Catching up with care and gardening for The Hayling View with the aid of Daniel and his friends Gary and Steve after the failures of our gardener whilst we were away. Debbie went to see her precious Sundance this morning but, as there was a good hack going in the afternoon, she worked around the stables and saved him for then.
Britain were doing well in the European Athletics Championships, 237 British women and children in Iraq and Kuwait were being gathered together in a Baghdad hotel in the hope of being freed by Sadam as the UN Secretary-General Peres de Cuellar met the Iraqi Foreign Minister for "an exchange of views".
Today was a day for catching up on the gardening. Due to the poor attentions of our gardener, the garden was in a very sorry state; parched and untended. The overnight rain did a little good, but I had a mountain to climb today. Daniel had his friends Gary and Steve staying last night and so I propositioned them over breakfast and employed them for three hours each at an hourly rate of £3.50 per hour. I had Gary cutting the games lawn and then edging all of the lawns. Steve was cutting the hedges and Daniel was mowing the rest of the lawns. I concentrated on supervising them and kept them hard at it but also got them a couple of glasses of orange squash each to keep their liquids up on what became a very hot day again.
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I also took the dead leaves off of the conservatory plants and flower baskets and watered them all thoroughly as well as putting the fishpond and swimming pool to rights. The boys stayed for lunch as well and, after that, I did a little work in my office dealing with a few action items. I only scratched the surface really and have another mountain to climb there tomorrow. Debbie went to see her precious Sundance this morning but, as there was a good hack going in the afternoon, she worked around the stables and saved him for then. Her pony has had very sore feet due to the poor consideration of her riding mate, Lisa Drake, who rode Sundance actively on the hard ground despite being warned that he was in such pain that it could end him being ridden for good.
This evening, I watched the coverage of the European Athletics Championships on TV and then returned to the garden to give it as thorough soaking with the hoses and sprinklers that I could manage. Britain are doing quite well in the athletics and may yet win a record tally of gold medals. East Germany, however, have more and, when their team becomes combined with the West Germans, it will be unbeatable. I managed to get further up to date with my electronic journal later tonight to give me more of a chance to catch up with my other work tomorrow.
The news tonight is of 237 British women and children in Iraq and Kuwait being gathered together in a Baghdad hotel and given clearance to leave the country at the weekend. Planes are standing by in Britain to airlift them home, but the Iraqi authorities may insist on taking them. Parliament is being recalled to debate the Gulf Crisis at the end of next week. Thatcher has been critical of the military response of some other European countries as being "patchy and slow" and has offended her partners again. There are now massive orders for arms being delivered from the USA to Saudi Arabia and this is causing worries for Israel who were also threatened with attack by Iraq if war breaks out. The UN Secretary-General Peres de Cuellar is meeting the Iraqi Foreign Minister for "an exchange of views" but it seems that negotiations are not on the cards. It will be cooler tonight, even chilly, but the weather will still probably be dry in East Anglia tomorrow. Surprise, surprise!