AT last the real reason for Terry's closure can be revealed. Reader Simon Eldritch has been sent a press release explaining the decision, which he kindly forwarded to the Diary.

"The directors of Kraft Foods realised three years ago that by 2005 it would be almost impossible for York residents to receive dental treatment on the NHS," it begins. "In keeping with our Quaker tradition of social responsibility, Kraft Foods decided that the only option was to close the factory.

"By moving production to Eastern Europe, we knew that this would cause a backlash and result in the boycotting of Terry's high-sugar products such as York Fruits and Chocolate Orange, therefore reducing tooth decay in the mouths of York's population.

"This was the only option available to Kraft Foods to enable the company to carry out its aims as stated in the in-house 'Save York's Teeth!' campaign, after the previous option of the secret fluoridation of the company's products ran into legal difficulties.

"In addition, we have decided to use the £50 million proceeds of the sale of the site in York to build turnip farms and buy 500,000 one-way tickets to England to use as wages for our Eastern European comrades in choccy."

AS predicted, more on the Diary's tour of the Museum of Psychic Experience. While exploring the Stonegate attraction, visitors undertake various tasks designed to calibrate their psychic powers.

Andrew, our guide, told us both the Soviets and the CIA employed "psychic spies", who used powers of heightened perception to "see" what their enemies were up to.

Our own potential to be psychic spies was then tested. We were asked to imagine a photograph which was to be randomly selected, placed in a file and opened later in the tour. Then we had to draw what came into our heads.

This was to gauge our group's ability to see into the future - which, as it turned out, was laughably poor.

A few minutes later electrodes were strapped to your diarist's head to look for brainwaves ("don't worry, it's very sensitive equipment", quipped Andrew). Disconcertingly, my brainwaves were more active when my eyes were shut and my body relaxed than when supposedly fully alert.

Tomorrow: a tour of our auras.

YORK Art Gallery once had the chance to buy LS Lowry's A View Of York, painted in 1952, for £50. Now it is on sale again - for £400,000. Having studied Lowry's smudgy, badly composed picture reproduced in last night's Press, the Diary would respectfully suggest that the art gallery was right with its original decision.

A YEAR ago today, the Rainbow Peace Hotel closed. Previously known as the White Swan Hotel in Piccadilly, York, it was renamed by the group of squatters who turned it into a symbol of renewal and community spirit.

Their intervention shamed the hotel's absentee owners into cleaning up the exterior of the building. Are members of the Rainbow coalition still around? Plenty of other York eyesores would benefit from their direct approach.

LIFE'S little ironies... the longest word in a new dictionary of phobias is hipomonsteresquipedalophobia - the fear of reading or saying long words.

Write to: The Diary, Chris Titley, The Evening Press, 76-86 Walmgate, York YO1 9YN

Email diary@ycp.co.uk

Telephone (01904) 653051 ext 337

Updated: 11:10 Thursday, May 20, 2004