A very exciting day. A launch, a police chase and a birth, all in the space of 24 hours.

It started after breakfast, when I picked up Rich at the train station and we buzzed up to Harold Hill for the launch of Link FM. It was the first radio station on which I ever had my own show, fifteen years ago.

Of course, back then it wasn’t a full-time station, but I was back every summer to do what became a regular slot, and helped out with the first application for a full-time license. We failed. And then again the second time around. And the third. Finally, though, it’s got itself a full-time broadcasting license, and today - Good Friday - was launch day.

It came into range as we crossed the Havering border, and we listened in to the countdown on the test transmission as we got closer and closer. We arrived at 11h58 - two minutes to launch - so sat in the car to hear it go live and then headed inside for a glass of champagne and a chat with familiar faces in the studios.

It felt good to be back, even if I wasn’t on the presenting roster this time around. But we had jobs to do, and so stayed only for an hour to see Dave get into the 13h news, then headed back to Chelmsford for DIY supplies for the house before Andrew came around and pulled the worst of the straggly plants out of my flower beds. He spent two hours weeding and trimming and mowing the lawns and by the time he left, three mugs of tea later, the place looked a whole lot better.

Mum was very excited - Sal had texted to say her waters had broken.

Not long after they’d gone, as we were getting ready to head out, we heard a muffled crump. I was looking out of the back window, and as the crump sounded, all the electricity poles leading off down the road shook wildly, the cables swinging back and forth. The neighbours rushed out into the street, and a man tried to walk casually through them from the direction of the park. They tried to stop him, but he broke free and ran off, pursued by the men while their wives pointed the police, in hot pursuit, in the same direction.

The women walked down to the end of the street to inspect a van that had crashed into the electricity pole, and been the cause of all the wobbling and swaying, and when we went out ten minutes later we passed another policeman speaking into his radio, explaining to the station that the van had been stolen, and crashed by the thief.

We walked on into town, past two further police cars just pulling up, to meet with the usual Good-Friday-meal crowd. Spanish this year, after last year’s disappointing Greek tragedy (we’ve already pencilled in Armenian for next year).

By now I was getting hourly updates on the labour as Sal texted mum from the hospital and she relayed it to me. Arrived at hospital, contractions every ten minutes… Contractions five minutes apart… Still on the maternity ward. No beds available… Contractions three minutes apart. Moving to delivery room…

And then, just gone 11, a call, instead of a text, to announce that I was the uncle of a healthy baby boy called Will. Seven pounds 11 ounces, born at 22h23.

I should probably have bought champagne, but instead I drained the sangria, finished reading The Hungry Caterpillar, which had been brought along to entertain Jude and wasn’t nearly so intellectually engaging as I had remembered, and then stumbled off down the road to find my bed as we all said goodbye on the banks of the river, agreeing to meet up again on Eurovision night.

All in all, then, a highly eventful day, as I say.

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