Saturday August 28, 1976

Up at 8.30am!! Planned to see CB but changed my mind over a cup of tea. Go up to see Mama, and she sends me to Dr Ludlow to get some tablets for her pathetic back [ache]. I also go to the library and get a pile of books to entertain her while she's bedridden.

Home at 12.30 and go straight out again. This time with Dad to Morrison's. Do the week's shopping and after lunch the two of us go down to 69 Silverdale Dr where we get on with the decorating. I rub down and sandpaper the lounge window and undercoat it. John comes in just as we are leaving to inspect our efforts. He stands around like the 1st Duke of Marlborough watching the progress of the building of Blenheim Palace.

Home at 7o'clock and after a hurried bath I go down to the Hare with Lynn & David. Lynn sitting on my knee in the [Triumph] Spitfire. See Judith and Kathryn and they have people in stitches with their quick flowing repartee and humorous chit-chat. CB and I go into the tap room and ring to book a taxi to collect us from the 'Upstairs, Downstairs' disco at the Stoney Lea. She gets pissed and tells me that she wants to go to bed with me. She always says that when I'm involved with another woman.

Tony and his 'latest' [girl] from Hertfordshire come in to the Hare at 10 o'clock, and they take CB, Carol Smith and me to the British Legion in Ilkley where we pass a hysterical hour waiting for Martyn. Up to the Stoney Lea at midnight with Martyn, CB and Carol S in a taxi, and don't remember all that much about the next couple of hours. CB and I are together all the time, and I feel revoltingly guilty, deceitful and unpleasant. I bet Lynn and Dave have something to say in the morning because I had the distinct feeling that disaproving glances were coming my way.

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Tuesday June 17, 1975

Bright, but showery day. The Indian Summer I thought we may be having is only a flight of fancy after all.

Doing the obits at the YP I see that Sir Richard Colville, press secretary to the Queen from the year dot until 1968, died on Saturday. (Lady) Margaret Hay, Lord Plunket, Admiral Sir C. Bonham-Carter, and now Sir Richard. As I keep saying, the few surviving members of the Royal Household will be drawing lots to see who's next. It's becoming quite serious really.

It's been a bloody horror taking those pills. Old Ludlow is obviously trying to finish me off by choking me to death with them in order to save me from the path of utter misery and painful illnesses which lie ahead. But seriously, they're about the size of a standard dustbin lid and they're a repulsive chocolate colour. I feel quite sick just looking at them.

Received a note from Christine. Written across the back of the envelope were the words: 'prepare yourself for a serious letter', which quite worried me at first, because I thought she might have done something foolishly hideous like stick her head in the gas oven or something. The mood she's been in lately, it wouldn't surprise me at all. She even mentioned the idea of emigrating to New Zealand!

At 7.30 John mentioned the Morris Dancers being at the Hare tonight. He rounded up Sue and Peter, who wanted to see what Morris Dancers were actually like - never having had the experience before. I also quite fancied the idea. However, on our arrival at the Hare we found the door bolted and a CLOSED sign on the front door. The Tetley strike's closed down the Hare! John was shattered. The four of us went to the White Cross, wherethe beer was awful, but we had a laugh sitting on the wall outside. Sue and Pete really do get on so well.

Back at home at 8.30 to see 'Edward VII' on ITV again. No Annette Crosbie but it was good all the same. Saw the 10 o'clock news and the ever increasingly enthralling Lucan scandal. Somehow I think something fishy is goin on with the Lucan business, but what exactly I don't know. Bed at 11 o'clock.

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Monday June 16, 1975

The numbness in my face is going off slightly, but I ring and make an appointment with old (Dr) Ludlow all the same. I might as well get my moneys worth out of the National Health Service.

Nothing of great interest in the news other than the re-opening of the sensational Lucan Case in London. I doubt very much whether any of us will ever hear of the Earl (of Lucan) again, and so it's an open and shut case, as it were.

Last Friday's Daily Mail had a piece about the Prince of Wales and Lady Jane Wellesley again. The will insist on linking the poor prince romantically with that ____ Radio Times researcher, who disgraces the very name of the august Iron Duke. If he, the prince that is, ever makes Lady J his princess I will take off all my clothes and parade around the garden in a nude form as a sign of protest. I'm not joking either.

Go see old Ludlow at 5.20. He sticks a massive metal instrument up my nose and peers up it and gives the occasional grunt. He then gives me a large jar of brown pills - quite the biggest things I've ever seen - and a few capsules to inhale. Hate going to the doctors. But the numbness was quite disturbing really. At work Sarah laughed when I said I probably had only six months left to live. I know it'sa terrible thing to say. I'm quite tempting fate in saying things like that, but one should always look non the funny side of life, and even more so the funny side of death.

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