Like many people I juggle a number of roles during every day – marketer, blogger, father, partner – and there are constantly any number of things calling out for my attention.

And despite efforts to raise my game at home and at work, I have one major stereotypical male weakness when it comes to my home life. I’ve got cleaning blindness.

I don’t mind washing and cleaning, but like many guys, when I’m left to my own devices it tends to happen when I’m down to the last clean shirt, or the last clean glass or plate.

Until I got an internet-connected radio anyway…

The reason I suddenly enjoy washing up

Suddenly I’m actually looking for reasons to do the washing up, or sort the laundry, and it’s all due to the fact I’ve got an internet-connected radio (a PURE EVOKE Flow DAB Internet Radio for those interested).

It means that rather than seeing it as time away from catching up with work and the tech world, I can combine that time with catching up on stuff I generally miss during the week (Just as my TV watching is almost entirely online), as well as listening to Absolute Radio on DAB (Disclosure: I work at Absolute Radio).

And my favourite tech show of the lot is This Week in Tech – it’s substantial enought to last through the biggest pile of washing up, and there’s something in Leo LaPorte‘s Amercian radio delivery that is immensely enjoyable and relaxing…

Suddenly there’s a tech gadget my partner really loves (She appreciates most of them, but this one actually produces a tangible benefit!), the dishes are clean, and I’m getting to listen to the opinions of a panel of great guests every week…

For reference, the list of favourite podcasts at the moment are:

This Week in Tech

GDGT – more gadget focused

Engadget – again with the gadgets

The Guardian Tech Weekly

Giant Bomb – awesome videogame podcast (Cheers to @pjeedai for the recommendation)

And various great podcasts from my employer, which are particularly great when I’m out and about at the weekend and miss Frank Skinner or Dave Gorman.

It’s interesting to think about the challenge of promoting DAB and internet-connected radios when the benefits aren’t always immediately clear. I’d always assumed that the combination of laptop, smartphone and MP3 player meant I had all the audio access I could want – but the benefit of having a dedicated device with decent audio quality built-in makes a huge difference. Within one or two button pushes it’s running, it’s always plugged in, and I don’t need headphones.

I wonder how many more people might not realise the benefits yet?