Thursday August 15, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

HRH The Princess Anne is 35, and Gary Booth is 22. HRH is cruising on Britannia in the Western Isles as she usually does on her birthday, and Mark (Phillips) is at Gatcombe Park astride his tractor. What a separate little couple they are.

MM and Marita appeared last night at 8. Ally wasn't feeling 100 per cent and struggled to come down to the bar. Joined by Dad from Menston. He looked tired and old. This year has aged him a decade. The MMs are fresh back from Yugoslavia where they shared a pension with a couple of 20 year-olds and noticed, painfully, the age gap. The years creep by.

Tonight (Thurs) Gary came in early doors for a few pints of pils lager, and was joined by a friend, a youth of similar age, to discuss their latest 'leg over' and the Leeds Utd fixtures for 1985-86. _________.

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Wednesday August 14, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

To Harehills at 9:30. I took my test at 9:45 in our new, gleaming vehicle. A Mr Harland took me. I did well with the exception of reversing around a corner which I cocked up, and needless to say - failed on this point. Everything else was OK. I came away unperturbed. One day I will succeed. Ally and Sam went shopping in Harehills and I met them after the test. The heavens opened. We went to Menston for lunch with Dad and Janette. I bought fish and chips for everyone. A depressing afternoon really. Dad was quick tempered with Sam. _________. Janette looked pained and thought Dad was being harsh. I must admit to a softness that will do my son no good. I cannot find it in me to be strict, and give in to him a good deal. I know this is wrong, and in twenty years time when I write here about my selfish, spoiled and evil son you can all then exclaim: "who is to blame?" -- and I will hold my hand up. To Sue's at 3 for another episode in the Hungarian Uprising revisited. One day I feel sure that Sue will be beatified. If the Pope can do this for a dead Nicaraguan nun then I'm sure that a hard-working Guiseley mother might qualify.

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Tuesday August 13, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

No staff again. Ally and I cleaned the bar thoroughly. Washed the optics, &c. Some of the old regulars sat tittering at our industry. I half-heartedly looked at the Highway Code. I have no nerves, which is probably my problem.

Lines on My Forthcoming Driving Test

Tomorrow I'm taking my driving test,

I've taken it before, in 1974,

That was eleven years ago,

Keith's Mum says the roads have changed since then,

Haven't we all?

E. Jarvis Thribb (17).

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Monday August 12, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

Karen Hudson was late for my driving and whilst waiting we took Samuel on to Hunslet Moor. The robbing window cleaner says I owe him a fiver from two weeks ago when he did the windows in a hurricane. He will get this money over my dead body. Karen came at 10:15 and I had a passable lesson. It all seems to have come together. She is a nice girl. Very blunt and down to earth. She is confident I can pass the test, but it all comes down to what happens on the day, the instructor and the Gods. 

No bar staff pm. We enjoyed ourselves tremendously.

World News: The PM has bought a Barratt house in Dulwich for £400,000. Does she think that her tenure of No. 10 Downing Street is shortly to be terminated? Oh dear.

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Sunday August 11, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

10th Sunday after Trinity

Much rain. Ally feels awful. _________. Still, we got up at 8 and after breakfast I drove to Harehills to show Ally the test centre at Hillcrest House. She wasn't in the mood to sit watching me manoeuvre the car and so we returned to the Moorhouse with raw tempers. Ally can be a wicked little thing at times.

Little Charlotte Nora is a week old today, and as yet has no surname. For her to become a Rhodes she will have to be registered by John. Without John's signature the baby will be officially Miss Drysdale. However, a Rhodes by any other name would smell as sweet, sayeth the Bard.

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Saturday August 10, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

To Menston today bearing Dad's spectacles which he left here last week. He's been a mess without them and borrowing Brian's (his neighbour at Horton). He spends many hours with the Daily Telegraph but says he doesn't have the concentration to read a book. I think he is frightened of becoming too like his father, who sat for hours with a weighty tome upon his knee, ignoring all around him. I can see the old boy now reading a biography of James Joyce. For many years I took this to be Lord Haw Haw ... but that was another James Joyce. At Menston Dad and John were painting the kitchen. Dad very subdued. I sat watching them ... yawning. Oh dear, what a life.

