Wednesday August 5, 1981

 _. Another scorcher. Up at 6:30.

Worked through lunch, sat at my desk until 5. Gloom. Home for 6. Lasagne. Bobbin looked better and has colour in her cheeks. 

Industrious later. Weeding the garden, then bottling lager. Dave L phoned for news of the honeymoon. He's coming over tomorrow evening to catch up.

News: the Pope has had another operation on his intestines, supposedly successful, but will he regain his old vigour? Viscount Quenington is to marry a Brazilian. Sir Geoffrey Howe says the recession is over.

TV: Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Caine in X,Y and Zee [1972].

Weather: thundery this evening. Tomorrow, cloud and thunder.

Tuesday August 4, 1981

 _. Hot, sticky, and uncomfortable. Up at 6:45 to the radio alarm clock blasting out the rousing national anthem in honour of the Queen Mother's 81st birthday. What will we do without her when the time comes?

To Leeds at 7:45. Phoned Mum from the office. The deadline for the Stonehouse Inn is tomorrow. She sounded depressed. It looks like the end of the line. 

I'm researching Diana's pedigree for something for the YP. Thumbing through the 1956 edition of Burke's Peerage. The new princess has a second cousin, Mrs Foster, of Oswaldkirk, near York, and another cousin is Mrs Robin Compton, of Newby Hall, Ripon. Diana is also related to Bessie's neighbour in Martyr Worthy, old Mrs Seymour.

Home at 6. Fish cakes. Ally is pale and exhausted. To bed .

Footnote: will Michael Heseltine be PM one day?

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Monday August 3, 1981

 _. Up at 6:30. To the YP for 9. Oliver Everett has been appointed Comptroller to the Household of the Prince and Princess of Wales and Private Secretary to the princess. He is her first appointment. It is rumoured that the honeymoon will take them to Kos, ideal for windsurfing and sailing..

Phoned Ally at 11. _________.

The 9 o'clock news: Ronald Reagan seems to be doing very well over in the USA. Er, that's it.

Had a long talk with Dave G, who is twenty seven today and back from San Antonio. He has missed us. Garry isn't the riotous type is he? Ibiza sounds to be more crowded than ever.

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Sunday August 2, 1981

Rachel.

 _. 7th Sunday after Trinity

Hot summers day. We laid in bed until about 10 looking at a map. We were seriously thinking about going to Chatsworth, but the time of day put us off. I suggested driving down to Althorp to look at Lady Diana's bathroom. But no. 

Rachel Judson came knocking on the door at 12. She said her car was 'leaking' and could I possibly put a stop to it? Oh, dear. I went over the road with a bucket of water, and managed to top up the radiator. I think that poor Rachel really just wanted to speak to somebody. She told me that she and Garry have 'finished' and that she was still pissed from last night. Rachel was clad in her black, silky disco gear and clearly had been in them all night. She bombed off in her MG, blond hair flowing. Poor Rachel. She looks at me in that naughty, dangerous way. Nothing can come between me and my precious Ally, not even the blond siren Rachel Judson. 

We drove up to the Goose Inn on the moors above Halifax. Sat with a lager curiously watching the barman. Is he perhaps my long, lost cousin? I went over and enquired: "Are you Graham Rhodes?" To which he replied: "Are you Michael Rhodes?" Great fun. Graham is the son of my Dad's older brother, Arnold. His younger sister, Miss Alison Katherine Rhodes [!!] is the waitress and brought our ploughman's lunches. Isn't it a small universe? We promised to see him again. Ally found him a very attractive youth, carefully addding that he was obviously of the same gene pool as her attractive husband. On at 6 to Haworth and then to the George & Dragon on Apperley Lane for a steak. The bill came to £14. ______.

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Saturday August 1, 1981

 _. Up at about 9. We had breakfast watching the royal stuff on the telly. The departure for Gibraltar of the Prince and Princess of Wales. Rain at Broadlands but the crowds were dense and good humoured, as they have been all week. The public interest shown to this couple must make them the most popular pair in history. The prince piloted the Andover of the Queen's Flight to Oporto[for refuelling], then on to the rock of Gib and eventually to the peace and quiet of HMY Britannia for 2 weeks.

The Commercial, Esholt.

To Guiseley at 12. With Mum, Dad, John, JPH, Catherine, Lynn, Dave, Frances, Sue & Pete to the Hare and Hounds beer garden. Back to Pine Tops at 3:30. JPH went next door to Richard Eccles's third birthday party. At 8 we went out with Lynn, Dave, Sue & Pete to the Commercial. Dave & Elaine Allinson were there. The girls were put out by this. You have to be in the right mood for an evening with Elaine.

Ally was feeling clammy and uncomfortable and so we left for home and bed. She gnashes her teeth in her sleep, you know.

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Friday July 31, 1981

 _. New Moon

Ally had a day in bed feeling lethargic. _________. I came home at 5:30. She looked very pretty.

To Morrison's [a few provisions]. They have a record section. I spotted Beethoven's 'Emperor' concerto and snapped it up. I also enrolled at the local library. Ally took out a couple of Dorothy L. Sayers novels. Back at home we sat drinking coffee, eating chocolate buns and listening with rapture to Ludwig's piano concerto No. 5. Spent the evening 'cuddling'.

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Thursday July 30, 1981

Diana: unmade bed.

