Sunday March 8, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

1st Sunday in Lent

David Andrew Baker is 31. Aunty Mabel is 68. The two Margarets opened up and we went to Auntie Mabel's where we were joined by Auntie Hilda. I was reprimanded by H. We haven't seen her since John and Janette's wedding last September. The Gadsbys have just had a new fitted kitchen at Wilsby, but H isn't enthusiastic. They say Clemmie resembles Frank and that Sam is a Wilson. A Wilson! He is the image of his Dixon mother. On to MM and Marita's at 3. They are having a lunch party for old friends David and Fay - garlic was wafting everywhere. Large gin and tonics and two hours later we left at 5. Ally very pissed on g & t's she took to her bed and collapsed until 8, leaving me and Samuel with a chicken and Yorkshire puddings. Ally came down to the bar groggy at 8:30. Just the two us worked.

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Friday March 6, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn

Stricken: Herald of Free Enterprise.

"Our" Lynn is 29 today. She phoned at breakfast time to say thank you for the cards but when Ally asked whether she liked her birthday present which we left with her in January [table mats from County Durham] she went very quiet and had quite forgotten to open the parcel. She told us that Jacq is pregnant and due on September 6.

This evening a terrible tragedy occurred. A Channel ferry from Zeebrugge, Belgium, sank minutes after sailing with the loss of life of almost 200 Britons. Watched newsflashes at one and 2 in the morning and went to bed very morose. What a ghastly way to go.

Viscount Brookeborough has died aged 64. 

Viscount Morpeth, who resigned his commission in protest at the Government's defence policy, wants to become a Liberal MP, it was revealed yesterday.

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Thursday March 5, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds LS11 5NQ

One of those awful days when I was keyed up and ready to have a heart attack. We played the Fisherman's Hut pool team, from Pool in Wharfedale, in the competition here, and during the evening when I was in the bar with no staff an old boy - a friend of Joe House - collapsed in the porch and the Fisherman's Hut landlord called for an ambulance and sat with him and his two companions until the emergency services arrived. Then he, the Fisherman's Hut guy, launched a vicious attack upon me saying how disgusted he was that I that continued 'pulling ale' whilst an OAP lay bereft in my foyer. When I tried to reason with him he argued that a normal publican would have switched off his beer pumps and given first aid to the victim instead of taking money and 'turning a blind eye'. I was livid, like a wounded beast. I hadn't even been party to this pathetic scene, the porch being out behind closed doors away from the active body of the pub. Sod them all.

Dinda Fermor-Hesketh [nee Hunt] wife of John Fermor-Hesketh, gave birth to a daughter, Alice Mary Louisa, on March 5.

Wednesday March 4, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn, Leeds

Before I go any further I must say I have just been watching Channel 4 (midnight) and the Bishop of London [Graham Ellison] talking such sense about his opposition to the ordination of women. He really should be translated to Canterbury instead of that namby pamby [Robert] Runcie. In the words of 'Private Eye' - "why ordain women when we have Robert Runcie?" Have you noticed that women with leanings towards ordination are always 'butch'? Short cropped hair, no make-up, deep, husky voices, &c? However, I am not a practicing member of the Church of England and perhaps should keep my mouth shut.

(Sorry, the Bishop of London is Graham Leonard. Ellison was his predecessor).

Samuel went to his school at Roundhay for the morning. He calls it 'the school with the bell' because it has an old fashioned bell tower. LG came here. He immediately calmed me re his letter of last Friday saying I have got the stick by the wrong end and that he meant no offence. We told him we had visited Whitby and Scunthorpe he jumped in and said he wasn't 'rushing us' and wants us to consider carefully, &c. "Will Scuntehorpe be different to Leeds?" &c. He was very jovial and honest. He is always at loggerheads with Ally and is forever having to say: "Ah, but you have a brain which is a rare thing among Sam Smith managers". &c.

Lord Londesborough has married one Rikki Morris.

Lady Muir-Mackenzie gave birth to a daughter on Sunday.

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Tuesday March 3, 1987

 Moorhouse Inn

Joan Greenwood.

Joan Greenwood, the husky voiced English actress celebrated for her performances in such films as "Kind Hearts and Coronets", "The Importance of Being Earnest", and "Tom Jones", has died a few days short of her 66th birthday. She was found dead, having apparently suffered a heart attack, in her London home at the weekend.

Prince Philip, 65, has undergone a hernia operation at King Edward VII's Hospital for Officers in Marylebone. He was in hospital for 24 hours and discharged on Saturday.

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