Giggles on the Radio

I have just read, somewhat late in the week, the shocking news that Charlotte Green, surely the BBC'S most professional, not to mention sexily voiced news reader is, like me, prone to the giggles and not just a few stifled sniggers or chortles but proper unstoppable, explosive, inappropriate, side-splitting, contagious fits of laughter. Last week, while reading the Today programme news, Green was "completely ambushed by the giggles" while announcing the death of screenwriter Abby Mann. The previous news item had included a bizarre sound clip of the earliest recording of the human voice (French folksong Au Clair de la Lune, recorded on 9 April 1860). It was later reported by Green's colleague Edward Stourton that her lapse was a consequence of a person in the studio suggesting the recording sounded like a "bee buzzing in a bottle". The incident has resulted in considerable public comment, most of which is thankfully supportive of Green. "I'm afraid I just lost it" she Green. Ceri Thomas, the editor of Today, commented: "When Charlotte loses it, she really loses it", and also apologised to Mann's family for his colleague's lapse. Listen to it here - absolutely hilarious.
Aside from the obvious displeasure it may have caused Mann's family and friends, you'd be churlish not to forgive Green and even feel a sense of relief that such a steadfast presenter, a bastion of British broadcasting, melts in front of the microphone from time to time. Indeed I'd say Radio 4 could do with a few more interjections like these!