It's Children in Need again, this time a week early, for some inexplicable reason. It's a big event in the town I live in with people collecting money on the streets from 7am to 6pm. Normal street collections are only usually from about 9am till 3pm, but because this is a nationwide thing it means everyone knows it's going on. What's also extra for this one is that we collect from cars stopped at the traffic lights.

This morning I got up at 6.30am when it was still dark to go and run around in the road. Which sounds like a crazy thing to do, but it's good fun. You have to run when the lights turn green and you have to get back to the front by the time it turns red again, so you can get as many cars as possible.

Although some of the interesting parts come later when you compare stories. I had one bloke who told me he didn't believe in it, one who forgot he hadn't wound his window down and hit his hand on it giving me some money, one lady who gave me a bag full and someone who gave a £20 note.

Every year I get hot doing it, so I tried to not overdress. But I got hot just walking to work to dump my stuff and I then I got really hot running around for an hour and a half and nearly ended up just in a long-sleeved shirt and my tabard. Except that my coat would have been a pain to carry, so I left it on. The sun didn't go in until later, so it was lovely and warm.

When I went out to the pub at lunchtime I could see loads of yellow where people were collecting. Although because I know most of them I ended up rationing my change so I could give each of them a bit while I spoke to them.

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