John first came to The Connection in 2010, and this is his story:

I was easy-going, happy, had a lot of friends. Had a life. But that disappeared. Everything I had, knew, owned, disappeared. I didn’t know where to turn. And the friends I had - friends are always friends when you are in a good position. When you are in a bad position your friends are very few.

I found friends here, I found people for whom I’m no relation but they go out of their way to see I’m ok.  As we speak I have family members 5 miles from here. They know my situation. Are they doing anything to help? No.

These guys here have been MY family. And If I were to land the biggest job and get the biggest house I would give back hundreds-fold. These people are family to me now.

I got my place to live through them; I got my job placement through The Connection. They’ve given me everything I need to get this job. Even basic things like a suit and a pair of shoes for interviews. It’s all from here. So, in effect, everything I am today is because of this place.

Since 2010 I didn’t exist, 2010 – 2011 I was a no-one to everyone. These guys have been everything for me. I’m trying to get to the position where I can come back here and (say) you know what, ‘What can I do for you now?’ Honestly I don’t see myself leaving this place. I’ll always come back and say ‘What’s there to do? How can I help?’ But if I can do that, at least some of my demons will go away and at least I’ll go back to being the person I used to be and the person I used to like being.  

So I’m a work in progress basically, if that makes sense to you?

My Dad always took photos of us and I never understood why. But now when I look at those photos I sometimes know why he did it. Because it’s a way of capturing moments that you can’t have again.

Photography has always been something I used to do and when Sophie (at The Connection) said do you want to come and join us I said 'Yes'. Why not? Again it’s something they have given me that I used to be.

I love different people giving me their ideas and telling me that’s a nice picture. To me it’s just like I’m doing the things I used to do, I’m going back to being how I used to be. It might not mean anything else to them or to anyone else. But when I go back to my room I say ‘I like myself today’ – I’m not angry, I’m not hurt, I’m not angry at the world. But I’m going back to how I used to be.

 

View John's gallery of photos here

The Radio 4 St Martin-in-the-Fields Christmas Appeal launches on Sunday, 1st December

Hear how last year's appeal helped Helen furnish a home and David's relationship with his daughter.

The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites 

 

With planning on Radio 4 and 4 Extra normally being so far ahead, particularly for drama, it isn’t always easy to follow up on a successful project as quickly as we would like. So when Easter Diaries, produced earlier in the year, won recognition in the Jerusalem Awards at BAFTA this October, I didn’t expect us to be able to pull together a Christmas follow-up for this year. Thankfully Nick Warburton, whose writing will familiar to Radio 4 drama listeners, was keen to make room to write again, and, since each diary is only two or three minutes long, studio and editing time could be found as well.

Like the earlier project, the idea was to re-tell the familiar story from the perspective of those involved, either well-known characters such as Joseph and Mary, or those from Nick’s imagination – a traveller on the Nazareth road, or one of Herod’s lawyers. And we wanted once more to do that in real time, hearing day by day how it might have felt for them, without our perspective coloured by the centuries in between.

But the Christmas story presented more challenges than the Easter one, with the key moments of the story being more spread out in time, and focussed on not one, but a series of miraculous events. Nick’s response, for me, is respectful and intriguing, centring on the idea of meetings with strangers.

For cast, we were able to secure the talents of Adam Nagaitis, Lizzy Watts and Ben Crowe from the Radio Drama Company, with Nicola Walker (Spooks, Last Tango in Halifax) as the traveller, and Anton Lesser (The Hour, Secret State) finishing the series as Herod’s troubled lawyer. And when they were gone, it was down to me to keep recording as I rustled hay, poured drink, moved buckets and gathered sticks. All for sound effects, you understand… we are on a tight budget here on 4 Extra!

• Listen to the Christmas Diaries  
• Read a blog post about the Easter Diaries on Radio 4 Extra   
• Sign up for the Radio 4 Extra Newsletter 

Last night I slept outside.

As soon as I was instituted as vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields in Trafalgar Square six months ago, this was something I knew I needed to do. St Martin’s has shaped its life around people with nowhere to turn since the First World War, when it gave shelter to soldiers toing and froing from the front via Charing Cross. If I was going to speak publicly about these issues I needed to know what sleeping outside felt like.

