Day 631

Went round to see C in the evening, played darts.

And now the 1993 pontification: 1993 was the Year of Fear - I seemed to catch it from the general crime kerfuffle that started with James Bulger.

A year ago I had yet to be totally disillusioned with the language library. Now I'm still unemployed. My sole hope, really, for 1994 is to end this interregnum and get something proper and fulfilling to do. Everything can be fine.

Day 630

Just one more day of 1993 after this. Things have been very slow recently. But despite all that I feel a lot better than I did a year ago, in most ways. I feel I must sort something out in 1994. On April 14th I'll've been on the dole as long as I was at uni.

Sad reflection. Still, if I'm still unemployed when my birthday comes, I'll be 24 and get £10 pw extra. Silver lining etc. Still, as I said, despite all, things are better and things can be better still in 1994, with a bit of luck.

Day 629

Time seems to be going really slowly since Christmas. Walked round to the Post Office to cash my Giro, went into town. Put £55 in the building society - up to £214 now.

Went to the library and found the UK 3rd edition Basic D&D book. Noted down the differences to my 2nd edition - mostly trifling, spell books for M-U's for example and carried treasure for humanoids; the latter must've been left out of the 2nd ed., because type Q is listed in the 2nd but never used.

Day 628

Snow lying this morning, more snow later: was rather warm though, so most of it had melted by the evening. Read more of Dorothy Wordsworth's journal.

Day 627

Felt Christmas beginning to wear off and the days of the week reasserting themselves.

Lovejoy and Last of the Summer Wine specials in the evening.

Day 626

To parents' again for Boxing Day dinner.

In the evening listened to a prog about Newman & Baddiel on tour on R1, put up my new Tolkien postcards.

Read some of Dorothy Wordsworth's journal - it's eleven years to the day since I started diarising. Wish I'd had something better to record this year, still D.W. didn't seem to get up to much: being begged from, gardening, going for walks and thinking about 'Wm.'.

I did enjoy last night - 'it seemed that one or other of the girls was the sister of one of the officers and that everything was taking place with the utmost propriety.'

Day 625

CHRISTMAS DAY. Round to parents' for Christmas dinner. In the evening M rang up inviting me to her brother's friend's house, where we spent a cheery 2 hours playing Botticelli.

Day 624

CHRISTMAS EVE. Woke up with a hangover to a Today item on the vodka industry in Russia.

Nasty gang rape in Catford, can't have been much of a gang, 30 of them ran off when disturbed by one person.

Finished X2 Castle Amber, most characters 6th level now and the thief 7th level. I got that module eleven years ago tomorrow, at Christmas 1982 when I got D&D. Be great if I could get a job in that sector (games) in 1994. Ah well. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Day 623

Christmas Eve Eve. I've always liked Dec. 23, lots of anticipation and no anticlimax.

Day 622

Went round to my parents', fixed kitchen stools, put up 2 curtain rails. Gave the Christmas Waiting For God a watch.

Day 621

Shortest day (I think). Listened to a Bob tape D sent me in summer 1992 for the first time: some truly terrible versions of his best songs. That's Bob for you.

Day 620

Drew £20 out of the building society for glasses and Christmas, first time I've had to withdraw since August. Collected glasses, vision much improved at distance.

Watched Newman & Baddiel's Christmas thing in the evening.

Day 619

Last effective Sunday of the year, next week being Boxing Day. Very dark and stormy about 2.30 today.

To town tomorrow for the opticians.

Day 618

Got a huge 1½ litre bottle of vodka to see me through the Festive Season - official start tomorrow.

Having got the ephemeris from the library made a list of Pluto position, for doing people's transits.

The opticians rang; I'll collect my glasses on Monday. Another £20 to find.

Day 617

Dark day weather-wise, rain in the morning, lights on next door at 2 pm. It is the darkest week of the year after all. It'll be Christmas Eve in a week.

Perhaps 1993 has been very productive: a lot of old worries off my mind. Perhaps the terrible lethargy that set in in June 1989 is finally clearing? That would be an achievement.

Final episode of Planet of the Daleks tonight, great stuff. The Green Death promised for the New Year, acquiring new topicality what with THORP etc.

Day 616

Always used to feel the 16th was a Christmas milestone.

To the doctor's. He said the headaches were either eyestrain or 'stress' headaches: he confirmed my impression that unemployment is stressful. Cashed my Giro on the way back.

