Diana and I go our separate ways as she drives to Cambridge with the girls and I stay back to revive a poorly dove chick and then took Daniel to The Happy Eater for lunch as we fend for ourselves. The death toll due to the Cameroon disaster has already risen to 1,500 with thousands of their cattle dead also and back home it is the tail end of Hurricane Charlie that is causing all of this wind and rain and the coldest August for many years and has already led to five dead on the sea and rivers whilst in London violent crime figures are rising with rapes, muggings and attacks leading the way
Awoke first after a more reasonable night and eventually persuaded Di to get the morning drinks. Showered, shaved and also washed my hair for a change. Dressed and then breakfast, which was somewhat spoilt by Di wanting to go to Cambridge early today, while I wanted to wait to see if there was any play in the Test before going to Huntingdon later. She took the girls to Cambridge anyway and I first checked the doves. The remaining chick was quite chilled, as I could not get out to feed them in last night’s wind and rain, which meant its parents were out from dawn looking for food. I held it and took an hour reviving it by the boiler before putting it back with its parents. Strange to see how an apparently dead and cold chick can be brought back to life.
A rather miserable day, waiting on the Oval Test, but only a six-ball over was bowled all day – and that in two halves. In fact, there was no play whatsoever in any of the other 1st class cricket matches today. I put the en-suite back into order after last night’s varnishing, then tried doing some paperwork, but lacked concentration. Took Daniel to the Happy Eater for lunch, as we had to fend for ourselves and then we had a short shopping trip to St Neots to pick a few things up. The first Dixons shop is now open and two supermarket building sites are racing each other to completion to take over from the motley selection we have at the moment. Out later to check that the dove squab was all right and later still to put away the ducks. Still wild and wet and both our dinghies had half filled up with rain water, which was quite remarkable. Debbie went to Amy’s party this afternoon and I had to cancel her riding until tomorrow. Daniel played with his computer all day and we will start to hear from his friends again from tomorrow. I received a reply from RAF Alconbury to my complaint about recent aircraft noise, but it only contained the standard excuses. Managed to do some of my most effective paperwork this evening, as I also watched the first day of the European Athletic Championships on TV. The track athletes from Britain were qualifying easily for the final rounds, but the field athletes were eclipsed by stocky European women athletes, who looked every bit like men. News today was of continued natural disasters. The death toll of the gas escape in the Cameroons has been confirmed as over 1500 people and Britain is making encouraging noises about providing disaster aid, but is lagging some other Western nations in speed and amount. The storms and rain over Britain (which is the tail end of Hurricane Charlie that has come across the Atlantic) swept north today and caused the deaths in the sea and rivers of up to 5 persons in rough weather. It still rains this evening and, after seeing the state of some other rivers on TV and the rain that has fallen here, I quite expect the Great Ouse to flood if it keeps up. US President Reagan has been threatening Libya with new US bombing raids and the Alliance and Labour parties are pressing the Tory Government not to allow UK air bases for such an attack this time. Esso and BP have put petrol prices up by 5p again and they will now be charging £164.6p a gallon at the pump. London’s violent crime figures are still rising, with rapes, muggings and attacks all up by 8-12% in the last year. More strong rains and winds are forecast for tomorrow to continue what has been one of the coldest Augusts for many years.