Dad enjoyed sitting in my Reliant when he and mum visited me on this day
Dad enjoyed sitting in my Reliant when he and mum visited me on this day

Working on financial affairs until Mum and Dad arrived and took a look at my Reliant and Rolls Royce before playing monopoly with me and the kids. This evening election planning and journal writing and then hearing of a tragic Austrian Alpine skiing accident, killing four British schoolboys whilst at home two children died in rail accidents. Wall Street starts the week lower.

Slept well and showered & shaved in good time for breakfast. I dressed in some old clothes in anticipation of doing some outside work. The day had started rather cold and misty and so I started my working day in my office, doing some paperwork to try and get my financial affairs in order for the tax year end. Worked on until morning coffee and then I went out to feed the ducks and doves. Saw that the games lawn turf was still moist and so I got the new multi-bladed mower out and used its weight and wide roller to flatten the turves from both directions. In and worked on my forestry accounts until lunchtime, providing the details needed for this year’s tax claim. A nice lunch and then I went back to my work, reconciling bank accounts and writing a number of cheques for outstanding accounts. I then turned on the word processor and typed up a letter chasing the children’s trust affairs, another putting a forestry matter to rights and then I was in the middle of a long letter about sewage treatment in Little Paxton when my Mother and Father arrived on a visit. I showed Dad my ‘new’ cars and he got in the Reliant. Then we had a look around the gardens before joining the others inside for a cup of tea. They looked well enough and had the stamina to manage the children’s exhausting appetite for games! We played a game of monopoly and it was quite dark by the time we finished it.

I won of course! (but then I always play to win). Later tonight I hurriedly put the ducks away, before finishing off my sewage letter and sorting out the tax vouches that Roger Brittain wants to clear my outstanding tax affairs. Worked quite late and had a couple of phone calls from Alliance activists with offers of help for next week, which was encouraging. Eventually wrote up my journal as I watched a little televised football, dance and jazz. A day of tragedies on the news front. Four British schoolboys are killed in the Austrian Alps, as they fell to their death after sliding around in snow boots. The distraught teacher said they had taken no notice of warnings – they were all 14 or 15 and from Maidenhead in Berkshire. Two children also died back home in separate incidents involving railway crossings. A three year old was run over when running away from her parents and a thirteen year old girl fell on an electrified rail whilst chasing a wild rabbit! The body has now been found of the missing bride, Shirley Banks from Bristol, missing since last October. Wall Street has started the week lower and we wait now for tomorrow’s London trend.