Richard Westcott

Very rarely is my job dull.

One day I'm wading through flood water in someone's sitting room, trying to persuade them how good it would be to get up at 5am and appear on the telly. The next I'm testing a new hydrogen motorbike (hello to all you bikers out there).

I've seen the back rooms at Buckingham Palace, been down a re-opened coal mine in Hatfield, swung on a crane above the fire-wrecked Cutty Sark and rummaged around Richard Harris's room at the Savoy (it was a bit small). I've had a sit in Robin Gibb's Lamborghini Countach (it too was a bit small), as well as the original Batmobile and I've met a gang of metal detector enthusiasts in a car park in Derbyshire at six in the morning. It was a nightmare organising them because they kept putting their headphones on and wandering off to look for treasure. There's me and the cameraman, shouting into the darkness trying to tell them they are about to go live on the telly. In the end, the only thing of value they found wasn't suitable to show on a family programme.

Then there's the range of guests I meet, some very famous, most not, the majority of them either interesting or crackers or both. Everyone has a story to tell. The only thing that is certain, is the 4am alarm call. How I love that.

I don't really know how I got here. I was head vinyl porter at Allders of Bromley for bit, then worked in a bank, then in advertising. Frankly, I wasn't very good at any of it.

Like everyone I know, my job eats up most of my time, but it's still a welcome relief from looking after two young children, which is the most stressful thing I've ever done. Maybe mine are just more badly behaved than everyone else's. I thought they'd idolise me. Not a chance.