Britains outgoing European Commissioner Lord Cockfield has been openly critical of Thatchers lack of commitment to the European cause
Britains outgoing European Commissioner Lord Cockfield has been openly critical of Thatchers lack of commitment to the European cause

I spent the first few hours of the New Year working on my AppleScan facility until 2:30am but I still rose in time to resume writing yesterday’s Journal in the conservatory before 9 AM Before going outside to clean the car ready for our trip to London. All afternoon and evening, working on my computer to progress my history project and then clearing things away ready for Joan to clean whilst we are away in London. Revelling yobs have been causing problems overnight in New Year celebrations, the search for Lockerbie bodies continues and another ferry capsizes off of Brazil, hopefully overcrowded. The New Year’s Honours list is packed full of knighthoods for Thatcher’s political and business cronies

This was a new week, month and year and I spent the first few hours of it working hard on my computer, wrestling with the AppleScan facility for inputting documents. Success, and thus sleep followed at 2:30am. I slept well and awoke at 7am feeling very hot as I left my electric blanket on! I chose to get up and showered etcetera before my enjoying my fried breakfast and then spent much time in the conservatory before 9am writing up this last day’s Journal. I returned afterwards to finish the job and feed the fish. I see they have recovered from gorging themselves and I am now adopting the technique of feeding them as much as they can manage in 10 minutes and then leaving them still looking for food, which is healthier. The weather is still unseasonably mild and so I made up my mind to spend an hour this morning alone cleaning the car. There was no Daniel to help me and so it was the only way in which it could be done and presentable for our trip to London.

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In fact, it took an hour and a half and then I took my coffee to my desk and got straight down to my history work. I worked all afternoon and evening but ran into difficulty and had to give up in the end. The task of making a full copy of my 30Mbyte of hard disk storage would take more than 40 diskettes fed in one after another! Then my computer was behaving strangely, and I could not get any help on the telephone and so I gave up and spent the rest of the evening tiding my office, fireproof safe and finally changing the alarm system codes so that Joan could enter the property in our absence when we are away in London. The fish were well this evening and feeding normally again and I will be more careful from now on. Their news today is of the New Year celebrations with crowds of violent youths causing problems in city centres. In the Lockerbie search, one more body has been dug from the crater and, with the US relatives of the bereaved getting impatient for the release of bodies, the investigation and search grind slowly on. Another ferry capsized – this time in Brazil waters – after being hopelessly overcrowded with revellers celebrating the New Year in rough waters. The New Year in Israel has seen the devaluation of the shekel due to the cost of the military and civil action against the Palestinians. Inflation is at 17% and rising on public expenditure cuts seem certain to be on the way. The New Year’s Honours list is packed full of knighthoods for Thatcher’s political and business cronies and it seems to get more blatant by the year