Back to Heronshaw to hear the bad news of Daniel’s car being stolen
Back to Heronshaw to hear the bad news of Daniel’s car being stolen

A very busy day after a very late night, driving to Norwich to collect the necessary calculations from the structural engineer and then the piling log plans from Amis some time later in Horning. Off to North Walsham and some time in town appreciating the old corn exchange building until Mr Cooper arrived back and accepted my plans.

Back to Heronshaw to hear the bad news of Daniel’s car being stolen but, there being nothing I could do to help, the drive back to Paxton to review canvassing progress. Realising that candidate John had not delivered the key leaflets I helped him until the job was done in Paxton today, leaving Southoe and Diddington to be done very early in the morning

I was awake at a reasonable time despite my very unreasonable retiring time, and this enabled me to get ready to leave for Norfolk after a normal breakfast. I drove steadily, arriving in Norwich first and going to the office of David Townsend to collect the additional page of calculations that the council wanted. There being no conflict within them with my new plans, I then went on to the Xerox copying centre and got copies of them for the council, before driving on to Heronshaw to meet up with Amis for the piling log and specifications. Unfortunately, they had been delayed in arriving on site after completing another job and I was left kicking my heels for a while.

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As I tidied up the boat a bit and did a few other things, Jack Edwards arrived to post me a Parish Magazine and I invited him in to the Heronshaw lounge and we chatted about wherries and other Norfolk things of interest before it was time for us both to attend to our lunch. Jack was off to The Black Horse, and I drove into Wroxham to get a couple of nice pieces of fried plaice for mine. As I arrived back, an Amis man brought the piling details I needed and so I was able to go back to Wroxham to get it copied and then on to North Walsham to see Mr Cooper, of North Norfolk Building Control. He was out on his rounds and so I took a walk around this "town" and stopped at a cafe for some afternoon tea. North Walsham is a nice little place, bustling with country people in its small traditional shopping streets around its marketplace and old "corn-exchange-moot"-type building. This latter structure was restored some years ago as being nationally important and is the focal point for the settlement.

Cooper eventually returned from his rounds, after I had to wait for a while further, and this time he was courteous and helpful and accepted the drawings for further study with the words that "if I had addressed all of the queries then they should be all right" which still left the matter open. Back to Heronshaw but, there being no sign of Amis, I locked up and made my way back home. We had some bad news today, Di having heard from Daniel that his car was stolen in the Anglia Square cinema car park yesterday evening. I telephoned Daniel to see if there was anything that I could do to help him, but he had seen the police and was hoping to get it back; though fearing that it would be found stripped of all its stereo and hi-fi equipment. And so back home where there were more canvas cards awaiting my arrival and the mail was beginning to pile up under the combined delays of election and boat-shed work.

I had asked my colleagues to submit their manning schedules and lists of polling-day volunteers to me by this evening and I had received those for Priory with Paxton and Eaton on their way for later in the evening. I then realised that John had not yet got out the target letters to "probable and undecided" voters and so found him in Gordon Road and worked with him to ensure that all of those for Paxton were delivered by this evening, with Southoe and Diddington to be done very early in the morning. I used my bicycle to get round the smaller roads all over Paxton and John went by car and on foot, until we both met up back at my house after dark. To bed quite tired after all of the work and lost sleep.