The storm continued, threatening our conservatory by dangerously sawing a nearby tree and the poor people of Towyn, on the Welsh coast, fell victim to a lake of sea water after their defences were breached with up to 3000 being accommodated.
I worked on this latest burdensome Focus copy and Diana again tussled with Fiona over Debbie’s accommodation of Sundance at the stables. A problematical meeting of Buckden School Governors this evening, fears over the new Government Student Loans scheme and a 10% fall in Japanese Share values at one time completed a difficult day.
I slept soundly, even though the winds were still howling and we had not managed to get the tree lopped yet. It is so unbalanced and swings around violently in the wind and threatens the conservatory which could be demolished by a fall. After getting up and having breakfast, I had to resume work on the FOCUS - this time on the advertising copy that we are doing for the first time. Percy came around and proof-read the leaflets as I worked on the computer ads, but it took me all morning to finish the job. The trouble was trying to get the right things in the right places and imagining how the final page would look. We tried very hard to please everyone and had the alterations to do and ads to move from one sheet to another. I created an Offords/Buckden sheet as well and had to lay that out. By lunchtime, I was very tired and had just about finished. Percy then took the result over to Cambridge and got it organised for printing on Friday.
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In the afternoon, I tried to tidy up my office and resume work on other things after many days and then I managed to deal with several items of correspondence that had been hanging over me. I also found time to put an item on the agenda of the District's Southern Area Committee meeting, which was threatened with cancellation, if I had not insisted on it going ahead. Poor Diana had to take Della to Ballet and then collect Debbie from Kimbolton and take her horse-riding. She had a difficult discussion with Fiona about the lack of light for Debbie to tend Sundance and got agreement on having a different stable where it is lit. The Smiths seem to be definitely running down the place and the winds are very threatening to the rickety buildings. They are a rum lot there.
This evening, I had a Buckden School Governors meeting where it was difficult to avoid further responsibility. In fact, it was a very long and difficult meeting with many problems being thrust on the Governors. The headmaster is resigning and a new one will have to be interviewed and appointed, we had difficult decisions to make on a range of discretionary payments to teaching staff and also had to form committees to handle all of the requirements of the new rules and regulations. It all was too much and went on until well after 10.00pm. I went on the Buildings Committee (avoiding School Meals and Finance) which I felt was an easier one than the others and have also accepted the job of undertaking next terms Governor's Visit to the school which will involve a day but not an evening. Very late to bed again.
The news was full of the storms and pictures of the poor people of Towyn where up to 3000 are now being accommodated with a lake of sea-water four miles by one filling from breached sea walls. In the House of Lords, the Liberal Democrats force a division on an amendment to the governments "University Loans" scheme and there was much opposition over these plans which will discourage higher education for the less well off. Over these last few days, there have also been storms on the Japanese financial markets with about 10% wiped off the stock capitalisation, but last night finished higher despite wild swings in prices.