Went into town, put down £20 at the optician's towards £40 for new glasses, so much for 'safe in our hands'.

Went to Masson's where we used to buy RPG stuff, found it had been demolished. That's how much the RPG craze has passed. Came back and finished B2. Total characters killed: 72.

T phoned and invited me up for the New Year but I declined because of the drug dealers and suchlike they mix with, not that I said so of course.

Day 615

Continued campaigning - lost about 70 characters now with one second-level magic-user left alive and the module nearly finished. Is it supposed to be so lethal?

During this current D&D phase the career thing has been neglected (not that it makes much difference) - could leave it till January now, with Christmas only 10 days away.

Day 614

More campaigning. About 50 characters gone now, one reached 2nd level!

Went round to my parents', put up extra Christmas decorations, string for cards etc. (Not for me - I haven't sent a card since 1987, except one to E last year).

Harry Enfield's last year's Christmas show was on again, quite funny.

Day 613

Gave The Keep on the Borderlands (B2) a solo run-through. Lost about 30 1st-level characters so far! Went into town and signed on, then to have my eyes tested.

Came back, got the Christmas Radio Times, really makes it feel like Christmas! More Keep in the afternoon, mercury soap play on R4, documentary about false claims about cosmetics in the evening.

Day 612

Campaigned again. Put the Christmas tree up in the afternoon. Listened to The Greek Interpreter. Another good day for a Sunday.

Day 611

Having seen in a media directory in the library that White Dwarf was still going, looked for it in Smiths: it appears to have been merged with the Citadel miniatures catalogue. Warhammer stuff only. It's 10x worse than when I stopped getting it seven years ago, which is pretty bad. But found Dragon and bought that: much better, D&D support too though there seem to've been rules changes and the 'Known World' map has been thoroughly detailed. Was interested so bought it. Did some more campaigning when I got back.

Day 610

Up bright and early, which gave me a peculiar (unfounded) sense of purpose. Nice day though.

I've been unemployed over 29 months now, can't say it's added to my self-esteem, especially with M, S etc apparently leading such useful and productive lives. Time has been going very fast recently - can't believe it's Friday again, the 10th in a row I haven't been out. Some sort of record?

I have however now done 6 weeks' Temperance, which is also some sort of record. But however encouraging all this is, it just points out the lack of advancement in the last 2½ years, despite the false start at the Workshop.

Day 609

The tree across the road had been blown over in the night. Wind abated in the day.

They passed the 6-hour Sunday trading option. Hope it makes Sundays less dull, eh?

Day 608

Watched a bit of vacuous daytime telly. Wind got a bit breezy at noon, fresh at 3pm, very strong at 6.30pm.

Sunday trading vote tonight, religious fanatic option seen off 3 minutes ago but liberation still not assured. Will Orwell's 'gloomy Sundays' become a thing of the past? Hope so.

Day 607

They cut down a 250-year old chestnut tree in East London today for the new M11 link road. What a disgrace. It took 200 police to drag away all the protestors, wish I could've been there. I will never use that road.

Day 606

Always used to feel like the threshold of Christmas, Dec. 6th.

Practised with Page Plus, getting quite handy now.

In the evening listened to the R4 play (colonialism), watched Panorama (racial attacks).

Day 605

Doesn't December go fast these days? Used to last about 10 years when I was a kid. Up at 9.15, listened to Alistair Cooke, went round to my parents' and helped my dad repair the shed roof.

Beautiful clear sunny weather, chilly in the shade though. Watched Last of the Summer Wine in the evening, Repetition of the Same old Jokes more like. Still got a sort of charm though. Does the constant out-of-control rolling down hills symbolise Mother Earth's power to excite and invigorate even old men who are scared by their women?

Another quite good day for a Sunday.

Day 604

Watched The Bill (I think we'll take watching The Bill as read in this diary from now on).

Day 603

West End Girls playing now, brings back memories eh?

Day 602

Up early. Found bits of the day rather slow but on the whole it's worth it if I sleep better. Good R4 prog about WW1 executions in the afternoon, revealed injustice.

It's two months today since I last went out for the night. Still, something good may happen. At least I'm not working at the language library this year!

Day 601

Watched Star Trek. Being Wednesday, the evening was devoid of other media entertainment: played darts.

First BBC Christmas trail today. It starts so early nowadays, etc.

