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Off to Bedford and the auctions on another busy day for the builders and then to unload a stone sink and to tidy the gardens of building materials with me just surviving any further injury to my sore back before I worked on my troublesome video tapes. This as the hanging of Benjamin Moloise had brought universal condemnation and outrage in South Africa but still Thatcher holds out against supporting the international community’s condemnation and call for sanctions but her Majesty, the Queen hosts Commonwealth dignitaries aboard the Royal Yacht Britannia despite a squall of a totally different kind
Up to my morning tea and to lay down again afterwards, which I have taken to doing lately so as to ease my back. It has mended quite well in the last few days, but I still try to protect it as much as possible. Down to breakfast of toast and fruit juice, but orange to drink this morning; we have run out of apple as Di has not managed to do the shopping. Then a while reading the Investors Chronicle and FT before out to the doves and ducks. The birds were hungry this morning, the cooler nights mean they must eat more to stay warm. The builders were there early after 8.15am this morning. Six of them were bricklaying and assisting (in two pairs of two) and also demolishing more of the internal brickwork for building preparation. Then off to Bedford alone for the Peacocks auction and a long morning waiting for my lots to come up.
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Another busy and dry day for the builders to work bricklaying walls and the chimney stack whilst I take Diana for a trip to Bedford with Della to choose Doulton lambethware and then tackle Daniel on his lack of interest in other school activities with threats of sanctions over Jason and his computer access. This, as South Africa decides to hang black poet/leader Benjamin Moloise and incenses the UN and the Commonwealth Leaders Conference but Thatcher still resists sanctions
Awake to my tea on a slightly more chilly morning and then I sit with the light on and curtains closed to catch up on yesterday’s paper and then start reading todays. It is now darker in the mornings. Down to breakfast and Daniel scrambles out rather late to only just catch his school bus. Two slices of toast this morning as a special treat because they were wafer thin! Out then with Della to feed the doves and ducks, collecting only one duck egg for our pains. I will have to use Della’s lead again as she wonders more and more. To the office for a little while to check for mail and my accounts and then back to take Diana off to Bedford to do some shopping. We first have a coffee together and then she has a look round the shops as I view the auction. A few things of interest – particularly an ancient stone sink and quite old pair of garden urns. Also a mahogany bed/back rest, made by a similar construction to my folding chairs. Lastly there was one extending oak table and, to my surprise, Di quite liked it and I shall return to bid for them tomorrow.
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Starting the day with a birthday treat and presents for Diana and then the ‘bird-feeding walk’ with Della before the builders arrive in force as both Diana’s parents and my own visit her as she goes to help organise the local Keep Fit class with children’s’ toys as Victoria Gillick loses the Lords appeal on supervising daughter’s contraception advice and the Italian government resigns after the Achille Lauro attack
Awake fairly early and, it being Diana’s birthday, I got up first and made the drinks. Then I went upstairs to Diana with the drinks, the family, and a tray of her presents for her to open in bed. A happy half hour with Diana enjoying the occasion and the children joining in the fun. I showered early and, after the normal breakfast, was outside rather early for the doves at 8.30am. An hour or two then in the office calculating this year’s investment capital gains and then I had to take Della out for a walk to both the doves and ducks. This time the doves were hungrier, but no eggs from the ducks today. The ‘bird feeding’ walks are getting longer and longer as Della keeps insisting on making detours up and down steps, stones and banks for walking practice. The builders arrived in force today. Six of them were occupied blocking up our existing kitchen door, building the new rear wall on our link building, erecting scaffolding and building up the chimney stack quite a bit more. They also stripped more plaster off of the new sitting room wall between the new window and fire place to make for a smoother future plaster finish and then the glazier called later to fit glass to our new windows.
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Dull and slightly damp day of progress with my Hayling View planning, investments and other administration but an unsatisfactory experience with my doctor’s surgery and then a struggle with Daniel over his schoolwork before we see many foreign cars featured in the Motor Show and contrast policing problems shooting demonstrators in South Africa with suffering crowd violence on Police in my former home of Tottenham and of threats to kill Ghandi when visiting Britain
A better night and then I sit up at the side of the bed to have my morning tea before laying down again afterwards. As I rest, I though how pleasant it was just to lie and think – as I could not read and the radio battery had also run out. Down to a breakfast of toast and fruit juice and then to the lounge to read my paper in my comfy swivel chair, before I shower and wash my hair. Not until 9.15am was I out to feed the doves and then a half hour sorting out the mess on my desk. Off after to the house and out to the ducks – 3 eggs today – and then in to St Neots by car for a visit to the doctor’s surgery for anti-tetanus booster injection. I waited ¾ of an hour and then got fed up with waiting and so insisted on leaving and making another appointment tomorrow. They have to be told sometimes, otherwise their service will deteriorate without complaint. Home and to hear that the architect was going to be late and so I settled into some more office work, reconciling my bank account and Abbey National account by the time he arrived. Then a meeting with Brian Cheesborough, the builder, and David Stokes, the architect, on the progress of the works. It seems that the scenario will be messy and they will need to get the upstairs bedroom wall replaced before the other bedrooms are ready and joined to the existing house.