Monday August 24, 1981

 _. St Bartholemew's Day

The anniversary in 1572 of the slaughter of 30,000 Huguenots by King Charles IX of France and his infamous mother Catherine de Medici.

Abysmal day at the YP. I use the word abysmal because Graham, my brother-in-law, uses it constantly to describe virtually everything from my green SAS-tyle trousers to his cold corn on the cob at the Connection restaurant. I spent the afternoon reading about Ronald Reagan's attack on Libya, and wholeheartedly agree with his decision. He may wear too much Brylcreem, but he's no fool. Articles about Joan of Arc in the Guardian and the Sunday Telegraph magazine.  There's a rumour going about that Carola Godman Irvine is to be the Princess of Wales's lady-in-waiting. She's currently one of the Duchess of Kent's ladies.

Sarah has gone on holiday for the week. Phoned Mum and spoke to Lynn, lunching there with Frances. We are dining at Burley on Wednesday. Mum is thinking of going to Scotland for the Bank Holiday weekend.

Audrey.

Home at 6. Had kidneys and rice. We discussed going to Hilda and Tony's but decided to go tomorrow instead. Ally disappeared outside with a bucket of soapy water to give Audrey a wash. The car hasn't been touched with a wash leather since we entered into Holy Matrimony.

Watched a drama on the life of Sir Charles Dilke, 2nd Baronet [1843-1911]. Quite good.

To bed at 11:15 but, dear me, the night was far from over. At 11:30 I heard the noise of a fracas outside and looking out I saw three youths, obviously intoxicated, urinating upon Mrs O'Connor's gate. [sorry, I mean Mrs O'Brien]. The boys had pushed a broken down car into Club Street and then went off with a can, laughing, to find petrol. I then went back to bed only to be rudely awakened at 12:15 by Ally screaming. Outside the lads had set fire to the car and the flames were licking around Audrey, threatening to blast our car and the whole of Club St into oblivion. Ally, in floods of tears, answered the door to Mrs O'Brien, who was worried about our car. I phoned 999 and the fire brigade and police were soon here. It hadn't been a deliberate attack. One of the drunks, pouring a can of petrol into his tank was also smoking a cig, and ignited the fuel. Sorry, I cannot give you a tale to match Pepys's account of the Great Fire of London.

-=-

Sunday August 23, 1981

 _. 10th Sunday after Trinity

Hot day. Not that we saw much of it. In bed until 11:30. No ill-effects from last night. No time for cuddling, the pub opened half an hour later. 

Had a fry-up with David. Sat reading the 'Sunday People' - utter claptrap. 

with Billy.

To the Ring 'o Bells for 1, and we sat outside drinking until 2:30 with Dave, Billy, Garry and Steve. A woman, who'd been at last night's pyjama party, came over to talk and remarked that she had always quite honestly thought that Steve was deaf and dumb. He does give that impression. Billy has a mortal fear of members of the hymenoptera family, particularly wasps, and he amused us by running around the beer garden shrieking as the little vespula vulgaris gave chase. Nothing goes smoothly when out with Billy. He's like a 1930s music hall act. 

Back at the Hollywood at 3:30 for lunch - turkey. We collapsed afterwards but recall seeing Burt Lancaster as Moses, and Harry Belafonte on the Muppet Show.

Our last sighting of Jim Glynn was when he hobbled off for his evening bath. I do hope he pulls through. We had a final drink with the lads at 7 and arrived home at 9:30. Bed.

-=-

Saturday August 22, 1981

 _. Sunny morn. Up at 8:30. Both into a very hot bath. Breakfast: eggs, sausages, &c. We squabbled over the toast and marmalade. Ally was in something of a foul mood. 

We left for Stockport and 11:00 and amazingly we were in the Hollywood pub at 12:15. It was wet and cold in Stockport, as usual.

Lily is a mass of brown curls, the blonde

The Armoury.

beehive of Bet Lynch-like hair is no more. She looks 20 years younger which is more than can be said for poor Jim. He's upstairs wrapped in a large dressing gown, looking haggard and pale. The poor man is only 58. He has not lost his sense of humour though, but was sadly incoherent, and mumbling. David attempted to act as interpreter.

We drank at the Hollywood and then went on to the Ring 'O Bells with Billy, Garry and Steve. Out this evening to the Armoury at 9, with the lads, to an 18th birthday 'Pyjama Party' at the Robin Hood. We frolicked until after 1 and then returned to the Hollywood. Ally went straight to bed and I sat bemoaning life's dreary outlook with David. He is cheesed off with his lot and needs a kick in the right direction.

-=-

Friday August 21, 1981

 _. A day of bliss at the YP today thanks to the absence of 'Mrs Slocombe' who is attending a golf tournament at Wetherby with her boyfriend who is the double of [President] Jimmy Carter. Such a dead ringer in fact that people stop him in the street and ask for his autograph. Kathleen did a night shift and so just Sarah and the new girl, Margot [who has replaced 'Shazzo'], who is becoming more and more quiet as the days roll on. Quieter than a mouse. 

Club Street.

I couldn't make any personal calls from the office until after 4 because the line in the library was out of order. Phoned Ally. A house on Club Street [number 9] is for sale and so I phoned Whitegates to be told, to my horror, that the property is on the market for a mere £6,000. Surely, something must be wrong with the place. Ally paid that two years ago, but the market has gone wild since then. I also phoned Mama to remind her we'll be away for the weekend. She had no startling news.

