Wednesday February 11, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

I am growing old. Receding hair [not so], flab, constant lethargy, &c. So awful. I am increasingly antagonised by my fellow man and dependent on the Daily Telegraph. I am almost 32 and look it. I also now listen to Radio 2. Derek Jameson and all that. 

Watched the Duke of York today take his seat in the Lords and sit on the Crossbenchers listening to Baroness Seear going on and on about growing cabbages. Poor boy.

Graham came at 6 for a few hours and we sat upstairs. He is a breath of fresh air. They are going to Spain in July with Peter and Dee. We nattered about education. He has not ever considered sending Matthew or Simon to a public school, but he does of course live in a leafy village. He is buying a house near Rugby, at West Haddon, or somewhere. His office is a garden shed. We had a inter-house quiz night extravaganza. Ally worked with Mags. The incumbent came from the Old Red Lion. He and five managers inc. the Raynville, the Hansom Cab [York], were all sacked on the same day. Poor overworked LG.

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Tuesday February 10, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

Uncle John Edward [Rhodes] is 51 today. What an unhappy man he is these days. Sheila has funny lumps everywhere but refuses to see a doctor, and cousin Valerie has set herself up as a rival property agent in Lanzarote, now employed by a rival firm purely because of her Rhodes connections. Dad says his niece is a little peroxide tart with a voracious appetite for Spaniards. Oh dear. Traumas. Samuel called Audrey a "stupid bastard" in the midst of a crowded lounge bar this morning. I blushed, and that is unusual for me. The worst thing about it was that everybody laughed and sniggered. _________. We do intend to send Sam to the North Leeds and St Edmund's Hall Preparatory School where perhaps his use of flowery language will be [undecipherable]. Just Ally and I tonight again. Quiet, but Clemmie wasn't and was still bright eyed at 11:45pm playing with her Royal Doulton rabbit, Bess. Joe House asked the question: "what do you call a sleeping fish?" Answer: "a kipper". Discussing darts with Jack Collett, he said: "I couldn't hit a cows arse with a shovel." So graphic. Goodnight.

News: Lord Stockton's Westminster Abbey memorial service.

The Countess of Bradford gave birth to a son in London on Saturday.

Obituaries: Lady Agnes Eyston, at East Hendred, Oxon, aged 79. She was Lady Agnes Marjorie Alice Mary Savile, eldest daughter of the fifth Earl of Mexborough. She married in 1930, Capt Thomas More Eyston, Royal Berkshire Regiment, of Hendred House, Wantage, who died of wounds received in action in 1940.

Lady Elizabeth Byng, who has died aged 89, formerly lived at Wrotham Park, Middlesex, the fine Georgian country house built for the unfortunate Admiral Byng [executed on his quarterdeck pour encouager les autres in 1757] which is now the seat of her son Julian Byng.

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Monday February 9, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

Horrible wet day. Samuel and I got a soaking this morning going to the bank. We saw Dad yesterday at Sue's. He looked awful and grey probably due to a few late nights, but I do worry about him. He seemed so low and off he went back to his remote Horton. 

Just Ally and I tonight. Very quiet, which is good because the beer supplies are pitiful. Upstairs we watched 'Nemesis', the redoubtable Jane Marple played by Joan Hickson. V. good. Phoned Marita today to say we are OK for dinner on February 17, to be told they are selling up and opening a hotel in Harrogate. Sounds exciting.

The news that the Duchess of York has been to see Tony Kenny of St Thomas's Hospital for a pre-pregnancy check-up has set the medical grapevine humming. George Pinker, of St Mary's Paddington, is 62, and speculation is rife that a new man may be in the process of being groomed  for the honour, not without its quota of angoisse, of delivering the royal babies ...

Obituary: Lady Essendon- at Laguna Hills, California, aged 87,. Widow of the 2nd Lord Essendon (Brian Lewis. the racing driver) whom she married in 1938 and who died in 1978, and previously wife of Albert Duffill. She was Mary, daughter of G.W. Booker, of Los Angeles.

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Sunday February 8, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

5th Sunday after Epiphany

The pub with no beer. No pils left and the Old Brewery Bitter is down to 20 gallons, which we will need for Mr Copley's retirement party on Monday. Margaret M in at lunch. I have taken some stick about the beer. Old Wernher has a bloody cheek. He came here from Germany to bomb Coventry and then decided to stay, and has the nerve to criticise my pub. He'd now be pushing up the Russian daisies at Stalingrad if it wasn't for us British. Bastards. No staff tonight. But, first, at 3 this afternoon we went to Guiseley and to Sue's to plant a Christmas tree. Wind and rain. Sue looked enormous, and like poor Mum, broad across the beam. She saw Dr Glass yesterday ___________.We were back at the pub for 5:30.

