Monday January 19, 1981

 _. Historic day. Ally and I had breakfast together at 7. Giggling together over cups of tea. Dad joined us. I pushed her down the lane.

12:40pm: Ally phoned to say she had spoken to the Rev Calvin Ward, Vicar of Esholt, and booked an appointment for us to see him on Saturday evening at 7:30. The ball is rolling. Feel very elated. Why didn't we think of this sooner?

9pm: Phoned Ally. She was in bed with a book and sore throat. A luscious little chat. How can we remain silent until February?

Other news: The US hostages in Iran are to be freed soon. President Carter leaves office tomorrow.

-=-

Sunday January 18, 1981

 _. 2nd Sunday after Epiphany

Up at 11. We headed out to see the Stonehouse Inn with Mum, Dad, Sue, Pete, Margaret, Jim and Julie. We drove there and looked at it without going on [it wasn't the time to do so with Margaret]. I can picture it renovated, nestling there in the sun surrounded by umbrellas, bustling with hikers. I pray this will come off for Mum and Dad. To the Miner's Arms for lunch. Bleak, and pouring rain. I stopped for a wee in a field on the way back and we lost the others. We returned home via Leathley, Farnley, &c. 

Back at Pine Tops Ally and I were interrogated mercilessly by the party re a possible wedding. Little do they know. One particular 'hairy' incident was when Jim and Margaret were discussing their pearl wedding anniversary, on June 30. Without thinking I immediately said that June 30 is a Tuesday. Jim's eyes glistened. He leapt upon it. Why have I been looking at the June '81 calendar?

Dad breathalysed all the party, just by way of a joke. I blew an alcohol-free bag as if I hadn't had a drop all day.

Tonight a momentous decision was made. The party disbanded at 9 and Mum and Dad retired at 10:30 and Ally and I took out a diary and decided to marry on June 27 at Esholt [my parish] because she doesn't like the look of Lidget Abbey [sic]. On January 30-31 we are going to Hampshire to seek parental approval and on Saturday February 7 we will go public. I'll tell Mum and Dad immediately on our return from Hampshire. How's that?

-=-

Saturday January 17, 1981

 _. Slept until lunchtime, but then erupted in a flurry of activity. I cleaned out the imitation log gas burning fire, and did the carpets with the vacuum cleaner. Ally washed her smalls and dried them in the new spin dryer. I even found time to split some spider plants and swept the leaves and litter from her slippery pathway. A real hive of industry, it was.

Home to Guiseley by 5pm to find Pine Tops deserted.Then Mum and Dad returned from a visit to the Stonehouse Inn at Thruscross, very enthusiastic about the place, saying that the owner, 87 year-old George Deakin, is considering selling the place and that Mum and Dad are his heir presumptives in the business. Great excitement. 

At 8:30 we went with Sue and Pete to meet Lynn, Dave, Dave Allinson and the delightfully vulgar Elaine, at the Nunroyd, a new pub in Nunroyd Park, Guiseley. Not very nice. Certainly doomed to failure. All the yobs from Guiseley and Yeadon were 'casing the joint'. On to the Stone Trough at Rawdon [full of teenagers], and finally to the White Cross. Saw Mick Lynch and Carole, with a new boyfriend, a hairdresser. Back to Pine Tops with Sue and Pete for a drink. Watched a lousy film starring Sarah Miles.

-=-

Friday January 16, 1981

 _. Didn't hear the alarm clock and woke up at 8. Unbelievably, I was at my desk at the YP at 8:50 looking well turned out, and efficient. However, by lunchtime I was exhausted. I put a couple of chairs together to make a makeshift hammock and sprawled out behind the filing cabinets [Africa: Zambia politics 17197], and slept for an hour emerging at 2:30 feeling bog-eyed and with a pulsating brain. Did no work and sat with my head in my hands.

Ally phoned to say she was leaving the AHA at 2:30 because of the snow. The girls quit the office at 4 and Ally came to the office at 4:30. I gave her some photo files to look at until 5:30 and then we went out into a blizzard to join Lynne Bateson at her leaving party in the Harrogate suite at the Wellesley. Joined by Peter Lazenby, Gavin Summers, Roy Holland, Nichola Gould, Stephanie Ferguson & Dave, &c. Put away a good deal of booze [again] but felt remarkably well considering I was so dead this afternoon. Ally got on like a house on fire with Pete and Roy. Somebody [the name escapes me] analysed by horoscope. Evidently, Pisces was in ascendant at the moment of my birth which dilutes some of the nastiness of Aries. What clap trap. On to an Indian restaurant on Eastgate with a party including a dreadful Jewish solicitor and his tarty wife. Ally was furious about her. The solicitor's wife took exception to Stephanie, for some reason, call it jealousy, and a slanging match, or battle of wits, ensued in which the indomitable Stephanie came out on top as one would expect. The bill in the restaurant was far too steep, and left me almost destitute. Ally gave a couple a lift to Roundhay and on we went to Club St, feeling tired, full and content.

