Shelagh Fogarty (5 Live) | iPlayer

World at One (R4) | iPlayer

Scott Mills (R1) | iPlayer

Meeting Myself Coming Back (R4) | iPlayer

Whytemead Weekly (Resonance FM) Podcasts

On Thursday, our internet lay down and wept. No emails, no news, no iPlayer, no vital reports on the state of famous women's cellulite or famous comedians' bank accounts, no nothing: so hooray for radio to keep up with what's going on. On 5 Live, Shelagh Fogarty had money expert Martin Lewis – a man who can't contain his exuberance over discount vouchers – and Dominic Laurie, a more downbeat presence.

Martin got excited about going on holiday. Not the actual break, but the joy of beating hire-car accident insurance agreements. "I never pay more than £10 a day for a car!" Martin became so delighted that he started to use a comedy Greek accent to represent the hire-car people. "No need for that," said Fogarty firmly.

Martin is so busy searching out bargains and getting a thrill out of it that the rest of the modern world just passes him by. Why not go lastminute.com, find an anonymous hotel deal that you fancy, then cut and paste the description of the hotel into a search engine so that you can find out which establishment it is? Dominic made a strangulated noise.

"Oh, it's good fun, playing detective," trilled Martin. "Live a little, Dominic! Save some money!" You got the impression that Dominic believes living a little is not quite what Martin is doing.

On Radio 4, World at One focused on the doctors' strike. There were reports from local correspondents in south Wales, Northern Ireland and south-west England. Live, no less. The excitement! The reporters handed over to one another as though reporting from separate battlefields. Unfortunately for them, the strike was patchy. There weren't many bodies. Back in the studio, the report quickly became a discussion about pensions, which, even when it's current, is a deadly topic.

So, to Radio 1, for the build-up to the station's Hackney Weekend, on this weekend. This, I hope, will have been a huge success, the most enormous, free, star-jammed festival, an example of what Radio 1 does really well and part of the opening Olympics celebrations. Instead, we got Scott Mills laughing. "Hahahaha," went Mills. And, "You need to watch online." Grr. He was playing Innuendo Bingo. Almost exactly as bad as you'd imagine. "I wish I could blow anything! Taking someone up the aisle! Finishing me off in a helicopter!" "Hahaha," said Mills. "Hahaha." Sometimes he – and Tim Westwood, come to think of it – remind me of the Paddy Considine character in A Room for Romeo Brass. Misfits only comfortable hanging out with people a lot younger than themselves.

Or should I be so cruel? Clive James, in a revealing and moving interview with John Wilson for yesterday's Meeting Myself Coming Back, said that, as a critic, he regrets some of the personal attacks he's made on others. (Me too: sorry, Sian Williams.) He also said – as widely reported – that he's been very ill since the beginning of 2010, with leukaemia and emphysema, "and then my immune system packed up". This, at the opening of the interview. But delivered in James's honest, yet teasing, way, the words seemed less devastating than they do when written down.

James, of course, is all about words, his self-confessed aim in his TV shows has been to get across the joy of the English language, as well as the humour of the human race. That's why he's great on radio, especially in his Orwell prize-winning series A Point of View. As he listened back to his career in audio, he often blanched: "Did I write this?" he wondered, of his first piece (a dissection of Baa Baa Black Sheep, written when he was a student). Wilson assured him that he had.

I like these Meeting Myself… interviews, Wilson talking to older people and reminding them of their lives through audio clips. You can hear the personality, and how it changes, in their voices. On an old Start the Week, Clive James was teased by Russell Harty. Listening back, James thought he should have been more honest. But how can you change who you were in the past? Born critic, excellent ear, James knew when he was good and when not so hot. He knew when a piece needed "more edge, more shape". Still, in his older, iller years, he's become kinder, even to himself, and though he wished he'd done some stuff better, he could live with it. For however long he has left.

Resonance FM has a sweet new series: Whytemead Weekly, made by seven- and eight–year-olds from Whytemead first school in Worthing. The first episode could have been slightly better produced – even seven-year-olds need to know that "What is your favourite colour?" never gets an interesting answer – but episode two, on this Sunday, is much better. The kids invent their own news and talk about magic unicamels. Exactly as funny and bewildering as children are. A great project.