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Casual, overstuffed, septic, weary, rousing, derelict and writhing are just a few of the words Morris Telford uses to describe his quest for the Olympian ideal.

I talked to Martin for the best part of 120 miles and although he was very nice, and his sister who owns a guest house, has five cats, drives a Ford Sierra and likes to do jigsaws also sounds very nice,

I didn't find out a single unusual, interesting, fascinating or sordid fact about him, his life, his family or his friends.

Just 120 miles of very mundane facts about him, his life, his family and his friends. 120 miles of his sister's varicose veins, his stamp collecting, his recent kitchen extension, his new frost free fridge freezer and his love of brown bread. 120 miles of chit chat.

Fortunately I was able to turn the conversation around to my own personal quest for world betterment and even though I say so myself, from then on the standard of conversation rocketed in quality.

I decided while Martin was telling me about his recent shopping trip to Manchester, where he bought a pair of trousers, a jumper and a calendar with some kittens on it, that I would go to Athens first.

The Olympics is on there at the moment and I can combine telling people that the example set by the folk of Shropshire is the only one to follow, with setting the record straight about where the modern Olympics originated.

I thought I might compete in something too while I'm there.

I do still have my Tupperware box full of Shropshire soil with me, it was securely strapped to my calf.

The quickest flight I can get to Athens will get me there in two days, which means I'll miss the first 16 days of the Olympics, but I'm sure that's mostly just warm up races.

Met an old lady with a septic hand. She had cut it two months ago while grating some cheese and despite the best efforts of iodine, antibiotics and several highly trained medical professionals had been unable to stop it getting infected.

She showed me her hand as she was changing the dressing and I saw immediately that the green tinged wound was exactly the shape of my homeland, Shropshire. Like a little aerial map of the county boundaries mapped out in scabs and pus, it was breathtakingly beautiful.

I congratulated the old lady on her wound and took a couple of photos. She asked me to leave at first, as people often do, but I won her round and convinced her that people in Shropshire will pay good money to see such a wonder.

...mapped out in scabs and pus...

Now she promised me she is going to fly to Shropshire and see if she can get a sponsor, maybe a tour of village halls or agricultural fairs. I'm glad she met me; she might never have known the miracle she was concealing under her bandage.

I wonder how many other modern miracles go unnoticed just because people aren't looking in the right places? I remember once Old Bob said he'd found a mole with three heads in his field, he thought it was a sign so he took it to the vicar to se if he could get the mole consecrated or something.

The vicar confirmed that it was not a three-headed mole but just a particularly furry potato. It didn't stop Old Bob charging five pounds a go to stroke it, he made a tidy sum from me that year.

I'm probably one of the few travellers that really enjoys it when planes are delayed. I'm in no rush to go anywhere, I just want to meet people, help them, educate them and maybe convince them to move to Shropshire.

An airport lounge full of weary travellers is a captive orchard of audience apples ripe for the taking.

Now I've been travelling for a while, I also have a wealth of interesting stories to tell and so I spent the day telling a large group of Asian tourists all about the past 41 weeks, all about my one quest and they listened to me, they actually sat looking up at me as if I was Hans Christian Anderson and they were pre-schoolers.

I felt like Alan Whicker at a dinner party, full of witty anecdotes and wry observations, I may start doing bookings as an after dinner speaker when I retire from saving the world.

There were a couple of hecklers, but I found myself able to come back at them, fell them with witty retorts. One man shouted "Shut Up, I'm trying to sleep" and I replied in a manner Oscar Wilde or Noel Coward would have been proud of, "Then go to sleep, I'm trying to talk."

Another said "Why don't you give it a rest?" and I countered "No, these people want to listen to me and might be able to turn their lives around with information about Shropshire, why don't you give it a rest" and I emphasised the "you".

I was on fire.

I was a little disappointed when the group of Asians that had been listening to me turned out to be comatose.

They had all sat in a circle around me to listen, and had a mass allergic reaction to some chicken sandwiches they had all bought from a burger van outside the airport. I had mistaken the onset of asphyxia for attentive grins.

I also tried to arrange a sprinting contest up and down the aisle and managed to get two quite enthusiastic relay teams together from a contingent of Bathroom Fitting salesmen from Wales before the co-pilot came out and shouted at us.

I then tried to lead a rousing sing along by humming the tune from "Chariots of Fire", loudly and repeatedly into the tannoy system, but again my endeavours were foiled by the cabin crew, they really don't understand do they?

I arrived at the Olympic stadium and there were all sorts of fireworks and dancing and singing, but very little athletics going on.

It turns out the Olympics only lasts 16 days.

It's just finished.

Paula Radcliffe, unable to conceal her disappointment at Morris's late arrival

Which is very disappointing and a major setback in my Olympic dream of a triple gold for Shropshire. Not only will I now have to wait 4 years for the Winter Olympics, I'll have to learn to ski as well.

I spent the rest of the evening outside the stadium exits with a big sign telling people how they had been lied to about the birthplace of the Olympics and giving out directions to Much Wenlock. Not a complete disaster though, I met a man who could set fire to his ears.

He was called Stanos and reminded me of Ian Tennant, only less angry. Stanos makes a living by getting run over. He stands at a busy Athenian junction and throws himself at the sides of passing cars, falls to the ground in agony and hopes the motorist stops.

Most of the time the agony is imagined, he fakes the writhing and screaming, but occasionally he misjudges the feint and the car really hits him. This adds to the authenticity of his performance but makes it more difficult for him to put in a full days work.

Stanos has his work ethic all worked out. He tells me that about 40 percent of drivers stop and see how he is, of those 40 percent, about 25 percent admit liability, and of those 25 percent, about half will pay in cash there and then rather than get involved in legal or insurance hassles.

So for every twenty times Stanos throws himself at a car, one person gives him money. Considering that, on a single weekday in rush hour traffic, he can get hit by over a hundred cars, that's at least 25 payouts a week, with weekends off for hospital treatment, skin grafts and bone pins.

Free enterprise is alive and well in modern Greece.

I offered to cover for Stanos while he had a tea break. I did quite well, I was successfully struck by a people carrier, three hatchbacks and a van.

Unfortunately, not one of them stopped.