-=-

Thursday January 15, 1981

 _. Kathleen put in an appearance today for 10 minuties in the afternoon and looked really shocking. She told us she is down to 8 stone, and resembles a Kampuchean refugee. She has been granted leave of absence by W.J. Austin-Clarke, and said goodbye knowing we won't be seeing her again until after her father's death, which could come any time. Sarah is left in charge and is far from happy with the situation because although she will have full powers she will not be receiving Kathleen's money. Trouble brewing here no doubt.

To Ally's at 6. She was scampering around in nothing but a towel looking very sexy, with her curls dripping wet. At 8 we went to a fish and chip shop and ate them sitting in the steamed up car watching the Bradford peasants frequenting the off-licence premises nearby. Why is it that very poor people, who can barely afford to feed themselves, always seem to have packs of Alsatian dogs, and canine half-breeds? Dogs, I think, are associated with the upper classes and the lower classes, but not those in the middle.

Onwards to the Drop where we over-did things with booze and frittered away over £7, which I can ill afford. We discussed the wedding and thought of going on to Oakwood Hall but returned to Rue Club instead and sat by the fire studying the calendar. June was suggested, and so was September, but July and August were not.

-=-

Wednesday January 14, 1981

 _. Freezing rain which occasionally looks like snow. Frank Metcalfe, a weather expert, tells me that tomorrow 'it will snow like buggery'. 

My alarm clock sounded at 6:50, and by 7:30 I was twiddling my thumbs, raring to go. I put through my morning alarm call to Ally and she took the traditional twenty minutes to struggle to the blower. She said it was the postman dropping a letter through her box that finally woke her, not the ringing telephone from her desperate lover 10 miles away.

Ronald Reagan is to be inaugurated US president next Tuesday. His friendship with Frank Sinatra could prove to be quite embarrassing because it's obvious that 'old blue eyes' is buried up to his neck in shady underground activities. Beleive it or not, I am now warming to this ageing old 'has been'. Carter was ineffectual and a bungler, and I think America is well rid. I did feel sad, nay -dismayed - in November, but it's January now. General Haig seems to be a decent chappie too. Someone who'll give the Iranians a kick in the sensitive area.

Ally came here at 7:30 and we watched 'Coronation Street'. Mum remarked that I must have been watching the programme all my life. It certainly feels like it. We glued photographs in a new album and reminisced about our last holiday and Sue & Pete's wedding.

Sue and Pete came to see Mum for ten minutes. She complained of feeling ill [again].

Afterwards I helped Ally insert her new earrings. She behaved as though it was a major operation. She had her ears pierced on Dec 1, and so the sleepers have had a good six weeks.

On the 9 o'clock news we heard that Lady Diana Spencer has joined the Prince of Wales at Sandringham for dinner tonight. The report claimed she went to Norfolk by train and was collected at the station before Sandringham by a member of the royal household. She'll be at the estate for two or three days. Is this it? It is interesting to note that the future King George VI proposed to Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon at Sandringham on January 13, 1923.

-=-

Tuesday January 13, 1981

 _. Very cold. Biting in fact. Phoned Ally at 7:30 [I'd regained consciousness at 6:30 on hearing Dad making his way to bed after a 12 hour shift guarding prisoners at Otley]. 

The joke now, when talking to Ally is the colour of the bridesmaid dresses, i.e. the dresses for HER bridesmaids. Today it was lemon with white spots. This wedding talk seems so unreal. When will it be? Ally wants to name a date, but I don't think it's down to her. What about an engagement?  I don't really think one is necessary, but to go without one altogether might not go down well in some quarters.

At the YP Kathleen has applied for indefinate leave of absence from her duties as chief librarian to look after her dying father who is lingering close to the abyss. Sarah is now ruler of all she surveys.

Tonight when Mum was heading off to bed and for the second night in succession she asked me how Ally can tolerate living on her own. I said: 'Oh, she's used to it'. She would like nothing better than to see us settled.

A foreign holiday this years seems lost and forgotten, and I don't give a damn. She looked at a house [£17,500] at Rawdon on her way home last night. Club Street is all very well but she is buying it with a Barclays bank loan [thanks to her Dad] and this cannot be converted into a mortgage because building societies do not give mortgages to properties without a back, side, or rear door. Don't ask me why, but this is the case. So, when we marry we might look for some other place to dwell, and in both our names of course.

Phoned Ally at 8. She's booked Hill Top Cottage, at Grassington, for February 6,7 and 8. Phoned Dave G to confirm his presence.

