift up to the 15^th floor – and queue for the StairMaster. Eventually I recognised the absurdity of the situation and de-joined (not always a simple process). Gyms can be carbon guzzlers, with their steam rooms, hot showers and AC, but if we could hook up all the treadmills, stair machines and elliptical trainers to the national grid, we’d solve two problems at once: reducing carbon emissions and our supersized girths. Meanwhile, incorporate some winding into your morning exercise routine. Every little helps!