Day 600

Budget in the afternoon, fags up again (what does rolling baccy count as?) but nothing on spirits, luckily. So all those selfish bastards who voted Tory last year'll get their just deserts with all the extra VAT etc.

Got the presents I bought yesterday wrapped up, 3½ weeks before Christmas. Not bad planning eh?

Day 599

Bitterly cold today. Went into town for Christmas shopping and to sign on. Doubled spending to £20 this year - didn't even have to take money out of the building society. Such are the benefits of Temperance.

Day 598

Read the paper. In the evening the usual telly, last in the series of Lovejoy. Still not the same without Lady Jane.

Day 597

Thought about asking for that new OMD album for Christmas.

Have been thinking about apathy, which seems to've descended in May 1989 and been here for the last 4½ years, apart from a brief period around the finals. Wish it would disperse...

Day 596

Cold and foggy. More NPC's. Rather boring day again in fact, apart from the new Viz.

A Dr Who segment in the Children In Need thing.

Day 595

Did some NPC parties, tenuous job link admittedly but never mind. I must admit I'm sick of feeling everything I do is futile unless it's linked to the equally futile search for a job. But after 2 years 4 months it's hard to get excited about it.

Only a month till Christmas, hopefully this gloomy mood'll've lifted by then. Still, rather have gloom and futility than paranoia.

Pris soon. That's one thing I'm still interested in...

Day 594

Rediscovered discrepancies between Expert and Companion D&D deriving from the different editions and the fact that Expert tends to regard 14th level as tops. Also tried to sort out the spells, found 3 undescribed 5th level cleric spells which I'll try and deduce from White Dwarf.

The James Bulger trial finished. 'Thatcher's bloody Bwritain.' This is what the me-first decade and American cultural imperialism have brought about.

Day 593

Continued the database, typed up some of my own creations neatly with Word for Windows. Might possibly be useful for a gaming job...

Day 592

Completed my War Machine spreadsheet on the 386, started a monster database on my computer

In the evening the Lee Harvey Oswald feature-length Quantum Leap. Far too long and ended with a cop-out. Ah well, suppose any Monday telly's better than none, eh.

Day 591

Woke up to an inch of snow. Went to the shop as an excuse for appreciating the scene.

Read the paper, did a War Machine spreadsheet with PC-Calc. A good day for a Sunday.

Day 590

In 10 days it will be Winter. Christmas should warm things up, but then we will face an isolate winter which, unlike the autumn, was not foreseen. This year has been much like 1991, but 1994 will (unless things change) be different and much more isolated. Even if M does come back next Summer, I doubt things will be the same.

'Something better change...' On April 14th next year I'll've been on the dole as long as I was at uni. Surely something can happen before then?

Day 589

Went round to mum's in the afternoon, used the laptop to do a D&D War Machine spreadsheet.

Day 588

This foreseen isolate autumn's proving a bit dull but not as bad as I feared. Let's face it, I had a good 21-month run with M being here, it couldn't go on for ever. Ah well. Pris later.

Day 587

Bright and windy and very cold. England and Wales knocked out of the World Cup. Could take the edge off expected reminiscences of 1990 next summer.

Day 586

Passed the morning with FRP. Perhaps there are jobs to be had in game design. I'm way out of touch with the scene though. It's an idea.

Very cold today, had to shut my windows. Spent the afternoon trying to keep warm. That horrible torture/murder case of that burnt girl from Manchester came up today. The deed was done in mid-December last year and I remember being affected by it. The point is it was before the Green Man Crisis that Christmas. Obviously the hassle down there was just a last straw to the paranoia I was feeling already. Which in a way is quite encouraging.

Better than 2 days/page so far in this diary book, it could last me till October 1994! Unless some really interesting things happen of course

(12.35am). Myra is dead. Recquiescat in pace Myra.

Day 585

Didn't wake up till 10.50, so was ½ hour late signing on. No-one said anything though.

Nothing on telly at all on Mondays at the moment. At least Pris is back tomorrow, at last.

Day 584

Very windy and cold, rain too. More White Dwarf reading. It got so crap towards the end and judging by the letters its readers (and former contributors!) knew it. Wonder if it's still going.

Got to sign on tomorrow, hope the weather's improved by then.

Day 583

On the whole the Great Temperance has been a success so far.

Day 582

Went round to my parents' and got all my RPG stuff down from the loft for ideas, inevitably read old White Dwarfs all day. Why was it so good at first (40-49) and so crap by issue 80?