Birthday fanfare for Reagan: by Hugh Davies in Washington: President Reagan celebrated his 76th birthday yesterday as the White House Marines band played him in to the party mood with the march 'seventy-six trombones'. 'Really, fellahs', said the smiling president, 'a simple chorus of Happy Birthday would have been sufficient.'

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Saturday February 7, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

35 years ago today our Sovereign Lady was proclaimed throughout her Kingdoms. She's fresh back from Kenya, now 61, beloved by all, and growing old. No side saddle at this years Trooping the Colour, an open carriage like the Queen Mother. Not a whiff of abdication. 

Temple Newsam.

Margaret R appeared at 12 with a supposed kidney infection. _____. She was almost sacked and then I thought back to Karin Ireland, and refrained. This afternoon at 3 Ally dropped me off at Temple Newsam with the children and for a few hours we romped amongst the damp rhododendrons. Samuel racing around the ancient trees. Sadly, the farm was closed. The light soon faded and we were left in darkness with only the spotlights from the roof of the house to illuminate the situation. Samuel thought it a real adventure. He chased me with a big stick. Clemmie, in her pink layers, beneath plastic sheeting, looking wide-eyed. Ally came back at 5:20. Home for tea. Worked tonight. Margaret R again. The bearded 'Our Billy' from Spofforth stood at the bar drinking vodka and looking glum. At 10 Dad came in with John, an impromptu visit. We went upstairs and watched Dame Edna Everage until 2am. Clemmie cried at the sight of strange men drinking beer in her home. A petty little thing she is.

In the news: Duchess gets her wings - The Duchess of York is expected to pilot her husband when she flies in to collect her private pilot's licence from Mr Christopher Tugendhat , chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority on Thursday. The ceremony will take place in the main hanger at Oxford Airport, Kidlington, after a trip from RAF Benson, Oxon. The duchess is the first woman member of the royal family to have learned to fly.

Liberace burial halted by Aids check - Liberace's burial at Forest Lawn, Hollywood, will have to wait because the coroner has rejected his doctor's death certificate in order to find out if he died of Aids. A post-mortem examination may have to be performed.

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Friday February 6, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

I spent the day in a state of some trepidation. For some reason I haven't ordered enough beer and my cellar looks positively empty. How awful. What will we do? Tonight was stone dead. Just Margaret M, Ally and I. We haven't heard anything of Gabrielle since our holiday and I do not expect ever to see the girl again. She is a Gemini.

Obituary: Lady Illingworth, who has died aged 86, was the indefatigable hostess at her historic Georgian house in Mayfair, 44 Grosvenor Square, the last privately owned house in the square which was disgracefully demolished in 1967 to make way for the new Britannia Hotel.... It was in the house's morning room in June, 1815, that the Cabinet, the guests at dinner of the 1st Earl of Harrowby, received the Duke of Wellington's victory despatch from Waterloo ....

The President of the United States is 76 today.

In the House of Lords: "Conditions in Letters Patent which prevent the eldest daughters from inheriting her father's hereditary peerage were a blatant discrimination against women, said Lord Diamond, chairman of the Social Democrat peers...

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Thursday February 5, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

Clemmie is so beautiful and female. She sits up - those lovely blue-grey eyes. So old fashioned.

Hectic. Can we afford £23 a week to educate Samuel privately? I hope so. We do not want agents of Kinnock getting their hands on our progeny. I could take anything from a child except left wing politics.

Margaret Rushton phoned in sick at 7. Or perhaps I should say her mother did. We were left 'staffless' on a pool night. The team from the George The Fourth came here with the usual camp followers. All Tetley women look like prostitutes, with flashed hair and bitten finger nails.

Ally says that one day we'll look back upon these hard-working times and laugh it off. God. It is such a wonderful experience all this.

From the Telegraph Peterborough column: Ouch! If proof were needed that nudists are a thick skinned lot, I learn that delegates attending a meeting of the Federation Naturiste Internationale  in Dublin this Spring  are to be issued with pin-fixed identification badges.

Sapper: Wylie.

Obituary: George Wylie, a sapper who saved St Paul's Cathedral during the 1939-45 War but sold his George Cross in a spirit of disillusionment  two years ago, has died in Bow. He was 77. Wylie was a member of a bomb disposal squad after a heavy night's bombing  on September 12, 1940, when he spotted a one-ton explosive 27ft below Dean's Yard. For three days despite a burning gas main and fears that the bomb which was sinking in the clay soil could explode, Wylie played a vital part in its removal. When it was taken to Hackney Marshes its deliberate explosion caused a 100ft crater. Wylie was one of the first three to be awarded the George Cross after its institution by King George VI ....

