Showing posts with label karl mather. Show all posts
Showing posts with label karl mather. Show all posts

20120130

Sunday February 6, 1977

Septuagesima. The Silver Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second. Bells peal and prayers are said for the Sovereign lady in churches throughout the realm. To celebrate the joyous, historic event Mum, Dad, Sue, Peter N and myself  went for lunch to the Birch Inn at Wilsill, near Pateley Bridge. Four or five pints of lager and a sirloin. Peter had a steak too, Mum had fish, Susan a curry and Dad a ploughman's lunch.
Birch Tree Inn, Wilsill

At 2pm we returned homeward and called on John & Maria just in time for JPH's liquid liver lunch. A messy business. He is a beautiful child.

To the YP at 5.30 and have a nightmare of evening. Rang Lynne. She's at Pickering cinema with Karl and Peter. Rang her back at 10pm. She tells me of her weekend cake baking saga and the dog's latest illness, &c. Home feeling miserable.


20110930

Friday November 5, 1976


A perishing cold day. Drive with Lynne to Thornton-le-Dale and at 8 o'clock we go with Mr & Mrs Mather and Karl to Scarborough in the hope of getting a glimpse of some beach bonfires & fireworks, &c. No such bloody luck. We are too late. After Donald, Vera, Lynne, Karl [for it is they] ate ice-cream whilst I supped a can of shandy we all departed to a remote mountain not far from Scarborough where Karl was let loose with his fireworks. Unimpressive things they are too. All Lynne can do is moan about the [cold] weather. I laugh at the sight of her stood wrapped in a one of the tartan car blankets. Mrs M is frozen solid too. After 10 minutes we depart for Thornton-le-D once more. Lynne complains about being tired again. My God she is only 19! Mrs M insists that Lynne is always tired because of the constant gas leak in her office. We laugh.

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20110829

Sunday October 10, 1976


A sunny day. Not umberella weather at all. After breakast, at midday, Lynne and I go to Scarborough with Rebel [the dog], leaving Peter at home messing about with a window frame and Mr Rat glancing at the Radio Times. Spend a couple of hours eating crab and candy [floss] and drinking coca cola and walking the dog. He's a crafty old devil and only limps when he can put it to his advantage. The sun is out in force. Scarborough is much better at this time of the year. No dirty peasants playing ball games all over the beach, &c.

Home to Ty-Onnen at 4.30 to tea and cakes with Mr & Mrs M, Peter, Karl and Mr Rat. Watch TV until the evening meal at 6.30. The gentlemen depart for Horsforth at 7 o'clock and after 'Fawlty Towers' Lynne and I go back to the Royal Oak [I think] in Pickering. Feel bloated all night and take great discomfort in the consumption of cold lager. Donald M and his good lady wife are so matey.


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20110817

Monday September 6, 1976



Up at approx. 6.45am and have breakfast with Lynne, Peter, Jane, Karl & David. I had forgotten how childish 15 year-olds are. Not having been associated with that group for some six and a half years I seem to have got out of the hang of it. We leave T-le-D at 7.25 for Leeds - the journey takes 90 minutes. Lynne is a good driver really. A pleasant but quiet trip into boring Leeds and all in all we counted 17 dead rabbits flattened on the homeward road. The recording of the number of our dead 'furry friends' may seem a somewhat sombre excercise, but anything to take the mind off the obnoxious silence of Miss Jane ____, and her bilious brother, David, in the back seat. Do all thirteen year-olds have trouble with wind, or is it me?

Work uneventful. Ring Tony, Lynne and mother [in that order. It's not an order of preference either]. To meet Lynne tomorrow; Tony on Wednesday, and will see Mummy at tea time.

New items: The Earl of Leicester is dead, and so too is the 300 year-old wife of former YP chairman Colin Forbes Adam. Peter N passes his driving test.

Nice to see the family again. Mum says Maria is showing no sign of delivering her son into the world. Have a bath and smoke a cigar in front of a Dirk Bogarde film. Lynne nips up with the luggage then drives off in a great haste.

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20110809

Friday August 27, 1976


Mum is bedridden with her back. I don't like being at home when a member of the family is ill. I have a pathological hatred of poorly people. I'd walk round Lourdes slapping cripples.

Poor Molly Macdonald is at death's door. John told Dad today that she burst a blood vessel in her arm yesterday evening and a doctor told Jim [Macdonald] that 'she could go at any minute.'

Sarah told me today that she and Peter [Baker] have finished. Pity really because he was quite a good laugh, but at least I stand a chance once again. Oh, I might have been going out with Lynne M since June, but that devilment still exists. You can't keep a good man down.

Out with Lynne at 8 o'clock to the Hare. A dead, miserable hole it is too. Sit with Sue and Peter all night, and then David L and the delectable CB arrive at 10 o'clock. Whenever she's around I go wild with exuberence and excitement and our eyes seldom drift from each other for long. Why is this? Is it cruel to Lynne? Do I really think anything at all of Lynne? What the Hell have I been doing since the beginning of June? Oh God. Have I been leading L down the garden path? After Carole, will I ever have a normal affair again? [I'm not offering any apologies for all these questions because you lot have nothing better to do than to attempt to answer them, anyway.]