Of course I had precisely what most people in this situation don’t have – a network. Two people who often sleep outside took me under their wing. We went out at 8 p.m. We quickly headed for locations where food is hard to come by. Then my companions took me on a scavenger hunt. We called in some favours: a muffin from this coffee bar, hot water from that burger joint, a chocolate bar from an off-licence where one of my friends has offered an unofficial protection service now and again. We sourced flattened cardboard boxes from the streets and newspapers from the stands to soften our bedding. It turned out another shopkeeper and hotelier habitually stored a sleeping bag or two in return for gifts in kind.

The night began around 11, after a few cigarettes and story time. My companions found a dry, windless garage outlet. But I didn’t sleep much. Every few seconds a car raced by or a shout or step announced that a (usually drunken) body was heading our way. One man even fell on top of me he was so loaded. Random, reckless violence filled the imagination, and inhibited sleep. Only at 3.30 a.m. did things settle down.

My companions showed me how to live – not just outside, but anywhere: with no self-pity, plenty of wit, and incredible resilience. Next time they get in trouble, I doubt they’ll come to me. But next time I get in trouble, I’ll most likely go to them.

Listen to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal and Donate now

Watch our slideshows telling the story of homelessness

Listen to Radio 4's Sunday programme

Anita Anand is used to taking calls from the audience on Any Answers? On Sunday she will be taking some of the thousands of calls we expect from listeners keen to donate to our Christmas Appeal. 

She will joined by some of Radio 4's best known voices taking shifts with the phone team at St Martin-in-the-Fields on Trafalgar Square.

Jane Garvey will be there, along with Felicity Finch (Ruth in The Archers), Paul Lewis of Money Box, Quentin Cooper of Material World and World Affairs Correspondent Mike Wooldridge.

Producers and managers and other behind-the-scenes members of the extended Radio 4 family will be there too. 

It's a big moment in our calendar and an important part of the Christmas season for huge numbers of the audience, many of whom have given every year for decades. This is the 86th time we have broadcast the appeal on behalf of homeless and vulnerable people in London and all over the UK. 

The need is as great as ever, as I saw for myself when I joined the outreach team recently on the streets of Westminster. In the doorways of jewellery shops and 5-star hotels we found bodies huddled in sleeping bags or on layers of cardboard, people who had slipped through the carpeted floor of mainstream life into a netherworld of cold, hunger, illness and danger. 

The team from St Martin's knew where to find them, knew many of them by name.  By the end of the night they had persuaded half a dozen to come into a hostel, to accept a meal, a wash, a bed, medical attention, the beginning of a long road back.  This work goes on every night of every week in London and in cities all over the country, helping vulnerable people at moments of great crisis, helping lost people find their way again.

Denis Nowlan is the Network Manager for Radio 4

Donate to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal.

Watch our slideshows about the realities of homelessness.

Follow Radio 4 on Facebook and Twitter.

 

We are fortunate enough to have somewhere to live, which is one of the reasons why we support the St Martin-in-the-Fields Christmas Appeal by making and selling Christmas puddings. When we were trying to decide which good cause to support with our Christmas pudding business a few years ago there just seemed to be something very appropriate about using the money raised by the sale of good Christmas food to help those who have so little to enjoy at Christmas.

So, it all kicks off in September, when we bulk buy pudding basins, sacks of sugar, dried fruit and vegetable suet, and what checkout people in the supermarkets obviously think (but don't ever say) is an excessive number of bottles of brandy!

Then aprons are donned and the weighing, mixing (all done by hand!) and cooking begins. The puddings are made in batches of five, ten or twenty - depending on size - and the work surface is usually home to puddings in a variety of stages: the mixture steeping in the mixing bowl, puddings waiting to be cooked, puddings cooling, puddings waiting to be wrapped. As the numbers build up (and we make between 250 and 300 each year) one or two of the bedrooms are gradually taken over with boxes and puddings - good use of empty rooms with children away at university, but it does create difficulties when we have visitors!

Orders start coming in before we have even started making puddings, mostly via a network of family, friends and colleagues, some of whom act as (very successful) agents, getting in more orders. We also sell the puddings locally in a wholefood shop, and at church and school events. But puddings have been taken far and wide, getting to Europe, Australia, and North and South America, and this year a very tiny pudding is going trekking in Nepal!

Over the years we have raised over £4500 for the Appeal, so by the time we hang up our aprons this year (probably not until the weekend before Christmas since there are always a few last minute orders) we should easily top £5000. We love making puddings (which is a good thing!) and we like to think that the money we raise makes a bit of difference to some people whose lives have not been as easy as ours.