Attacked the probabilities-of-3d6 problem in the afternoon, which finally yielded to a brute-force program on my indispensable pocket computer.

Day 581

Watched the last Red Dwarf - a bit serious.

Day 580

Went round to the chemist's for cough-mixture.

Christiana rang up in the evening, talked for 20 minutes. She's living up on the new estate again, I could go and see her. Is this an unforeseen compensation for the foreseen isolate autumn? (Though often Christiana is something you'd want compensation for).

Day 579

Cracking episode of Pris last night: the mercenaries killed an extra but now Myra has got 1 minute to decide who'll be next. Pris won't be on for another week so as the announcer said, it'll be a long minute for Myra.

C's birthday today, so winter definitely coming soon.

Day 578

Put C back on the laptop. Had success with various programs, managed to understand useful pointer facts.

Pris on today, the first time on a Monday since they changed to Tue/Thur from Mon/Sun 3 years ago. Might cause dislocatory boredom tomorrow.

Quite a good day really, those C successes really built me up, plus S's encouraging words yesterday of course.

Day 577

Mixed the Christmas cake.

S. came round, she was very encouraging about improvements in me after the great abstinence. I wonder if her encouraging words will actually get me anywhere jobs-wise? You never know.

Day 576

Listened to Week Ending, watched The Bill.

Day 575

Listened to No Further Questions on R4, interesting series about court cases.

Mum lent me her laptop again - triple speed, 25 MHz!

Lots of firework noise, obviously gunpowder treason isn't being forgot round here. I've got very anti-European recently. Classic unemployment-based suspicion of foreigners. But it's us they'll be expecting to bale them out again when Germany next goes on the march. Let's hope the traditional quarrel with the Russians keeps Fritz occupied.

Day 574

No career moves yet: this is the time for arranging courses, I don't want to lose by default a third year in a row.

In the evening watched Red Dwarf - really good series this.

Day 573

Had a bath in the evening, practiced darts, videoed The Buddha of Suburbia which they've been trailing for weeks.

Government running into trouble over their attempt to dismantle BR, Tory scum. Sorry, bit of politics there.

Day 572

Investigated football statistics, found teams who play in blue are less successful and blue and white stripes more successful. Sort of.

I must say I feel better with the Great Temperance.

In the evening Naked Video. Pris later: the text listing gave away the plot again, I ought to complain.

Day 571

C was going to Harlow so I went along for the ride, came back to sign on. Misty cold day out in the flat countryside, beautiful autumn colours.

Got Pagemaker onto my computer, found it hard to work without a mouse though.

Victor Lewis-Smith on telly in the evening - not too funny.

Day 570

River Phoenix, whose film Jimmy Rearden I went to the premiere of, is mysteriously dead. He was only 23 too, the same age as me. Fancy dropping dead outside a nightclub.

No Hallowe'en hassle so I wasted all that adrenalin worrying.

Day 569

Have been feeling nervous recently owing to Hallowe'en tomorrow - the possibility of being annoyed by kids.

Day 568

Wine in the evening, after 2 units I feel pretty relaxed. Think I'll go for 3.

Day 567

Red Dwarf very funny again.

So here we are at the End of the Great Abstinence. Four and a half months. I never thought I'd be able to do it. Let's hope I've learnt my lesson. The Great Temperance is next. Why spoil a good thing?

Day 566

Watched a Young Ones video: the last one, Summer Holiday, the one that started my uni ambition on July 1st, 1985. Rick's philosophical statement at the end was responsible for the amaranth dream.

Day 565

2 days of the great abstinence to go. It's good that I've achieved that, because job searching has got completely hopeless. Admittedly there was that 'Restart' in September but all that got me was a wasted walk in the rain. 8 months since the Workshop finished now. Well, perhaps something will turn up

I suppose though that I'm not doing so badly with this forseen isolate autumn. It was October that was the worst in 1991 and we've almost completed it now. Of course this year there probably won't be 3 parties to go to in November. Never mind.

Day 564

Went round to the new Co-op for skimmed milk. Many memories of going to the Co-op in the third year at uni.

in the evening Newman & Baddiel. A pity the latter throw so much dross in with the jokes.

Day 563

Cold, grey, bit of a wind. Usual clocks-going-back confusion. Quite a good day for a Sunday. It's been one of the pay-offs of Saturday losing some of its lustre these last couple of years - Sunday has got better.

