John Major made his speech at the Conservative Party Conference
John Major made his speech at the Conservative Party Conference

A day spent on personal activities with gardening and World Cup Rugby the priorities. This after catching up with the last two week's episodes of the "House of Elliott" twenties series and newspaper reports of the Tory party conference where they had not caught up in the opinion polls

I did not get a very good night's sleep as Diana insisted on having her side of the electric blanket on even though the unseasonable mildness had the room temperature of our bedroom at 70degC! Still, I was up quite early and was down to breakfast with the girls before Debbie set off for school, being carried in Diana's car to the bus stop in view of her load.

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I decided to get some exercise by way of gardening in the morning. The main task was to get on with making the shuttering for the new concrete path down by the river that had been defeating the gardener. Bill, the gardener, came this morning but only to cut a neighbour's hedge and not to do any work at The Hayling View. By lunchtime, I had completed the first stage ready for the concreting to begin. There then followed lunch and, after this, a long period of rest and relaxation as I sat and watched three World Cup Rugby matches on the television. The casualties of the play were the Welsh who played bravely against the Australians but lost just about every line-out and, with them, the match and so they exit the competition.

After tea, I got out the shredding machine and started to attack the pile of debris from the old compost heaps and then spread the results on to the heap by the summer house. The gardener seems reluctant to use the shredder and so the compost heaps are bigger than they need to be. Packed up at dusk and went into my office for a little while before bed. To bed at a reasonable time after the relaxation and relief of another television programme.

Earlier, I caught up with the last two week's episodes of the "House of Eliott" twenties series which I still find by far the most interesting on view at the moment. The weekend's newspapers are evaluating the results in political terms of the complete round of party conferences and it seems that the Tories have not managed to get ahead in the opinion polls. John Major made his speech at the Conservative Party Conference which was by way of stark contrast with the previous ones of Margaret Thatcher.