Catherine and Susanna Jamieson raise money for the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal. Many thanks to Catherine and Susanna from Radio 4!

Listen to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal and donate online.

Hear Phillip's story of homelessness in our audio slideshows.

Follow Radio 4 on Twitter and Facebook.

The Damnation of Faust at the English National Opera

Tempted to test your memories of the year's music, films, books and more? Then try these two:

1. What links John Cleese's Alimony Tour, The Damnation of Faust at the English National Opera and a new short opera The Doctor's Tale at the Royal Opera House?

2. Which 2011 memoir, by a very popular poet and performer, includes these lines:

The following week it was all over the local paper alongside Arthur Titherington's photograph of me lifted from the cover of my booklet. "Local girl a hopeful for Opportunity Knocks" read the headline with all the dates and information I had given him. My friends were astounded.

Answers below - but don't tell your family or friends. You can remind them of your wide-ranging cultural knowledge when you tune into the Front Row Boxing Day Quiz on Monday at 7.15pm.

Mark Lawson leaves his regular seat in the seclusion of studio 50C for the question-master's chair beneath the bright lights of the Radio Theatre in Broadcasting House, London.

There he lines up these and many more cultural brain-teasers for two competitive teams with buzzers at the ready. Historian Antonia Fraser, crime writer Mark Billingham and Downton Abbey's Dan Stevens face a team of writer and performer Natalie Haynes, playwright Roy Williams and actor and writer Michael Simkins.

It's quite a contest, and even features an artistic "What Happened Next?" round.

John Goudie is the editor of Front Row on BBC Radio 4

• The Front Row Boxing Day Quiz is on Monday 26 December at 7.15pm on BBC Radio 4 and online shortly afterwards.
• Answers:
  1. All works involving members of the Monty Python team - The Damnation of Faust was directed by Terry Gilliam, and The Doctor's Tale features a libretto by Terry Jones.
  2. An extract from The Necessary Aptitude by Pam Ayres.

The morning after I had visited The Connection at St Martins, I woke up at 5 am and wasn't able to fall back asleep. It was dark and cold - the timer on the central heating not yet having kicked in - and outside icy raindrops were pinging off the bedroom window. I pulled the duvet up to my chin and remembered Jo who had told me it's early winter mornings that are the hardest when you are sleeping rough.

By that time of the morning, Jo told me, no matter how many layers you've wrapped yourself in, the cold of the pavement has seeped in, through your flesh and into your bones. If you wake up too early, and can't fall back asleep - before the day centre, the underground, libraries or anywhere else that might provide shelter is open - then you're stuck: cold and shivering.

If you've got enough money you might go and get a coffee and sit in McDonalds for a little while, she said. But you have to leave after half an hour which is hardly long enough to chase the chill from your feet or hands.

Tom slept rough for two years before recently having found accommodation. Women joke, she said, about how the female body isn't made for sleeping on hard flat surfaces. Men are made "straight up and and down", perfectly adapted for lying on concrete. Women have too many curves to get comfortable and end up getting horrendous backache.

Early winter mornings, I was told, are even worse than the nights, when passers-by give you a kick, just for the heck of it. Which is most nights, Sarah told me. But not as often as some lairy idiot sees fit to yell insults at you because maybe you haven't had the chance to wash recently and, maybe, you're looking a bit rough.

But not as bad, the women say, as those many nights when, despite your best efforts to hide your gender, you're subject to unwanted sexual attention. All the women have experience of that and know of others who have been sexually assaulted or raped. Because, let's face it, Sarah says, when you're a woman living on the streets it's not just the cold you're vulnerable to.

I didn't expect any of the women I interviewed for Woman's Hour in connection with the Radio 4 Appeal to tell me that rough sleeping or being homeless was "easy".

What did surprise me was how, at certain times in their life, sleeping on the street - even with the cold, the discomfort, the abuse and the constant fear of violence - was still preferable to the "home" situation they had left behind. Whether it was a violent partner, mental illness, a bereavement or some kind of other family breakdown; whether they had been evicted, abused or fighting alcohol or drug dependency issues, the homeless situation these women found themselves in was, often, the only option they felt they had.

What I learned from Jo, Tom and Sarah was that the reasons a woman becomes and sometimes continues to be homeless can be very complex. And that those reasons are always, like the women themselves, very individual.

There is no such thing as a "typical" homeless person.

