- Details
Breakfast with Debbie who also slept late and then the day on The Lady, securing a router and the correct bit to make my new canopy groove before inside to an aggrieved Diana as Geoffrey Howe calls off his South African visit as Botha refuses to see hime and the Haringey report on the Tottenham riots criticises police actions
A restless night trying to get the temperature right and also thinking of something, but I know not what. I dreamt that I bought somebody else’s swimming pool and that I was trying to make sense of owning a pool at their house by trying to rent it commercially to swimmers! Late getting washed and dressed and down a half hour after the appointed time. I collected Debbie on the way down, who had also slept late and so we had a ‘brown-eyes’ breakfast together that stopped her being upset at being left behind.
- Details
A long day restoring Lady Martina’s cockpit running channels with a break for a fine roast pork lunch and tea of scones and cake with Daniel serving his Sunday detention as the ex-Philippine President Marcos refuses to go, Ian McGregor British Steel and Coal hatchet man is being suggested to head the NHS and Nigel Mansell wins the French Grand Prix
A lay in today and not awake and up until 8.00am. Showered, dressed and down for my fried breakfast before feeding the doves. A bright start to the day and so I carefully peeled back the covers on The Lady and let the woodwork dry out again. Today I spent my time filling the recess in The Lady with mahogany stopper and then fashioning the new wood to form the repairs to the cockpit channel. It was a long and difficult job, hand sawing through 5”x2” mahogany to a length of 6 feet, with a taper one way and an angle the other! Was the whole morning and much of the afternoon to do it and then drilled the screw holes up and across.
- Details
An earful of grievances about our new lifestyle from Diana after our morning romp before she went shopping with the girls and I carried on with my chores until all together for a poor lunch at The Happy Eater and then a session in our swimming pool later as Bishop Tutu rebuffs Sir Geoffrey Howe with more deaths in South Africa indicating the futility of his approach without policy change
Awake early and well rested after an earlier night. I awoke Diana for a romp and then sat and wrote up yesterday’s journal until breakfast. Di then made us late by giving me a dialogue on her discontent – she is missing our Sunday outings of last year, our trips to the cinema and is finding the chores of the large house a bit demanding. Down to breakfast of nice warm croissants, with apple juice to drinks. I fed the doves and let the ducks out and, when Di took the girls shopping and Daniel went to school, I sat down to my papers and spent the morning typing correspondence and watching the cricket on TV at the same time. It was a wet start to a damp day and the gardens are getting a much needed drink of fresh rain, after weeks of heat and drought.
- Details
Off to Peacock’s Auctions in Bedford after checking the doves and swimming pool and then back to Lady Martina to find its wood damp after the rain and Debbie has Briana to swim but Daniel was not in the mood to join them. Some letter writing and to hear news of more South African shootings and protests as over a thousand union officials are imprisoned, the policeman who shot infant John Shorthouse is cleared and 50 women police officers walk out at Risley Remand Centre
Sound asleep again when brought my morning tea, but soon up and washed/dressed ready for breakfast. I wore my new jacket and trousers this morning, ready to go out with Di to Bedford, in preference to dressing rough for another day’s work on The Lady. Breakfast of wheat flakes (which even Daniel preferred to Co-op own-brand corn flakes) and then out to feed the doves. All’s well with them at the moment, but two pairs are incubating pairs of eggs that should produce chicks just when we are due off on the boat in a couple of weeks. I also checked the swimming pool, where the additions of yesterday had managed to restore the chlorine level again, after the high use and hot weather of late. A little time with my paperwork in the office, particularly looking at today’s post and papers, then loaded up and ready to leave for our expedition.