The day working on my security system and caring for the children whilst Diana shopped and then the evening hosting a dinner party and trying not to be tantalised by Linda’s daring dress barely concealing her fascinating body. This as Heseltine turns Westland into challenge to Thatcher , Ulster Unionists failing to control the violence of their extreme members and emerging fears of Libya’s Gaghafi being behind European airport attacks
A fair night, with calls of nature disrupting the first part of it. Awake to morning tea, but had to find the paper and post myself at each end of the building. I will have to rationalise the letter boxes, once the building work is complete. Mr Cheeseborough had phoned last night and they will be starting as planned on Monday. Quickly showered and dresses for work, I took a cereal breakfast for a change, before getting down to work on the alarm system. First to straighten the shower room by stapling the two wires into the entry recess and then around the floor, under the candlewick carpet. Then to the playroom, where, by lunchtime, I had wired up another junction box in the corner and stapled wires in all directions; to the shower room, French doors and playroom/west hall door.
Diana had done a lot of shopping this morning – getting straw for the ducks at last, a half dozen bags of granular salt for the water softener and layers pellets for the ducks; besides all of her food shopping. I looked after the kids as well as worked for most of the time. Lunch of pie, chips and beans and to agree terms of £2.50 for Daniel’s efforts this morning in cleaning out the ducks and moving all else about. This afternoon to install pressure mats in the dining room and on the west stairs, contacts on both playroom doors, until eventually all of circuit #3 was complete. Also outside to run cables for #3 & #4 through the rear hall and tie them under the balcony, before the builders panel it in. By this time it was nearly 7.30pm and, with guests expected at 7.45pm onwards and the house in a mess, a mad panic to get showered, changed and ready. Poor Di was angry at the state of the house and piles of dust and wire clippings and we were both relieved that nobody arrived early. First was Caroline, Marilyn’s daughter, shortly followed by a youth, who was admitted as her ‘friend’. This came as a shock as we were not expecting the babysitter to have a companion and we had known her previous boyfriend quite well. No time to query it as both other couples, to be our partners to dinner, arrived at the front and back doors simultaneously. We ushered them out to the cars and set off rather cramped in my Jaguar to the restaurant for dinner. We shed our coats for drinks and the girls dresses were the first topic of conversation. Poor Helen (literally) had bought a new red dress for the occasion, but was sadly eclipsed by an even brighter dress for Linda. Daringly, it had a deep low back and her braless breasts, shaped nicely with proud nipples on a cold night, made an equally sexy front elevation. Too close attention was out of order on such a formal occasion and so I limited myself to a few glances and muted expressions of admiration. Strange how some girls like to fade drably into the background and others set out to attract, fascinate and impress. And ironic, the wisdom of the old adage that the latter are best as girlfriends and the former to marry, with little compromise between the two. Her escort, Ian, who lives with her and is surrogate father to her two girls, has been trying to marry her and give her another child, but she declines this commitment, which puts him in a very difficult position. A pleasant enough evening and meal of no great moment and then home in a cramped car to relieve the babysitters. Given the chance, I would have relieved Linda of that red dress and answered a fascinating mystery – with such a low back, I could see what she was wearing under the top half (nothing), but what was she wearing under the bottom? I settled to the televised football after paying off the babysitters (£7). We had came back to find them looking around and this revises some thoughts I had been having on internal restrictions and security on these occasions. News today is of a large and messy pile-up on the icy January roads and of more wrangling over Westland. Heseltine had now developed the affair as a direct challenge to Thatcher’s method of laissez-faire government and has positioned himself as a worthy opponent, should the conservatives lose the next election. Tension rises over the recent airport attacks by Palestinian terrorists of Rome and Vienna airports and with growing suspicions of Libyan involvement. The US is elevating military options for launching a punishment attack on Gadhafi and this prospect has caused wide scale protests from the Middle East and Africa. A mob of unionist protestors attacks RUC constables and vehicles after an anti-Anglo-Irish secretariat demonstration and mainstream unionist leaders are unable to prevent UVF extremists amongst the crowd from using violence. The weather will continue rather cold, but not too extreme.