And ultimately, lying there in my warm bed, snug and dry at five o'clock in the morning, it's hard not to feel how fortunate I have been that I have not faced the same challenges or hurdles they have, because the truth is, it could have been me. Given the wrong combination of circumstances, it could be any of us.

Anna McNamee is a reporter on Radio 4's Woman's Hour and a presenter on the BBC World Service arts programme, The Strand.

• Anna's report on women and homelessness is on Woman's Hour on Thursday 22 December.
• Details of how to donate online or by post to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal are here.

The Cardiff big screen, picture by Richard

Then there was Antonia in Manchester. She works one day a week in the city centre for Big Issue North. She would be there on Thursday and could get a picture for me. Clare who works for the Mines Advisory Council also braved the winds in Manchester to take a picture.

Manchester big screen

Aurelia who is a designer took this one in Bristol in the Millennium Square.

Bristol big screen

In Belfast, Karen, seen here amongst the trees, works for Capita. They answer our Radio 4 Appeal calls each week and drafted in an army of volunteers on Sunday to help us answer all the extra calls for the St Martin's appeal. Karen and colleague Michael ventured into the Christmas market to take this picture.

Belfast big screen

Finally a photo from Woolwich in London. I described my mad idea to Sue one of our studio managers and she immediately said, I could ask my husband to take a picture for you - so thanks Mike.

Woolwich big screen

So five down, sixteen to go - if I am to get every BBC Big Screen. So if you live (or know someone who lives) in Birmingham, Bradford, Coventry, Derby, Dover, Edinburgh, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Middlesbrough, Norwich, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Swansea, Swindon or Waltham Forest and want to be part of a rather mad challenge then the slideshow will be showing on Tuesday 13th and Wednesday 14th December at 12.30pm.

Tweet your picture using our hashtag #R4Xmasappeal or post it on the Radio 4 Appeal Facebook site or email it to: charityappeals@bbc.co.uk

Meanwhile on Sunday when the appeal launched I was fortunate enough to be amongst the volunteers taking calls. It is a very heart warming way to spend time. We've had lots of phone and web donations but the biggest proportion of donations for this appeal have always come in the post, people like to write cheques. So we hope the post man is kept busy.

Sally Flatman is producer of The Radio 4 Appeal

• You can donate to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal on the phone by calling 0800 082 82 84, online or send a cheque made payable to the St Martin-in-the-Fields Christmas Appeal and post to:
  St Martin-in-the-Fields
  Trafalgar Square
  London
  WC2N 4JJ
• Where are the BBC Big Screens? Details here

As I emerge from the Tube at Embankment, I step over a pile of crushed cardboard boxes, surrounded by a scatter of tins. Somebody's bed last night. It's after 9am but the cold still strikes through my fleece and I'm glad to get indoors at the building opposite St Martin-in-the-Fields which houses the Connection - the centre for homeless people - and the Christmas Appeal office.

Inside, there's a lively buzz. The phones have been going since 7.30 and the first shift is leaving, including a BBC foreign correspondent and an editor from Current Affairs. I sign in, do the data security briefing, find myself wearing a headset and immediately the phone rings.

The first caller gives £100. He gives every year to the Radio 4 Appeal: "I'm not sending cards or giving presents this Christmas but I want to do something to make the world a better place."

A woman gives £200: "It's my winter fuel allowance. To be honest I don't need it anywhere as much as the people you help, so I'm sending it to St Martin's."

Another woman phones to say how important she thinks the appeal is, and although she can't donate immediately (because her utility bills are due) she will send a cheque after Christmas. Both these callers mention, when asked if we can gift aid their donations, that they don't earn enough to pay tax.

There are only seconds between calls. One comes from a woman who herself became homeless aged 50.

A tray of tea appears. Around me, there is a constant trill of phones and murmur of voices: "How much would you like to donate? Would you like a newsletter? What is the long number? And the expiry date? Thank you very much and a happy Christmas to you."

The volunteers include St Martin's parishioners, BBC colleagues, staff from a City accountancy firm. A mother and daughter have travelled 2 hours from Dover to help. Everyone feels privileged to be part of it, welcoming this flow of human kindness.

On the office wall there's a coloured map of the UK, showing the distribution of funds from last year's appeal, from Cornwall to Cape Wrath. There are only 2 or 3 counties in which grants have not been made, helping vulnerable people at moments of critical need.