Day 562

My parents have gone on holiday so am house-sitting for them again.

Day 561

Good quote from Jeremy Hardy yesterday, 'My radicalism now consists of watching the news and saying "Bastards" periodically.'

Day 560

Carried on with On Broadway. Red Dwarf VI was good again.

I got a copy of Pyramid today, the UoL mag, which induced nostalgia. Still living in the past as you see.

Just a week of the great abstinence to go.

Day 559

Very cold, dark grey stratus just thin enough to show the sun. Put the last abstinence £20 in the building society, looked at programmable calculators in Boots.

Beguiled the evening with On Broadway. Why is there never anything decent on telly on Wednesdays?

Day 558

Clear, sunny and cold again. The police helicopter hovered overhead in the morning, and moved sideways to inspect me when I went out to have a look.

Day 557

Spent the morning making physics calculations. All the physics made me wonder if I could do any sort of scientific re-training to aid the job search: as I thought later, I didn't do linguistics with a job in mind, I was only 17½ after all and very callow. I chose UoL mostly because D and R did. (A fact nobody knows). And they failed their A-levels in the end anyway.

Mum came round with a lap-top. She's accidentally been given two of them for work. She said I could use this one if I took care of it. Used Excel to draw up financial plans: I have £28 a fortnight free after rent, baccy and Private Eye. Realised though that I was making plans for circumstances that pertained a year ago (as usual?).

Well, who knows. Something good and interesting could happen any day.

In the evening Newman & Baddiel.

Day 556

Watched Lovejoy in the evening: that new woman's not a patch on Lady Jane. Then Drugstore Cowboy. Wow! What a film!

Got to sign on tomorrow, hope it's less cold and windy.

Day 555

M rang saying come to the new 'theme bar' down by Homebase. I duly set forth after The Bill, but unfortunately M was not there - had a good look round and waited outside for about 10 minutes, it was too cold to wait longer. Stars nice and clear though.

Day 554

M came round about 4.40; she told a tale of violence in Newcastle which I didn't like the sound of much.

When did I start finding going out so repellent? At uni and when I came back it was everything, so much so that when we went out on Friday I'd fret because there'd be nothing going on on Saturday. I think I lost interest when that started happening. And of course all this angst is many times multiplied by having not much to do. Even if there were any jobs to look for it couldn't take up much time and there's a limit to the amount of entertainment you can provide for yourself.

I must say that all in all things have turned out disappointingly since uni, and that itself wasn't as good as I expected. 3 years there and 2¼ years on the dole. On the other hand, I have got somewhere to live etc. On the other hand again though, I've had no luck at all in the jobs field. Every time something promising turns up it evaporates, like the Workshop and the NVQ's. 'Do a course' people say. In what? Where? To get what job? When? Paid for by who?

Day 553

Really cold. About 3.30 the Sun had came round to heat up my room. Then watched the 35th anniversary Blue Peter (!) - John Noakes and Peter Purves were among the ex-presenters, real blast from the past. Cooker bloke finally came at 5.15 so tea was ½ hr late, had to tape Jeremy Hardy.

Day 552

Floods all over the region with all the rain - not so much of it today.

In the evening listened to The Second Stain - last in the series - frankly this lot of Holmes stories just haven't been as good.

England lost 2-0 to Holland after some dirty play by the Dutch - probably they won't qualify now. Still, a World Cup in America's bound to be pretty shit anyway.

Day 551

It rained heavily all morning and all evening - bright red radar echoes. For practice with Windows Write typed out all the summaries I did yesterday.

Wouldn't be surprised if I heard from M some day soon - it'll be her birthday in a week or so.

Day 550

In the evening listened to gloomy R4 play about N. Ireland (again). I see R5 is to be replaced with the news and sport service - because of the Tory bastard Luddite fanatics it can't go on R4 LW as originally planned.

Day 549

Made the most of Sunday morning as you should. Later taped Love Is A Big Scary Animal off the chart. Watched Lovejoy.

Day 548

In Martins I was flipping through the new Adrian Mole - all very depressing, Pandora carrying on with her professor, A's parents divorced, his grandmother dead. A far cry from the heady Diary and Growing Pains days which I could actually empathise with.
Watched a bit of Gladiators in the evening.

