Alistair Campbell

Addis Ababa The last time I was here was to cover the story of the mid-Eighties famine for the Mirror. The story was complicated by the fact that we had Robert 'Mercy Mission' Maxwell for company. I was summoned to the presence for a briefing by Captain Bob. 'First, we are going to save the starving. Second, we must do it in a low-profile way. And third, I want you to organise the TV coverage.' Once there, a photographer and I had to exhort him not to come with us to the famine-relief stations. The picture of big fat Bob with little dying babies was the kind of bad visual the non-Mirror media would have loved. We persuaded him to stay and annoy politicians in Addis instead. A few days later, we arrived back to a note from the Captain: 'My work here is done.

Good old Boris! What a guy! I write to ask him to sponsor my charity run in the London Marathon, and back comes the offer of 44Hp a word for a Spectator diary. So here it is (those last few words work out at more than 20p a letter - brilliant). And Boris being so personally loaded with his multimedia earnings, like columns, books, quiz shows, supermarket openings and appearances in Parliament, there's no doubt a big personal cheque to follow. Top man. Boris is not the only press magnate to respond to my appeal. Mark Seddon, editor of cash-strapped Tribune, has offered a great item for auction - George Orwell's stapler. Given Tribune's continuing financial problems, that really is an act of generosity. Bids for the said item, ladies and gentlemen, are now open.