Many donations are of £10 or £20, the givers always saying a variation of: "It's not much, I know, but I want to do something to make a difference." Often they say they have heard Libby Purves' Received With Thanks. One man says it "melted my heart of stone".

A retired nurse calls. She has already given £10 but when she heard Libby's programme she decided to phone and give another £10. She says she is on benefits herself but she knows from work with homeless people that there is nothing better than helping someone get back on their feet, and you never know someone's story until you really listen.

A man calls from Sweden to donate and tells the story of his youngest brother, who fell on hard times living in London, lost his job and home and became alcoholic.

"An intelligent guy, nice background and family - but it can happen to anyone." The Connection at St Martins helped him and he got into a hostel and, eventually, a flat. But he didn't recover from the alcoholism and died at 45. "I really believe in this appeal, " says the caller.

When told how big the response is, despite difficult economic times, he remarks that "it says something very special about the British public". And so it does.

Denis Nowlan is the Network Manager Radio 4

• You can donate to the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal on the phone by calling 0800 082 82 84, online or send a cheque made payable to the St Martin-in-the-Fields Christmas Appeal and post to:
  St Martin-in-the-Fields
  Trafalgar Square
  London
  WC2N 4JJ

If you phone us to give a donation on Sunday - we promise we won't play you music whilst you wait to give! You will hear Libby Purves giving you some facts and figures about why your donation is so crucial.

You may hear the bells of St Martins - each year we set up a call centre manned by volunteers, in the church offices - just alongside the church. Or you might go through to one of our volunteers in Belfast - organised by our colleagues at Capita. We'll be keeping them going all day with copious amounts of tea, coffee and cake. (This Radio producer feels that cake is always the solution!)

Work by the homeless photography and writing group at St Martins

It has been a busy week. On Monday we put up an exhibition of work by the homeless photography and writing group on the railings of St Martins. It has been great to watch people stopping to read the boards.

David a former homeless client found he was suddenly greeted by a group of school children who had recognised him from the photographs! Making the words and pictures of homeless people 'visible' is for me the real power of this work. You can also get a taste of these pictures thanks to a slideshow made for us by the BBC magazine Ariel.

On Wednesday the Connection will open their doors to the public so if you are around London that day and would like to see at first hand the place you have heard about over the years - do drop by. Libby Purves will be opening "Behind Closed Doors" at 1pm. The centre will be open through till 6pm with an art exhibition, music, food and refreshments and a chance to see at first hand how the centre works.

I think if you ask most of us to picture a homeless person what may come to mind is someone lying in a doorway... not a young woman staring into brightly lit shop windows thinking that if she could just step through that door, that glass, she could be back in the world with everyone else.

I made this slideshow with an artist Betsy Dadd - she said that the power of the photographs taken by homeless people was for her that we were not just presenting a caricature of what it is like to be homeless.

The homeless person has taken the pictures, thought what they want to say - told their story. The slideshow hopefully helps to make the invisible visible.

So thank you to everyone who has given in the past and if you are new to this appeal - welcome to a charity that has been going for 85 years, some of our donors started giving when they were children and are now in their eighties - you're in good company.

Sally Flatman is producer of The Radio 4 Appeal

• The Radio 4 Christmas Appeal begins on Sunday morning at 7.55am. Make a donation on the Radio 4 web site.
• Read Ariel: BBC Radio 4 helps homeless appeal for 85th year
• Pictures by The Connection's photography group are on Flickr.

One young homeless woman tells me, when you are on the streets, it is as if the world is going on normally on the other side of the glass and if you could just take one step you could step back into that world.

Another man who was homeless for over 20 years smiles: "That glass looks so thin and fragile but it's very thick."

(Ed's note: You can hear from some of the people helped on this video slideshow - PM)

For the past few weeks I have been gathering stories for this years Radio 4 St Martin-in-the-Fields Christmas Appeal. I laugh with one interviewee as we compare notes on our favourite Radio 4 comedies. He was a project manager in construction, until a series of misfortunes including cancer, and debts left him with no money and no home. Originally from Glasgow he says "At least you won't run into your neighbour when you are 300 miles from home."

Libby Purves and I visit the night centre at The Connection for the report back programme Received with Thanks.

Listening back to the interview with a man who was sleeping there that night, I realise he keeps telling us how cold he gets, how hard it is to get warm, how he never really truly sleeps because he's so cold.

