Of starfish, masochism and a final call

OK people. Der Tag minus 2 and counting. Forty-eight hours from now will find me girding what are left of my loins and heading towards my native town of Omagh. Shortly after getting there I will force my ageing body into two hours of serious pain which will end either with a discreet funeral (no flowers please) or my form collapsed in a corner of Omagh Leisure Centre sucking on a free bottle of Lucozade and trying not to slip into unconsciousness.

Either way it'll all be in, as they say, a good cause. I'm indulging in this masochism to raise some money for Trocaire, who do sterling work in the developing world. OK, OK, I know - it's all only scratching the surface of things, governments should be driving global reform, trade should be organised so that charities to developing countries become superfluous. But they aren't and it isn't.

It's like the man who came on this young boy on the beach.  There are hundreds of starfish hpelessly stranded in the sand and he's picking them up one by slow one and throwing them back in the water. The man says "I can see you've a kind heart but you do realise  there are thousands, maybe millions of these stranded starfish all along the coastline? What you're doing will really make no difference".  The kid picks up another starfish and lobs it back into the sea before replying: "Well, it made a difference to that one".

So please, please, PLEASE click your way to the donation site. You'll see my goal is £1000 - not a lot of starfish there - and I'm still that bit short of it. If you don't want to think of your contribution as pushing me over the line, think of it as pushing me over a cliff. OK? But. Just. Do. It. You'll be literally saving/making lives that, without you, would struggle to get through another day.

The site is   http://www.trocaire.org/sponsor-me/judejcollins/omagh-half-marathon

Time is running out. I'm in your hands.