I'd be talking in a broad Australian accent, akin to Les Patterson, and trying to Australianise not just England but the whole, pardon my French, bloody island, promoting a British didg.,

That's more like the old Walkaboutsverse! Fighting talk! In fact, it moves me to reveal a little about our friend's early days in England. The first time I met WAV, he rolled into a singaround at The Cumberland Arms in Byker waving a machete round his head crying 'YOU WANT A KNIFE? THIS IS AN EFFING KNIFE, YOU POM FAIRIES!' then proceeded to lob it at the darkboard scoring bullseye from twenty paces. Impressed? You bet, even if he did proceed to accompany every song on his didgeridoo and no, not one of us dared say anything, largely on account of aforementioned machete. Thereafter I would see him around, wrestling crocodiles on the streets of Newcastle, trading platypus pelts in the Grainger Market, or whoring around Sandgate and the Bigg Market, brawling and boozing his way into the lasting affections of Canny Newcastle. I have fond memories of The Walkaboutsverse Bush Tucker Mess Tent - a sort of free-form al-fresco tabernacle he'd pitch up on Northumberland Street to give McDonald's a run for its money. It gave me a taste for the Wattle Seed, Quandon, Lemon Myrtle, Kurrajong Flour, Macadamia Nuts, Warrigal Greens and Illawarra Plums that still form an essential part of my cooking today, not to mention the Kangaroo steaks, Kangaroo Tail Soup, Wallaby Stew, Emu eggs, Emu, Witchetty Grubs, Bugs and Yabbies. I tell you - WAV brought that real Outback Vibe to Tyneside; and he had it, he had us, right there in the palm of his hand. But he blew it, by getting into folk music and thus did this once proud and heroic repatriate lose his naturalised Australian culture and humanity and, as we all know, when a man loses his culture, society suffers. It breaks my heart to see him like this, a once proud Bush Man, who could recite Henry Lawson with the best of them, and here he is growing ever softer on pottages, stottie, chips and mead.

By the way, WAV - I've still got that picture you gave me all those years ago; I might look at it from time to time to remind myself of the sort of man you used to be. I hope you don't mind me sharing it with my fellow Mudcatters so they might get a flavour of just what has been lost here. WAV as he was in his pre-folk glory.

They thought of the far-away grave on the plain,
They thought of the comrade who came not again,
They lifted their glasses, and sadly they said:
`We drink to the name of the mate who is dead.'
And the sunlight streamed in, and a light like a star
Seemed to glow in the depth of the glass on the bar.