Welcome to Gilbert and Jacob � a formidable array of skill across those 20 new diarising fingers.

Last night driving back I listened to a programme about tranquillity and its disappearance in England. Some Quango has been trying to map it � over time and show the extent to which the area of tranquillity has contracted. They believe there may be an island of tranquillity at Dunsfold. Up until then I thought this place was famous mainly for its near perfect Early English village church � although I must admit I did go there one Sunday afternoon to cool out during the stress years.

The aircraft from Gatwick are a major threat to Dunsfoldian tranquillity it seems. Vann is nearby - which I prefer � I think the Jekyll garden there with the statues may be properly tranquil � and the annual chamber concert is a good blow all round. In Canada you can learn how to do active listening by going on walks so that you better appreciate tranquillity when you encounter it. Everyone who learns the technique is surprised by how much sound is revealed even in the most mundane circumstances.

I woke quite late and still rather tired from last night�s driving.Drove into work strangely entanced by the 2pac CD James had left in the car In the office there was an EMail from Paul about the latest book of poetry J H Prynne which he has been sent a copy of and also more on his new novel and CD. The novel is about the notional linkage between Yves Klein and a Japanese conceptual artist in New York in the early 1960s � clearly mini-series material. I tried but failed to get the mp3 of BBC 500 to cross the Atlantic and the High Sierras.

EM from DfES about the Modern Apprenticeship Task Force � I replied in a bullish tone having taken advice from my boss. Gilbert mailed about the early Reich piece � he had listened again and revised his assessment of how much more was needed. Later on I revised the tuba part and put on some D Horn. It�s a kind of joke on Reich in that it has become cod Weberian ( with slight slide guitar implications ).

Snail mail from Barry about leadership with some points on my suggested approach to quantification - I responded to him point by point in the interests of digging deeper. Stefan has been taking soundings from the National LSC on the Centre of Vocational Excellence initiative and it sounds as if we might be looking at this pretty seriously. There was also a letter from the Institute of Logistics which seemed to offer an opening in a similar vein. Keith told me about the reception last night which I had to miss because of the visit to Hogwarts. Maybe that was a lucky escape.

I posted a piece on www.kwase-kwaza.org about Mbeki�s defence of the ANC record at the latest conference yesterday � they only hold them once every five years. He comes across as quite an uncharismatic figure.Its hard to tell why it is he doesn�t give action to counter the HIV/AIDS problem higher priority. Maybe it is simply because he is a materialist � the goals and goods that he recognises as intrinsically valuable don�t cover this case simply because much of the benefit is too intangible.

I mailed Peter Chatterton Rajan�s 90 page analysis of the threat to the world from combinations of addictions and certain diseases. I thought we might put it up on the site but I am not sure how this is best achieved.

James seems to have quite enjoyed Hoggwarts � one of the tutors taught at Cornell and fortunately James visited there on his US tour with Penny Chris and Alexis � so they were able to talk about the weather. James was able to relate the encirclement of the BEF in 1940 to the German tactics in Russia in 1941 and 1942 and to have disagreed with them on the relationship between the Kaiser and Bismark � the truth of which is anybody�s guess. Fortunately he seems to have known as much as anyone about the Poor Law � one of the essays he submitted � my suggestion on this was he tried to bring in Foucault but fortunately this desperate measure wasn�t needed. He was also quite uptodate on the German view of the teaching of 20C European history in 3rd Millenium British schools.

These dogdays before Christmas are not my favourites by a long chalk A lot of people sound very tired. Half a bottle of Chilean Merlot went down well.

In Sainsbury�s I bought some bathroom commodities and a Soul triple CD � reminded me how much I like the electronic percussion on Luther Vandross.