In Cardiff I met a woman who arrived back from hospital with her new baby only to be evicted from her house along with her two older sons and her partner. I joined her as she was given a grant for £250 by the Vicar's Relief Fund to help buy a bed, bedding and a cooker for the temporary accommodation they had just moved into. I was struck by her stoicism:

"I have to stay strong for my boys but it's all a front, deep down it's ripped me apart but if the boys see me upset it will upset them".

She bought a bed to be delivered later that afternoon "you just like to be snug don't you and have a good nights sleep".

The average Vicar's Relief Fund grant is £180 and takes just 3 days to turn around. These are crisis grants, helping to prevent an eviction, secure a tenancy or buy vital household goods. Grants go all over the UK.

The Connection at St Martin-in-the-Fields helps over 200 homeless people a day. They've faced reductions in their statutory funding and the Chief Executive describes last years record Radio 4 Christmas Appeal as a "lifeline".

So I want to thank every donor for every gift however big or small.

I also want to thank all the troubled people who give me their stories with such brutal honesty. The stories will be told through the Radio 4 Programmes Received with Thanks and the Vicar's appeal. They will be on our slideshow on the BBC Bigscreens or the web.

What is great about giving to this appeal is that people are not merely saying they support the charity financially they seem to say "We support what you are doing". It also says they care about the individuals whose stories have been told.

Sally Flatman is producer of The Radio 4 Appeal

• Find out more about the Radio 4 Appeal on the Radio 4 website including how to donate
• Read Ariel: BBC Radio 4 helps homeless appeal for 85th year

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00wh1dk

Editor's note. We've published several photographs from the homeless photographers group at St Martin-in-the-Fields since the Christmas Appeal started. This snowy scene by Blodeuwed really emphasises how hard this Winter has been for homeless people. If you haven't made a donation yet, you can do so on the Radio 4 web site - SB.

One million pounds for the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal. Yes, you read that right: one million pounds for the Christmas Appeal and we are still pinching ourselves!

Last year we reached almost £900,000 - that was remarkable but we know that appeals don't have a right to increase year-on-year and life is tough for many people at the moment.

Gwyneth Williams, Controller of Radio 4 says:

This is a wonderful result, particularly given the difficult economic times. Evidence, once again, of the generous kindness of Radio 4 listeners and the importance of the work being done at St Martin-in-the-Fields for vulnerable people in London and across the UK.

The one million is, of course, made up of many thousands of donations - including one gift of £2 given by someone who is currently homeless.

This appeal clearly has a very special place in the hearts of many of you - we know that, not just because we've reached a million pounds but also because of the letters you've sent in with your donations. One lady sent a cheque and said she had been giving 'ever since Dick Sheppard', the first vicar of St Martin's to give a Christmas Appeal.

Rev Nick Holtam with the pot of coins

This small but very heavy pot held by a smiling Rev Nicholas Holtam, the current vicar, also holds a lovely story. It is jammed full of small change! A listener heard the 2009 Appeal and decided to put her coppers into this pot during the year to give to the 2010 Christmas Appeal. When it came to delivering the money it was so heavy, her husband had to drive her and the pot to St Martins! Thank you.

I am sure that the cold weather in December made all of us acutely aware of how dreadful it must be to have no home in such weather. One listener wrote: "I have always been a bit judgemental with regard to the homeless but this cold snap has made me grateful for my warm and comfortable home. I cannot imagine anything worse than sleeping rough just now."

For those who like numbers Craig Norman who administers the Christmas Appeal tells me that it hit the £10,000 mark in 1939. It hit £100,000 in 1982.....and in 2010 it has achieved £1,000,000 - it truly is a landmark year. But as the Rev Nick Holtam says:

Austen Williams, who was my predecessor but one, died on the day of the Christmas Appeal 9 years ago and he heard the appeal and said one day they're going to reach a million pounds and actually we're standing on the shoulders of lots of people who've done this before and we've reached a million pounds - it is extraordinary.

Thank you.

Sally Flatman is producer of The Radio 4 Appeal

• Donations to the appeal are still coming in. Make yours on the Radio 4 web site.
• The picture was taken in Leinster Square, Bayswater in West London by Blodeuwed, a member of the homeless photographers group at The Connection at St Martin-in-the-Fields. More pictures from the group are on Flickr.
• The BBC Radio 4 Appeal has a Facebook page. Visit the page and click the 'Like' button for updates on the weekly appeal which raised a total of £1.5M for 52 charities last year.

Editor's note - the second instalment of Ed Reardon's midwinter odyssey. There are more to come. Still no fee - SB.