 _. Out of bed at 6:30.  Ally looked ghastly but insisted on going into work only to come home and to bed at 10:45. ___________.
Royal wedding round up: some comments in the office. Sarah, a follower of fashion if ever there was one, has no good word to say about the fashions yesterday. Lady Diana 'looked like an unmade bed' in her 'tatty', 'creased', 'crumpled' gown, with a 'hideous veil'. Surely, taffeta is supposed to look crumpled? It didn't end there. Diana's hair was 'like a wet rag'. My dear, sick wife, in Diana's defence, says she looked 'exquisite', and that my work colleagues are nothing but jealous. The Prince and Princess of Wales, we are told, spent the day fishing in the River Test and walking 'hand in hand' in the sprawling grounds of the Broadlands estate.

This evening Ally came downstairs only briefly. She looked horrible.

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Wednesday July 29, 1981

John & Maria.

 _. The wedding day of HRH The Prince of Wales, KG, KT, &c and the Lady Diana Frances Spencer. Ally and I were up and out at 7am to buy newspapers, and then we took up our positions before the Tv set. Angela Rippon was there on the streets whipping up excitement for a couple of hours, and then Tom Fleming took over in time for the processions. Lynn, Dave, Frances, Sue and Pete came at about 10. John and Maria came along later.

Ally.

A potted review of the ceremony: The Queen [in blue] left the palace followed by the Queen Mother [peppermint], all members of the House of Windsor following on. The Prince [of Wales] in an open landau with Prince Andrew, looking tense. Vast crowds lined the Mall. The bride left Clarence House with her father Earl Spencer at about 10:30. The usual fairy princess malarkey, romantic, yards of taffeta, yard after yard of silk &c. The poll at Pine Tops was that the dress was not up to standard. 'Dowdy' was mum's comment. The Emanuels are our greatest designers, but have they erred? The musical part of the service was wonderful. Kiri Te Kanawa sang Handel's 'Samson', and Jeremiah Clarke's 'Trumpet Voluntary' blasted out as the bride made her three minute walk to the altar. For the staggering Earl Spencer it must have been a great ordeal. Diana promised to take 'Philip Charles Arthur George' as her wedded husband, and Charles promised to endow his bride with HER worldly goods and not his. The Queen Mother looked tearful, toying with her handkerchief. The Queen, tense, as she always is. After the signing of the register the bride and groom came down the aisle to Elgar's 'Pomp and Circumstance' March No. 4. Tumultuous drive back to the palace. Wildly cheering crowds. Kisses on the balcony. Flags waving. They left in a landau for Waterloo Station and on to Broadlands. Charlie has done it at last.

We left Guiseley at about 10. A good family gathering.

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Tuesday July 28, 1981

Nancy: fish out of water/

 _.Got a bus to Guiseley at 5:30 and Ally met me there. We went to Pine Tops to watch the Prince of Wales and Lady Diana interviewed. It was recorded in the summer house at Buckingham Palace in the middle of last week. A touching, simple little interview. I thought Lady Diana looked very thin and pale. From tomorrow I do hope that the couple will be afforded some privacy to lead a normal existence. We don't want our future Queen to spend her life in a Tetbury asylum.

There was a Hyde Park fireworks spectacular tonight for the 'crowned heads of Europe'. Fireworks are very nice if you like that sort of thing. They sat Nancy Reagan next to a Mandingo chieftain. She looked like a fish out of water.

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Monday July 27, 1981

 _. Back to the YP. Sarah, it seems, lost the 'royal wedding ballot' and is working on Wednesday. She isn't all that bothered about looking in on the royal nuptials.

Ash Tree Cottage this evening almost buzzed with activity. After eating I bottled almost 20 bottles of lager, then brewed another gallon. One never knows when cousin Steve might drop in for a slurp.

Watched 'Far from the Madding Crowd' starring Julie Christie and Peter Finch. Such a depressing take of woe. Thomas Hardy's books always have an aura of melancholy which is quite unique.

Crowds on the Mall.

Royal wedding fever is getting to everyone now. Crowds are already gathering on the streets of London. Old ladies lagged in the Union flag, encamped on the Mall. A gang of punk rockers, would-be rioters, waving plastic flags with gusto outside Clarence House. The Queen Mother, ill with a leg ulcer, has the press convinced that she will miss the ceremony. I do not suppose that the Her Majesty would miss the event even if it meant being wheeled into St Paul's in an oxygen tent. I do wish that the press would desist repeating that Lady Diana will be the first English Princess of Wales since the Plantagenet era. Mary of Teck might sound foreign, but she was born at Kensington Palace to an English princess mother
.

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Sunday July 26, 1981

 _. 6th Sunday after Trinity

Warm. A morning in bed with the sunlight hurtling in through the curtains. We took a leisurely breakfast.

Slumped on the settee watching a John Mills film Ally remarked upon my indolence. Taking this as a hint I took up a bucket of hot, soapy water and gave the car a good clean. It cannot have been touched since the Spring.

We lunched on lamb chops, cauliflower cheese and new potatoes. Absolutely delicious.

Sue & Pete: anniversary.

Royal stuff on the news. The Prince of Wales and his team playing polo at Windsor v. Spain. Lady Diana, like a frightened rabbit, was at the back of the royal box and refused to come out. The poor Queen was entertaining Nancy Reagan, but the 'First Lady' left the match early surrounded by secret service and CIA agents. 

To Pine Tops at 7, first calling at Sue and Pete's with an anniversary card. It's their first today. John, Maria and the children were with Mum and Dad. Catherine was eating a banana like a tiny chimpanzee. Maria was complaining about her throat - another case of tonsilitis. 

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