Home at midnight and Lynne goes off to Bramhope to collect Karl from a party and they drive to Thornton-le-Dale. Won't see her now until next week.

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20110728

Tuesday August 17, 1976


Even hotter today. Work was uneventful, and home at 5.15 and have roast chicken. Rang Lynne today. She's been making enquiries about a flat. Karl wants to complete his final year at Prince Henry's Grammar School and so he'd be able to join her. No doubt she'll want one in the Otley area. I cannot understand why they [the Mathers] had to move all that way to Thornton-le-Dale in the first place. It seems to me that Donald Mather is the only person who wanted to move. Very undemocratic. It certainly would never be allowed to happen in our family. If, for instance, Dad wanted to move out of the area against the wishes of the rest of us, he would be court martialed, and no doubt found guilty of high treason, and executed. The Angolan mercenaries received no sympathy in this house.

Leap into the bath at about 8pm to help kill the boredom. The television is uninteresting and things in general are running at a low ebb. My research into the descendants of Charles II remains incomplete, and I just cannot be bothered to take it up at present. You have to be in the right mood for that sort of thing.

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Sunday August 8, 1976


8th after Trinity. Up late and after a good lunch retire to the lounge to listen to Pennine Radio. The house is deserted. Mum is in the garden and Dad is at work. Sue, Peter and Lynn and David are at David's brother's in York. Just as I sit down Pete M arrives and asks if I want to accomapny him on a birthday cake distributing adventure. I readily agree. The boredom at home would have been unbearable. Go to Christopher's. Show out holiday photos to Mrs Ratcliffe. Then move on to Denise's but she isn't in either. (When Carole rang on Friday she told me that Denise had gone to London ________________.) From Denise's we went on Peter's place which is in a state of organised chaos. No carpets or furniture - horrible. Sit and drink tea with Lynne, Peter, Mrs Mather and Auntie Lilian. Mr M watches cricket on the TV in the wreckage of the lounge. He was sitting on a soap box. Have a laugh showing the family our holidays pics. Peter measured us all with a tape measure up against the side of the house - I am six feet and half an inch.

At 5pm we all had dinner. That is me, Lynne, Peter, Karl and Mrs M. Oh, and Auntie Lilian. After tea we take the two ladies to see Granny M at Scalebor Park Asylum. Evidently the old girl is 82 and is senile and quite daft, in her old age.

Mrs M comes out of the asylum looking sad, and so Lynne and I take her and Auntie Lilian for a drink to the Red Lion. They cheer up soon enough. After taking them back to Bramhope Lynne and I go to the Commercial until closing time. Today was probably the last time I will ever set foot in Ty-Gwyn (the Mather home in Old Lane) where Lynne has lived for 9 years. The place looked sad and desolate - but it only is bricks and mortar. It's people who make a home - wherever it may be.

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20110510

Sunday August 1, 1976



7th after Trinity. Arise at quite a decent hour and make my way to the bathroom. The stench of vomit outside Karl's bedroom is revolting, but after further investigations I see he is the only casualty.

Peter says CB and Roger appear to have had a good time in the lounge and Chris tells that they (CB & Roger) look to have been 'up to things'______________________.

Denise and I take a vaccuum cleaner each and start on the downstairs rooms. Even Roger had a duster in his hand. Lynne was most uncommunicative and surly much to the amusement of CB who kept grinning at me across the lounge. By 11.30 we've done all we can and Chris takes Romeo & Juliet home (that's Christine & Roger by the way).

Denise, Peter, Lynne and I sit in the dining room chatting until Mr & Mrs Mather get in at 12. I can see Mr M casting his gaze around the premises looking for cases of vandalism. I shudder when I see him mounting the stairs because I know just what a dreadful smell will assail his nostrils when he reaches the top.

At12.30 - Lynne who is all packed ready for her holiday - brings me home.We kiss and part until Saturday night. Have lunch with Mum, Dad, Sue & Peter and then spend a couple of hours with the Blackwells. We talk about Vic Feather, the Duchess of Windsor, the Queen and Queen Mother and other sundries. Edith had some unsavory comments to make about the old duchess and she says that the Queen Mother 'fancies herself'.

Back home I watch TV all night with Mum & Dad. A good programme about the history of the BBC with bits of programmes all bunged together. After Dad goes to work Mum and I watched a sad, morbid film with Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift. Don't get me wrong, Elizabeth and Montgomery didn't watch the film with us - they were in it.

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Sunday April 1, 1984

 4th Sunday in Lent Mothering Sunday New Moon Sunny, bright, &c. Smothering Sunday. All Fool's Day. Busy. Rob came and so too did th...