Readers of my previous posting, or message in a bottle... actually message in the hope of a bottle would be more accurate (white or red, either gratefully received) - but a hope destined to be dashed, judging from the vehemence of the response when I had the temerity to ask for a small fee for contributing these words. The 'BlogMaster' as he styles himself, no doubt hankering after all those wasted years at 'uni' playing Dragons and Dungeons, left me under no illusion that far from embracing some silly outdated concept like 'being paid for writing', the invitation to do this was a privilege and one for which Ed Reardon should count himself lucky.

Well, I suppose it's not every day that I get to rub shoulders with the likes of Melvyn Bragg whose erudite 'In Our Time' blog posts range far and wide from the cute office puppy to 10th century Viking funeral ships and back to the cute puppy again. So, to recap... readers of my previous posting will be on tenterhooks - or 'tender hooks' as I heard someone on Radio 5 Live say the other day, though to be fair (as their football pundits are so fond of interjecting), the accurate usage does contain a daunting three syllables.

Incidentally, when I tuned in to 5 Live Sports Extra for the test match commentary good and early the other morning I heard the station being described as 'From the creators of 5 Live' no less! For the Corporation to blow its own trumpet about the World Service, say, might be understandable, but is this particular act of creation, the home of phone-ins for the compassionately challenged, anything of which to be proud? The Almighty must be turning in his grave.

Anyway, readers will be on tenterhooks to discover how went my foray into Broadcasting House, the dual purpose being to record some promotional 'trailers' for the forthcoming series of Ed Reardon's Week and more importantly to come back with a substantial haul of party food - the latter in lieu of payment for the former - to keep Elgar and me going over the tricky festive period.

The omens seemed propitious. The studio I was led into had played host to The Moral Maze's Christmas Special the night before, and was thus in sore need of BBC cleaners (or more probably eager volunteers from the Big Society to come in off the streets) to clear up the empty wine bottles, wreckage of pulled crackers and torn paper hats - and, cryptically, the legend 'MP Fancies MB' in shocking-pink lipstick letters smeared on the glass window between studio and engineer's booth.

The identity of this fun-loving couple would have to wait until I'd had a look through the Christmas Radio Times at the Euston station bookstall (a quick flick, as they've started recognising me) because time was getting on and the snacks would no doubt be disappearing down 12 year-old gullets like hapless warblers feeding a giant baby cuckoo.

In my party-going days in London some twenty years ago, sound advice to a would-be gatecrasher was 'Say you know Dave'. Now in my experience, it is either 'Ben' or 'Matt' (or both to be on the safe side) that has the desired effect at a media function, and all was going swimmingly until I tried to pass through the metal detector at the entrance to the Radio Theatre. It was a moment of sheer Hardyesque frustration as yet again the fates conspired against me. If only I'd taken the rubber dice or the tangled-pieces-of-plastic puzzle from the remains of those crackers instead! But no, I'd been too clever by half and pocketed the bottle opener - which being from a cracker was already bent and useless.

But the damage was done and I was ejected as a potential thief, which was technically correct though I would have preferred not to have it loudly announced in the foyer of Broadcasting House while genuine infant friends of Matt and Ben swanned through Security clutching their Hamleys bags.

So, back home to Berko, tail between legs. But on the mat, a welcome surprise for once from the BBC. Back in 1974 a sketch the teenaged Ed Reardon had sent in about Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips appearing on The Generation Game had been used on Week Ending. Moreover since the advent of Radio 7 it had apparently been repeated eighty-six times.

Unbeknownst to their client, my agents had held onto the fees until the total passed ten pounds. And there it was, showing up in my bank account which I dared broach on-line for the first time in months. Enough for a meal, a half-decent bottle of Barolo and a handful of charity Christmas cards for my nearest, dearest, and agent.

Ed Reardon is an author, pipe smoker, consummate fare-dodger and master of the abusive e-mail

• Read Ed's previous blog post.
• Ed is back in a new series of Ed Reardon's week, written by Andrew Nickolds and Christopher Douglas, on 10 January and you can hear his Edinburgh special 'An Audience with Ed Reardon' on 3 January at 1130.
• Subscribe to Melvyn Bragg's newsletter (the one with the puppy) on the Radio 4 web site.
• The picture shows Bruce Forsyth and Anthea Redfern on The Generation Game - root cause of Ed's life-saving royalties cheque - in 1976.
• More pics of Ed on Flickr.

