Let me confess, right at the start, that I am half pissed as I write this. Unfortunately, it is the upper half, which includes my brain. And, to be frank, I would never have read your journal had it not been for El Capitan Rudd, who was silly enough (despite Machiavelli's prescription) to declare himself in your pages with twaddle guaranteed to haunt him till time's end. Funny what an approval rate around 70% can do to a man.

So, bored - Friday evening; hiatus in home life - I have a go at the rest. John Hirst transports me. I hear the music. The children. The music, again. "What's that button do?" And I have found a man who has turned a demarcation dispute into a symphony, literally. Some call it an epiphany; my explanation is far more prosaic, more deterministic. But no one yet can fully explain the little tingle - arms and legs, all over - when you read something so Right.

Can't happen again, I thought. What the hell is a John van Tiggelen? Weirdly, I know these paysannes he paints in his piece. Hitching through the outback, working in the bush, I remember them from another age. Again, a John transports me. I smell it.

Is all your journal this good? Tingles for me? Statistically, probably not. I was a Bulletin subscriber, and I miss it sorely. But maybe, maybe, I've found something here. Something I can chew over. Meat. Goes well with the sauce. Thank you (hic!).