Home at 6. Marlene phoned asking me to get her some news cuttings from tonight's EP where Mark is mentioned doing something in the Peak District. ________.

Dave G phoned just to confirm the weekend orgy. Watched 'Casablanca' with Bogart and Bergman. Exquisite. I'm still on with Antonia Fraser's Charles II. I went to Lidget Green library and took out a biography of the Duke of Edinburgh [just to look up one particular fact]. It's a painful volume actually. Ally is buried behind another Agatha Christie.

-=-

Thursday August 20, 1981

 _. Brought back to consciousness by the drone of the radio alarm at 6:30. Putting my head under the pillow as the BBC informed us that President Reagan has shot down a ghastly Lebanese aircraft [Oops] I of course mean a ghastly Libyan aircraft. I sincerely apologise to all Lebanese followers of this journal. In other news, the railwaymen are to strike and today sees the Fermanagh and South Tyrone by-election. Obviously, another IRA hunger striker will be elected. 

Had a very large breakfast and left my gurning wife at the door. YP dull. Kathleen went home at 12.

Phoned Mama. She spent yesterday afternoon in Masham. They've booked a coach tour with Wallace Arnold to Alassio in Italy for two weeks from September 20. They haven't had a foreign holiday since Spain in '74. The warm Italian climate will do them good. I told her the sad news that her friend, the landlady of the Miner's Arms at Greenhow, has been killed in a car accident. She told me that Mr Bradbury from the White Cross Post Office is dead and was buried yesterday.

Had two phone conversations with Ally who laughed hysterically throughout both, for some reason. Derek Jenkins was the cause of much of her merriment.

Ban smoking on buses.

I'm slowly becoming sick and tired of the typical British bus passenger. I always make for the upper deck and wherever possible I throw open all the windows for some fresh air on my tortuous journey to Bradford. The majority of my other passengers are invariably over dressed. They nearly always close the windows and then proceed to set fire to the roll of tobacco hanging from their nicotine stained lips. I now know why Lidget Green cemetery is so full of young corpses. Smoking should be banned in all public places. Surely this seemingly ridiculous move will improve the collective health of our nation? Bloody Hell. If they don't kill themselves they're going to kill me. The fumes this evening were unbearable.

Home at 6. Ally was waiting for me in a white shirt. Red lips. Tomato soup, then liver and onions. An evening of tranquil domesticity reading. I'm on with Antonia Fraser's Charles II, and Ally is 37 pages into Queen Victoria's correspondence with her granddaughter Victoria of Hesse [later Marchioness of Milford Haven] by Richard Hough.

Some old crone by the name of Jessie Matthews has died in Pinner. I can't see what all the fuss is about. I don't think she's done anything since 1923.

-=-

Wednesday August 19, 1981

 _. The YP is becoming intolerable. My job is slowly being phased out because Kathleen is convinced that I will soon be quitting. She thinks that within twelve months I'll be gone. Much of my routine is being done by the night staff. I spend most of the day reading the national newspapers and filing the interesting stuff, pondering over the troubles in the world. Keeping a watchful eye on the current state of emergency in Sri Lanka.How many people out there are mourning the loss of Jack Coia, the Scottish architect of Italian extraction? 

Black Hole:

Just what is the point in anything? We are led to believe, in a report in one of the papers, that the Universe will be catapulted into a Black Hole in 50 million years time, and when that happens what will it all have been about? Why did God go to all the trouble of creating Leonardo Da Vinci just to send everything he created into oblivion, along with Wren's St Paul's Cathedral, Alan Whicker and the Petit Trianon? Blimey, Michael. Go pour another coffee. Taking up another newspaper I see that that reporters have caught up with the Prince and Princess of Wales on Deeside, and both say married life is marvellous and highly recommended. I tend to agree with this sentiment.

Can I discuss Ally's face-pulling gurning ritual? Each morning my darling wife accompanies me to the door and kisses me goodbye, and then, when I look back over my shoulder, I see her face, pressed up against the little bottle-bottomed glass window in the door, hideously gurning, her face contorted in some horrific grimace. And with each passing day the facial postures grow steadily worse. I lay awake in the night, sweating, my mind racing: what horrific apparition will send me to my daily labours in the morning?

Home at 6. We had a peculiar quiche with some chips. It wasn't quite like Ally intended. Later, wallowed in the bath. Ally, wearing my pullover, doing the ironing. Afterwards we shared an orange and watched an American disaster movie. The characters in these films are always so vile you want them to die anyway, and so some of the suspense is diluted.

Are you bored of reading this? Gone are the days of spice and degeneracy. You heart no longer pounds at my tales of bawdy exploits. It's gone from depravity to homely regularity. Goodnight.

-=-

Tuesday August 18, 1981

 Wet first, dry later. Dead at the YP. Home at 6. Dumplings. 

[As I write the above gripping entry Ally is sitting on the floor, atop a large cushion, thumbing through The Times passing remarks as she does so, such as : 'Shelley Winters is fifty nine today', and then, taking up the Yorkshire Post she giggles at a leading article entitled 'The Irish Albatross'.]

Later: we watched two films, the names of which escape me. One featured Jack Hawkins, in ancient Egypt. An epic from 1955 co-starring Joan Collins. Then Burt Lancaster and Virginia Mayo in a Robin Hood-type swashbuckling drama.

Ally took a volume of P.G. Wodehouse to bed with her. 

-=-