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Wednesday February 4, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

The usual frantic sort of day. Work, work, work, &c. Tonight Mags worked from 8 and I joined in Alan Batey's quiz and partnered poor Mary Knight. She is so embarrassed about her relationship to our cig machine bandit. We won and I gave the £5 winnings to Mary for something for Sarah-Jane, 2. 

We have a letter from St Edmund's Hall Prep School re an open day on March 4, prior to Sam's entry into school life on April 28. We were thinking it would be September. 

Frank and Bessie have gone to Tenerife, Islas Canarias for 2 weeks.

In the news: Liberace, the flamboyant American popular pianist who has died aged 67, was the world's single highest paid performer throughout the 1960s and 1970s.

Demolition for Royal lodge: A Victorian hunting lodge once considered by the Queen as a wedding gift to the Prince and Princess of Wales has been offered to the Army to dispose of in a demolition exercise. The 12-bedroom Delnadamph Lodge, adjoining Balmoral estate in the Highlands, has been empty since it was bought by the Queen for £1 million 10 years ago. The property came with 7,000 acres and several cottages.

Lady Rendlesham, who has died in her sixties, was (as Clare Rendlesham) the doyenne of London fashion retailing and in 1969 had the distinction of opening Rive Gauche, Yves St Laurent's first franchise in London. 

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Tuesday February 3, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

Ally is livid at LG's attitude. He has obviously phoned Bonnie & Clyde and discussed the diluted spirits, and it has caused irritation. Apparently, he needs this nauseating couple. He says that nothing can be proved at this stage anyway, and he laughed it off. We are out of favour most definitely. 

Today. Hungover. The draymen woke me at 7:30. I have been over doing it with the orders in recent weeks and and so they dropped only a little. No doubt we'll be dry by Saturday. Buggered. Maureen opened up until 8 and then just Ally and I did the remainder. Liz has asked for a reference.

From the Daily Telegraph, Peterborough column, I think: Hard to crack -- LAST week's Surrey Comet reported: 'A cement mixer was stolen from Birkenhead Road in Kingston on Tuesday night. A police spokesman said yesterday "there was nothing concrete to go on".

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Monday February 2, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

Ally spoke to Leslie Gledhill, who was very casual and 'laid back' about our diluted Bacardi. Annoying really. He was more concerned about how much they had taken over the counter. The reliefs did £2,700 last week. To the General Elliot at 6. The couple at the Raynville, Bramley, have been dismissed, but are refusing to quit the premises, hence this new venue for a meeting. It was a long meeting. We drank until 9 with the Darringtons, so very nice and normal - she especially so. Saw Ann Revell too, who was stunned beyond belief that 'Our Billy', as she calls him, is dating Margaret Rushton. We invited them back to the Moorhouse and surprisingly they agreed. Ann came for an hour or so, but the Darringtons were here until 12:30, going home in a taxi. Dearest Marjorie (our former barmaid) was babysitting.

From the Daily Telegraph: Safe hands? Passengers on a Qantas flight from Bombay to London the other day were greeted with this announcement from the flight steward: "I would give you the emergency safety instructions but I'm afraid the tape machine has broken down." He paused, and went on "never mind, I'll read them manually."

The Americans seem to have great difficulty in understanding Thomas a' Becket's place in history. Following my note about the tourist in Canterbury Cathedral who wanted to know where Becket had been shot, a former chorister assures me that he was approached some years ago by an American who asked: 'Say, can you show me the spot where Joe Beckett was knocked out?' Joe, as boxing fans will recall, was not a saint but a heavyweight champion of the 1920s. 

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Sunday February 1, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

4th Sunday after Epiphany

Thick frost. A rough night with Clemmie. I was up at 4:30 watching Damien: Omen II - a murder every 45 seconds or so. A 'full-English' and then over to the paper shop with Samuel, a precocious beast. Later, two Margarets worked and we escaped to Harewood House. The grounds were open today for the first time this year. St George's flag was fluttering above, and the lake was frozen solid and no amount of sticks and stones thrown in by Samuel would break the surface. Back at 4. Watched a chunk of 'Omen II' (tape) that I missed in the small hours. Dined on fish. Watched part II of 'Bertram's Hotel' at bedtime. Dear old Joan Hickson is an excellent Miss Jane Marple.

From the News of the World: Princess Margaret's son Viscount Linley is to marry his long-time lover Susannah Constantine. He has already been secretly shopping for an antique engagement ring with his sister Lady Sarah Armstrong-Jones.

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