Day 547

That woman from the Busywork Trust rang up to tell me about a training scheme in London. I knew all about it having been rejected for it a year ago but I had to say so tactfully. II thanked her for taking an interest but I still felt bad about it and had to watch my TMBG video to recover.

Day 546

Listened to Jeremy Hardy, very funny again.

Day 545

Cashed my Giro. Then rode into town for a printer cartridge and the building society. As I put in double last time I could keep most of next fortnight's £20.

Back via Homebase for a 23W mini-fluorescent bulb for my bedroom (save £45 over its lifetime, I calculate). Takes a while to warm up but has a nice white light.

The Abbey Grange was on R4 in the afternoon. I don't think this series is as good as the others, still quite good though.

Day 544

Carried on with My Son, My Son, but despite this interesting reading I got very bored. Wonder what all this boredom recently means? Has the Great Abstinence cleared my mind so much that I really need something to do more than ever?

Day 543

Went to sign on, came back.

In the evening a very good Newman & Baddiel.

So another Monday done. They never have been particularly inspiring, on the dole, at school or at uni.

Day 542

Took my leave at noon. Got to Stratford about 1pm, 1.12 train, a brisk walk back from the station got me home by about two.

Dramatic news from Moscow with the Parliamentarians staging a counter-counter-revolution against that fat drunken dictator Yeltsin. Funny, the coup against Gorbachev happened during my other visit to D in August 1991.

Got to sign on tomorrow, hope it stops raining by then.

Day 541

Set off for the station at 1.40. Train at 2.06, Romford at 2.36, Stratford at 2.42. Unfortunately I'd under-estimated the walk to D's which took me an hour.

Day 540

Did this and that. Scanned job ads. Rang T: he told me the address information I wanted. Rang BR to find out where to change trains (Romford).

Earlier watched the end of Conference, quite heartening.

Day 539

Tried at intervals to ring D as there are two Wellington Roads in her part of London and I'm not sure which one she lives in. Wrote down directions from Stratford station to both of them. Think it's the E16 one.

Finished Borstal Boy, started Cranford which he mentions in BB.

Must try and get through to D tomorrow - don't want any uncertainty on Saturday. Should be a new Viz too. These are the things you look forward to on the dole.

Day 538

The sun came out for a bit in the afternoon after 5 days. John Smith won his one member one vote thing.

Started Borstal Boy. You can get so carried away with Brendan Behan's blarney you forget he was a terrorist, or intended to be, if any of it's true. Se non è vero è molto ben travato.

I should really be putting the effort into salvaging something from the wreck of my Career Opportunity, the one that never has knocked, not yet anyway.

Day 537

Had to resort to the fan fire again to keep the temperature at a barely-tolerable 60°.

Wrote a prog to let the user paginate a document at print-time - very good after 4 versions (2 in Pascal, 1 BASIC2 which worked well, 1 QBASIC).

Watched John Smith's Conference speech - very stirring.

Day 536

Freezing cold and raining. Went down for the interview: despite me being 3 minutes early the bloke had gone 'to New Street', and at the address they gave me there was no-one who had heard of him or the course. So I walked home again.

If their course is like their appointments I'm not interested. I had a 4-mile walk in the cold and rain for nothing.

In the evening Baddiel & Newman which was quite funny.

Day 535

Worried about this interview tomorrow - hope I can find the place OK. Awkward time too, 2.30pm: like an afternoon seminar, hanging over you all morning.

A dull three days in prospect. Still, suppose something good might come out of the interview.

Day 534

Went into town to the library, checked the place where I've got the appointment on Monday on the way back.

Day 533

In the afternoon was reading Private Eye when M came round in a van she'd hired to take stuff to Newcastle in.

Day 532

Quite nice weather but the equinox definitely here - sun much lower in the sky than it has been. In the afternoon a bloke from the NVQs rang up, I've got to go and be interviewed on Monday. Something to do I suppose. Considered what to wear.

Manchester didn't get the Olympics - good. Major would've made propaganda out of it. Paddy Ashdown made a good speech about him at the end of the Liberal conference - he recited that poem:

As I was going up the stair
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away.

Day 531

Cashed my Giro, went into town. Put £40 in the building society as I had plenty of spare cash. Done 100 days' abstinence today, 36 to go. Hopefully I'll be able to carry on saving a bit after it finishes, it's reassuring to have a cushion if they ever stop my income support.

