Debbie and Della were enjoying the swimming pool today
Debbie and Della were enjoying the swimming pool today

Inside on this cold and frosty morning compiling my third and final leaflet for my election campaign before Michael Pope came by to help canvass this afternoon. The swimming pool was gaining heat gradually and steaming in the cold air but this did not stop Debbie and Della swimming! The plane hijack goes on, but some progress as a Kuwaiti Royal hostage is released and some Tories rebel in the House of Commons to force some Poll Tax concessions as as Wall Street plummets 100 points and reverses earlier gains in London to losses of equal value as the US trade gap widens by over $13 million

Was earlier to bed last night and I appreciated it this morning. Up, showered and dressed, but still last to the breakfast table on a very cold and frosty morning. The swimming pool was steaming because of the temperature difference. This morning, I stayed in the office typing up and composing my third and last leaflet. It is a block-busting A3 newsletter, playing on all of the issues and comments I have heard on the doorsteps, which will be very difficult for Jeanette Green to combat. After lunch I typed it out and pasted it out ready for Bill Walton to typeset this weekend. Michael Pope came over to help me canvass this afternoon and we found the first Tory poster up on the back of a caravan in the High Street. It looked quite lonely! After tea, I took Debbie horse riding to Offord. She was in the outside school on Rumpold and held her end up quite well amongst older riders. It was cold outside as the sun went down, with the sky clear. She and Della had gone swimming in our pool today, even though the pool was only 65degF and the air 55degF.

Daniel hopped in and out briefly – he is getting as soft as me and Di now, as it was too chilly for him! It is rather too full of algaecide at the moment, which gives Debbie's legs a rash, but it will soon get diluted in time. The rest of this evening I was out canvassing again with Michael Pope. We saw Jeanette Green, my Tory opponent, in Southoe, but still no leaflets delivered in the three villages. She must be still intending to have only a single leaflet campaign. Tonight I liaised with John Matthewman over getting my A3 leaflet printed and typeset and I am due to go over to Cambridge in the morning to deliver the artwork and get some more ‘out’ slips printed for urgent needs. Stayed up a little to calm down after the tension of today’s electioneering and also watched a nice angling programme on TV about catching Barbel on the Hampshire Avon. News tonight is of the plane hijack going on, but some progress as a Kuwaiti Royal hostage is released. Elsewhere, the accord for Eastern Block troops withdrawing from Afghanistan has been signed with the US, which means more progress for East/West relations. Faced with a Tory revolt in the House of Commons by some 50 MPs, the government has announced a Poll Tax concession on the rebate percentages and headed off some problems for the time being. A surprising turn of events on the world’s stock exchanges, as Wall Street plummets 100 points and reverses earlier gains in London to losses of equal value. All this as the US trade gap widens by over $13 million and the dollar plummets.