Editor's note: I have asked Radio 4's favourite journeyman-scribe Ed Reardon to document his festive season in four blog posts, to be published here between now and the first episode of his new series in the new year. Licence fee-payers may be gratified to learn that no fee was paid - SB.

It is that time of year when Elgar's tin of cat-food has snow on the letters of the word 'VALUE' and sprigs of holly round the dents. In short, 'tis the season to be jolly... jolly inventive that is, when blagging one's way uninvited into television or radio drama department parties. 'Blagging' is in fact a clue to the Reardon modus operandi, a term dating back to 1970s' crime series, when young writers such as myself sat in agreeable houses in North London and imagined scenes set in disagreeable South London lock-up garages.

TV producers' offices then bore a more than passing resemblance to said lock-ups, only with cases of wine and whisky piled high behind the desk rather than some dodgy but lovable villain's stash of music centres, church-roof lead and in one memorable episode of Minder, talking parakeets. The Christmas parties were lavish and Bacchanalian and it was a point of honour among writers never to leave empty-handed. I well remember two young Turks of British theatre stumbling away from Teddington Lock in a Jake the Peg arrangement, one Afghan coat between them concealing four bottles of Southern Comfort in an empty trouser leg.

Being extremely well-rewarded for putting words like "Leave it out, Tel" into colourful geezers' mouths, we didn't actually need to go to any of those lengths, but back then the thrill of the chase was all, and with it the warm glow of triumph at having successfully made off with a carafe of Paul Masson, a pocket full of king prawns and a toothsome PA with whom to share them in an account taxi home.

Of course this was in the palmy era when each ITV company had its own plush office block. These days it is not the whisky that is twelve years old but the producers, all crammed like oily and headless sardines onto one floor on the South Bank, the rest of the building being reserved for the personal and private use of Messrs Jason and, latterly, Clunes. Ed Reardon too has felt the chill wind of financial reality in recent years (17 of them to be precise) with the result that more often than not it's been a case of no Christmas party, no Christmas dinner.

But then, a sudden chink in the curtains hitherto firmly drawn in front of the window of opportunity! A call arrives from a person at the BBC, possibly male although as the voice is barely broken it's hard to tell, informing me that it would be 'plugtastic' if I were to promote the next series of Ed Reardon's Week by travelling to Broadcasting House at my own expense from Berkhamsted and recording some 'bijou trailerettes' - argot I thought had disappeared with Round the Horne, so presumably this is an example of post-post-post-modernism.

I have no need of Skype or whatever asinine nomenclature it goes under to be able to picture this offensively salaried creature: betrainered feet up on the desk (undoubtedly the only use for it) and shortie scarf knotted invitingly at the throat. However, I do not quite justifiably slam the 'phone down, my usual reaction, as a metaphorical lightbulb has appeared above my head - albeit only 30 watts and one which I'm obliged to carry with me from kitchen to bathroom, the finances being what they are. Entering the BBC on official business means a one-day badge, and to an old pro like myself that also means Access To All Areas.

If I were to set out early enough that would give me time to find a route from the studio - traversing the wasteland of football tables, cartoon furniture and empty work-stations like a modern-day Patrick Leigh Fermor - to the ultimate destination of the BBC Radio Theatre where doubtless some thoroughly undeserved Christmas party should be in full swing. Or failing that the recording of an episode or two of Brain of Britain, where it will be possible both to scoff at the appalling ignorance on display and fall asleep in comfortable warmth.

So: Check-list for the day ahead. Padabag sewn inside overcoat - it protects the pockets from anything too greasy and keeps purloined sausage rolls or pieces of sushi intact. Home-made 'Out of Order' sign for the train toilet to allow free travel (carefully remembering to take a choice of two, one in italic lettering in case it's a Virgin Pendolino). A last look outside to check that Roger Bolton isn't coming up the hill - when Feedback isn't on the air he's always on the cadge for a couple of drinks and a chance to put the world to rights.

And - over the top!

Ed Reardon is an author, pipe smoker, consummate fare-dodger and master of the abusive e-mail

• Ed is back in a new series of Ed Reardon's week, written by Andrew Nickolds and Christopher Douglas, on 10 January and you can hear his Edinburgh special 'An Audience with Ed Reardon' on 3 January at 1130.
• The picture is by Mary Thompson. Some rights reserved.
• More pics of Ed on Flickr.