Monday January 12, 1981

 _. I am cultivating something closely resembling a beard, and although many people fall about laughing at it, I think Ally likes it, and is happy, and the more they mock it, the more I shall grow it, or attempt to grow it, because I'm driven on by comment. At least people are noticing me.

Royal news: The Daily Mail reports that Lady Diana [Spencer] with her sisters and father will be spending next weekend at Sandringham. If this is so then it could have very exciting possibilities. The more I see of Lady D the more I realise she is the girl to be Queen.

Prince Welf Ernst of Hanover, a nephew of the Duke of Edinburgh, and contemporary of the Prince of Wales at Gordonstoun has died suddenly in India, whilst playing karate, aged 33. He has been cremated on the banks of the Ganges in a Hindhu ceremony. Queen Victoria was very fond of Indians, and one, whose name escapes me, rose to be a private secretary and wielded great power over her.

Freezing rain today. Ally's car wouldn't start so she dumped it until this evening and collected it when she came to dinner at 6. I went with Dave G to Leeds and saw him off back to Stockport. We are thinking about Grassington in February.

Poor Dad is working a 12 hour shift from 6am tomorrow, guarding prisoners at Otley. Mum loathes his lengthy absences. Ally and I had a candlelit dinner, and later she went off to Club Street. I hate the Citroen for it's constant indecision. Saw TV. 'The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes' until 11:30. To bed.

-=-

Sunday January 11, 1981

_. 1st Sunday after Epiphany

Out of bed late and again. We went down to the chemist in Guiseley for something for Mum, who was writhing in bed with an upset stomach. Mr Ussher made up some potion and we took it back to Mum, tucked up safely in bed. To preserve the tranquility of the house we took Dave to Burley where we sat drinking sherry with my ever widening sister. Dave B was nowhere to be seen. He was out in his garage playing with the engine of Lynn's car. We sat with our drinks in one room whilst Lynn and Dave had roast lamb for lunch in another. Ally thought that this was perhaps a trifle rude. When we did have conversation it centred on babies and houses. Christine Dibb has told Lynn that Ally was moving from Bradford. Highly amusing.

Back to Pine Tops at 6 for dinner with Dad. Mum still laid up, but slightly better. Pork chops by candlelight. Watched TV until almost 1am. We started with 'Houseboat' starring Cary Grant and Sophia Loren, then Vanessa Redgrave playing Fania Fénelon in 'Playing for Time', a horrific tale about the Auschwitz concentration camp. Finally, James Mason and Diana Coupland in 'Spring and Port Wine'. To bed at 1. Ally looked exhausted and Dave, full of cold, sniffed throughout the epic TV session.

-=-

Saturday January 10, 1981

 _. Out of bed at almost 12. Breakfast on eggs, bacon, &c. As soon as it was decently possible we escaped to the Bod for a drink. A pleasant session. Afterwards we drove to Guiseley and sat with Mama and Sue and Pete. Sue clad in a new fur coat - a Christmas present from Pete. Wine flowed. Snow fell. Night fell.

Out at 8 [Ally driving] Dave, Sue, Pete and I to the Fox & Hounds and then the New Inn. Saw George W and Jayne [again], but we left the Fox after just two drinks because it's such a dull, old place. The New Inn is delightfully rough, and packed. Sat with Dave W, Gus, Johnny, and a guy from Hull. The usual mob were in pouring drink all over each other. I was revolted to see a heap of genuine vomit on the bar at the end of the evening - carrots, the lot. Came home to Pine Tops afterwards. I was feeling damp after Johnny had pushed me into a urinal at the New Inn. It was flushing at the time reminiscent of going over the Niagara Falls. We made a good deal of noise before going to bed.

-=-

Friday January 9, 1981

 _. To Leeds from Bradford. Felt tatty - wearing the same shirt from the day before. Spent the day 'running' the library. Home at 6 after meeting Dave G at the station. He has a glowing nose and had even less hair. We both dined with Mum, Dad and JPH. They'd been looking after my nephew for the day because Maria had an appointment with a gynaecologist. JPH behaved himself very well, whilst David spilled his wine over the table and slopped around like a three year-old. JPH told me that I have a funny voice. I probably do.

Ally came over at 8 and the three of us went to the Fox. We met George Waite again. He was drunk and didn't say much. To the New Inn at 9:30 to meet John, Maria and Chris Ratcliffe. The place was packed and noisy. Chris hated it.

Maria told me of her gynaecological problem __________, and because of this she has to come back to Yokshire in a fortnight to see the quack again. She had told this story to Mum and Dad this afternoon, and Dad [poor man] bolted red-faced from the room. He embarrasses so easily. 

John was very talkative and on leaving he kissed Ally, which touched her. He isn't a kisser.

We left at 11 and took David to Club Street. Had a few drinks and listened to the Specials before bed.

-=-