Day 530

Experimented with Windows Write all day - quite good for a free prog, and apparently M's sister wrote a dissertation on it.

No Anglia Pris today - Sport Special Ipswich v Cambridge. Would only be worth watching if Ipswich win - think I'll take a trip down Memory Lane and watch London's episode.

Day 529

M gave me a lift into town for the interview. It went really well, I got a nice bloke for a change but I had to agree to another extra-£10-pw scam, this time for an NVQ in Supervisory Management, would you believe it. Still, I could learn something useful about capitalism I suppose.

Checked Stratford trains at the station for the trip to see T - quite frequent but involving changing trains. I'll have to get 2 singles for £11 altogether. How can they persuade people to use the trains with this sort of thing.

In the evening M came round again to borrow more discs - solved a C programming prob for her. Talked again. Watched Newman & Baddiel in Pieces - half the blokes from The Mary Whitehouse Experience and about half as funny.

Day 528

A lot of stuff on the telly still about that BNP councillor. Seems a lot of fuss - for practical spite and evil the Tories are miles ahead of them.

At the end of Lovejoy (not the same without Lady Jane) M came round.

Perhaps this DHSS interview tomorrow might lead to something good. Who knows, I might even get a job.

I've done 96 days now (40 to go), the longest abstinence in my drinking history. I think it's a notable achievement, I'd never've guessed that I'd manage it.

I'm still unemployed though - 26 months now - and facing one of their dodgy interviews on Monday. Let's hope unemployment at least will end in the next diary volume.

Day 526

New shareware catalogue by post kept me occupied. Did some programming. Had fleeting anti-abstinence temptation (95 days), but successfully resisted it. Less than 6 weeks to go, after all.

Day 525

I think unemployment is like the equation for the Ascendant, which took me 5 years to find out with successive rearrangements. Did it in the end though. Hopefully if I shuffle the DHSS, applications, experience, money and courses about for long enough I'll come up with (an) answer.

Day 524

Listened to The Three Students in the afternoon. I must say I've been pretty bored these last few days. With everyone leaving and the 'depart-for-uni' season coming on apace, it seems like time for a major effort. You never know, the try-and-stop-your-benefit interview on Monday might turn something up. The Foreseen Isolate Autumn is coming on and I don't think there'll be any parties like there were in 1991 to break the October/November monotony this time.

Day 523

Went round to M's about 4.30 to get her cover discs. She's going north in the middle of next week.

Day 522

Watched the Arab-Israeli peace treaty being signed, I still don't think the Palestinians have been completely fairly dealt with but some sort of compromise is probably inevitable. Considering the Israelis haven't got much right to be there at all they've done quite well out of it.

Day 521

Watched Lovejoy - the last one with Lady Jane - will it be worth watching without her?

Day 520

Went round to my parents', experimented on dad's new work laptop with a free Missile Command game from PCW. In the evening watched Back to the Future III - excellent without C. criticising it this time.

Day 519

Went into my mum's work in the morning to sort out the computer - plug not switched on!

Day 518

Found it even harder to find anything to do today: wrote part of an interpreted script language in QBASIC to control the sound card.

Wonder what I'm going to say at that bloody DHSS interview on the 20th? Hope they don't give me too much hassle.

What an episode of Pris! All flashbacks to the past with the women telling that Lexie about the characters. Then at the end - Bea is dead, burnt to death in a riot at Barnhurst (Baanurst). Ah well. I prefer Myra anyway.

Day 517

Six years since my great triumph, 800 days in the planning.

Went and cashed my Giro, rode into town to the building society and to get another diary book. Found £20 I'd left lying about, nice surprise eh? I can use it for the trip to D's.

Listened to The Six Napoleons.

Day 516

Stopped the imaginary betting. Final average loss was about 14p/bet, or 7%, which isn't so bad on over 2,000 bets (£4,000).

Tidied up the room, transferred the D&D combat resolver to QBASIC (to have benefit of procedures and functions). Watched The Bill - no more Frank Burnside, which'll be a pity.

Day 515

Read Mr Britling Sees It Through by H.G. Wells which I got from the library. Just pre-WW1, interesting modern-day Balkan parallels.

In the evening watched Panorama, about the parents of that kid Tim Parry who was killed in Warrington a while back. Quite good.

Definite lessening of paranoia recently after twelve weeks' abstinence.

Day 514

Reprogrammed the D&D combat simulation in BASIC2.

