Wednesday April 26, 1978

I went from the YP by train to Pudsey where I joined Mum and Dad at Auntie Mabel's for tea. She made us a nice salad and afterwards we sat with a few drinks before the television. It's now almost certainly been confirmed that my Uncle Jack (Myers) is suffering from cancer of the pancreas. Sadly, Jackie (Myers) didn't arrive as planned at Auntie's. I haven't laid eyes on Jacqueline since May, 1976.

... You could all employ yourselves doing something beneficial to the community instead of eavesdropping on me. Blimey, I probably died years ago, and none of this drivel will matter when all is said and done.

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Tuesday May 20, 1975

Hot day. At lunchtime I have a few photographs taken for my ten year passport. They look really grotty, but not all that bad when you think it costs about £2 to be photographed by a cravat-wearing Old Etonian with a lisp and double-barrelled name for something very similar, but probably a bit more glossy. Don't take this as an insult to Lord Snowdon please, because nothing was further from my mind. OK, he may be an Old Etonian with a camera, but he doesn't lisp, and hasn't worn a cravat in donkey's years.

At 4.30 armed with a bottle of Lucozade I marched on Leeds Infirmary and threw myself upon my ailing aunt, the one and only Mabel Paine. I didn't recognise her at first because she seems to have lost a good deal of weight since we last met, but otherwise she was very cheerful. The thought of having cancer worried her to death (Oops) of course, but they've assured her now that it's all clear. No more treatment required, and by Sunday she'll be a free woman again. I really despise hospitals. The smells and the general lay-out make me weak at the knees. It was so nice to get out into the fresh air at about 6 o'clock - away from the stench of death and illness. I only hope to God that I'll never have to spend any length of time in such a place. Mind you, by the time I'm 60 they'll have done away with hospitals and they'll be injecting OAPs with cyanide. The nice, easy way out.

See 'Edward VII' at 9 o'clock, and retire at 11.

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Wednesday May 14, 1975

Busy day really. Overcast and cloudy again. Home at 5.30 and have tea straight away. I'm always half starved on an evening, because I rarely eat anything during the day.

Poor Auntie Mabel didn't have a cyst after all. It was cancer, and whilst they were operating on her today they removed her breast. A horrible, petrifying thought I know, but if it stops the malignant thing from getting any worse that is all that matters. I'll have to call in and help cheer her up one afternoon this week. It must be horrible being in hospital. I'd like to think I was going to be healthy and reasonably fit until the day I drop dead, and as long as that happens I'm not bothered about how, or in what circumstances, I am removed from this fair earth.

I'm in two minds about going out tonight as is always the case on a Wednesday. One thing's for sure - at least I'll see Christine because I know for a fact that when she says she isn't going out she always does. It's heartbreaking to see her crawling around Gary.

A morbid occasion we are having today, but it's just the way I feel.

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