Pope John Paul IInd visiting the grave of the murdered Priest Father Jerzy Popieluszko this day
Pope John Paul IInd visiting the grave of the murdered Priest Father Jerzy Popieluszko this day

A fine breakfast and lunch as a reward for some earth shifting this morning with Daniel painting the sheet steel piling until thunderstorms stopped us both and allowed me to resume paperwork. The Liberals and SDP are seriously considering a merger, Labour who dominate the seats in Scotland call on the Tory government to scrap the Poll Tax as they have no mandate North of the Border, Ford plan to pull out of South Africa and John Paul IInd visits the grave of the murdered priest Father Popieluszko, Derek Bell winds the Le Man race and a US jet beats the word circumnavigation record in just less than two days with four re-fuelling stops

The first awake and up this morning, having recovered from my recent late night. I got the morning drinks and found Diana in the small spare bedroom, having retreated there with her trouble* overnight. I got her a coffee, myself and Daniel some tea, and the girls orange squash. I was dressed and ready by now, so I went out to start work earth moving, working up an even better appetite for my Sunday fried breakfast. Di called me in and I enjoyed the food very much. All morning shifting earth, getting the remaining owners to remove their boats from the frontage, so that we could work on. Came in at 12.30 pm and got out the best china and silver, so that we could have Sunday lunch in the dining room for a change. A nice meal of roast beef, but I had to smack both of the girls, who had been naughty all morning and had been trying Diana’s patience. Daniel dried as I did the washing up, then we both went back out to the river frontage. Dan was painting the front of the sheet piling with Tractol, red paint and did the entire job today. I hope that his fingers and arm will not be stiff for part II of his mathematics ‘O’ level exam tomorrow.

I made great progress this weekend, almost completing the shaping of the downstream bank (except for the drainage chamber). Apart from a few twinges, my back has escaped injury, which is a blessing. Thunderstorms and heavy rain stopped my efforts at 8.30 pm this evening and so I came in, had a bath, saw Daniel do the same, and then settled to my journal and TV news. More thunderstorms and showers are forecast over the next day or two and so I might get some paperwork done at last. Main story is the aftermath of the election. Now David Steel is calling for the ‘fusion’ of the Liberal Party with the SDP, calling a meeting of Liberal Party officers for Tuesday to consider the matter. Norman Tebbit, still Tory Party Chairman, but no longer a Cabinet Minister, has announced plans for a drive to win party support in the inner cities, but I think he has an uphill battle. After a three-hour meeting of the Labour Party’s Scottish Executive, shadow Scottish Secretary Donald Dewar (backed with 50 Labour MPs north of the boarder) calls for an urgent meeting with the Tory Scottish Secretary, Malcolm Rifkind. He says that the Tories have no mandate in Scotland and that they should scrap the rates reform plans that will introduce the ‘Community Charge’. The Ford Motor Company are the latest multi-national corporation to decide to pull out of South Africa. Pope John Paul IInd has ended his trip to Poland after visiting the grave of the murdered Priest, Father Popieluszko, meeting General Jaruzelski for the best part of an hour, and calling for Poland and the Vatican to have diplomatic relations. In a day of good sport, the Welsh rugby team lose heavily to the New Zealand All-Blacks, and Britain’s Derek Bell is one of the team of three drivers that won the two-day endurance Le Mans sport car race. Unfortunately he was driving a Porsche, rather than a Jaguar, but Jaguar are still leading the world championship. An American Gulfstream executive jet has become the latest aeroplane to beat the world record for circumnavigating the world, starting and ending at the Paris Air Show, in a journey that took 45 hours, 26 minutes and stopping to refuel four times. * Diana suffered from very painful piles