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Friday August 9, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

My brother-in-law Graham John Dixon appeared here on Wednesday and has spent two nights with us whilst selling suspended ceilings in Sheffield and Nottingham. What a reformed character he is. He renounced smoking when last on the Isle of Wight and has held to it since and, would you believe, he goes out jogging every morning in shorts and training shoes, &c. Just like Steve Cram. It is awful how people can get the athletic bug. Graham has always had a tendency to breathlessness and is positively Edward VII in appearance. We get along extremely well. _______. He and Gill are looking for a house, only half-heartedly, in Basingstoke or Newbury, &c. Frank and Bessie cannot come here on Aug 31 (Di & Paul's wedding day) because they are having Frank & Barbara Makin from Windermere. Sod it. Who will babysit?

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Thursday August 8, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

Charlotte.

Sunshine. To Otley to see Janette and Charlotte Nora. A Dr Goebbels-like nurse refused to allow Sam to view his cousin and so Ally went in for a few minutes and I followed. I played outside collecting stones with my son and heir. Charlotte is a very large, pink baby. Poor Janette has a leg in bandages and says it's a thrombosis. I associate the word thrombosis with heart attacks. This is hysteria on my part, so I'm told. To Guiseley afterwards. Scenes reminiscent of the Hungarian uprising of 1956 at 21, Thorpe Lane. Sue is on the verge of madness. She says she had a showdown with Jim yesterday__________.

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Wednesday August 7, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

This day is a complete blank. I have been getting lapse of late. I  will try to convey a description of the diarist as he is at the moment. I am now in my 31st year. I am not too fat, though my tummy tends to sag. Still, my trousers measure only 34 inches around the waist. I weigh 13 stones and a few ounces. I have a lack of musculature. Scrawny arms, &c. I stand just under 6 feet. My hair is thick and dark - no grey. It's too long at the moment but it's getting cut soon. I have a very thin moustache with envelopes my tiny pursed mouth. I do not have to shave every day. I am a light shaver. It would take me forever to grow a beard. I have a tendency to grow a double chin. This is because my face is full. Some would say round. I dress like a typical thirty year-old when working in the bar. Boring, dull trousers, shirts, ties &c, but dress more flamboyantly in private life. Certainly I look younger than my years. Politically I am more right wing than General Zia. I love music. Anything from Debussy to Duran Duran. I love my wife and I love my son. I miss my mother more than I can say. I am happy with my life though it is too busy at times._____.

Tuesday August 6, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

Reasonable morning, but blowy. John Newband came from the brewery to apologise for the lack of exterior decorators. The place looks a shambles. We went at 1:30 to Tadcaster and the 'Pig Roast' - a so-called 'Family Day' which proved to be a complete wash-out. A multitude of managers at Tadcaster Bowling Club. Jumping, bouncy castles, ice creams galore, bowling, beer, &c. Just as the barbecue began a cloud burst let rip over Tad and everybody scampered for the pavilion, a hot, sweaty place no bigger than a telephone kiosk. The outside tables were a sorry sight. Bowls of water-logged salad and coleslaw and two wet pigs on a spit. We were like drowned rats. Samuel insisted on bolting for the door at every opportunity, and our lunch was a hurried, snatched affair. We spoke to only a few. Most people gave us the cold shoulder. Roy & Marie were as normal as ever. The ghastly Ferris trio. The Pipers were cool. We escaped at 4. Sunshine in Leeds. Audrey worked 5:30-7:30. Janet came in. She goes to Belfast for a holiday on Thursday. Her work is somewhat slack. ________.

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Monday August 5, 1985

 Moorhouse Inn

After a gap of eleven weeks we have a Nora in the family again. Dad says he is frightened of becoming an old drunkard. It would be an easy thing to do, I do suppose. Marjorie worked 12-3:30 and at 3 Dad took Sam and I to the Clarendon Wing to look at Charlotte Nora for the first time. She is very pink with a broad face and Janette's features, but also strongly resembling baby's half-sister, Hannah. We left poor Ally at home. At the hospital Samuel was restless and he shuffled about. Grandad gave him black looks. He expects perfection. However, Sam was good with the baby and he kissed her on the top of her dark head. I had a nurse and Janette related the intricate details of her confinement. I began to nod off in the chair. How embarrassing. Hospitals are such lethargic places. Like greenhouses. It's no wonder that most of the inmates look half dead. Mother and baby go to Otley Hospital tomorrow. I fail to see why Janette was prevented from giving birth at Otley. It's a perfectly agreeable place to come into the world. Lots of pubs, and a nice river, &c. Dad went to Guiseley from Leeds, and Ally came to collect Sam and I at 4. Dog tired. We do provide good hospitality at family parties.

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