About 3pm D rang up, she was very surprised by the great abstinence (83 days today, 53 to go). She's now assistant manager of a post office or something, who'd've guessed it?

S went off to Nottingham today. So we're entering the outliers of the Foreseen Isolate Autumn.

Day 513

Yesterday must've been exhausting: slept till 10 am.

M has gone to look for accommodation in Newcastle, gone for good in a couple of weeks, S off tomorrow. This Autumn could be even more isolated than 1991, which'd be saying something. Ought to do something about it really. (Again).

Day 512

Continued the diary-trawl, eventually getting to June 1991. Out in the evening with M, S etc etc.

Day 511

Bloody DHSS letter this morning, poxy 'Restart' interview 2 weeks on Monday. It's irritating.

Carried on ploughing through diaries, by the evening got to April 1990.

M rang up to say she'd sawn her bike in half in frustration, went round to see, and look at her (very good) latest game The Lost Vikings.

Day 510

Continued ploughing through diaries up to the fraught Autumn of 1989, four years ago if you can believe it.

What with all the diaries and it being September again, plus S going away on Monday and M in a couple of weeks, I feel a bit sad that I haven't got anything arranged - even my brother's starting that course soon. Well, perhaps the extra confidence I've been feeling recently might lead to something good.

Day 509

Spent the day going through 1987-88 diaries. Never realised what laughs we had in Politics lessons, and down the King William at weekends. Those were the days.

Day 508

Bank Holiday today - lost an imaginary £35 at the races.

Opened Prof F's letter in the afternoon, it was quite witty and even helpful. Hitch-hiker on R4 now - but what with hearing this radio series umpteen times already, plus the telly series, book and book of scripts I don't think I need to listen to it again.

Day 507

Bank Holiday tomorrow, May Day Bank Holiday in fact, so at least I haven't got to sign on. (I hope).

Day 506

Paranoia almost certainly much abated recently.

Day 505

Still got a strong impression that 1993-94 is the year when I'll have to sort something out. Still don't know what.

As far as I know M's still away - I notice J never bothers to ring up at weekends now.

Day 504

Cold better - coagulation. Up at about 8 am, passed a long morning typing in a program from an old Your Computer.

A letter came from Prof. F this morning, I haven't had the courage to open it yet in case it's a piss-off letter like I'm used to getting these days. I tell you, while the great abstinence (73 days) has improved a lot of things, it's brought out a load of things drink let me ignore.

I reckon I've got another 12 months at most before things get intolerable. But what can I do? I'm back where I started 5 years ago but this time there isn't a way (like uni was) to avoid taking tough actions. But what should I do? I tell you one thing, things are bloody hard to get, even when they seem to come easily. Or rather they're near-impossible to hold onto: happiness, carousing, money, academic success - I've had all those things in the last five years and lost them all.

Easy come, easy go? Could be. It seems to be the things that are hardest to get are the easiest to hold onto, in a way. Ah well.

Day 503

Bad dripping cold. Cashed my Giro.

Day 502

Got PCW, now with nearly 600 pages and a free guitar chord display prog on disc.

Went out to take in the washing, as it was quite cold and getting dark I was struck with an intimation of Autumn like five years ago.

Day 501

Paid off the last of the money I borrowed for the hard disc with the abstinence cash from the building society. Completed 10 weeks today, by far the longest since the end of 1986.

Day 500

Experimented with FORTH. Listened to Annie Nightingale again for the first time in ages - she always plays something I like. Brought back memories of when she played my request (early 1988 was it?).

Day 499

Got a FORTH book from the library. When I got back, discovered it had a disc in the back, and that turned out to have a complete PC version of FORTH on it! Immediately copied it, great stuff. What a stroke of luck, eh?

Halfway through the great abstinence (68 days). I'm sure the second half'll go faster. Going to need a new diary book in 3 weeks or so.

Day 498

Worked on FORTH (CREATE and ALLOT).

Think paranoia may be abating, certainly yields to examination more than it used to. Saturday tomorrow: don't enjoy it as much as I used to, whether I expect to go out or not. Wish I could find some way to advance things, been unemployed 25½ months now. This situation isn't going anywhere. When was the last time something really good happened to change everything? Meeting J I think, April 16th 1989.

Day 497

Went round to my parents' and helped dad with re-roofing the shed. Hot, calm day again.

Later in the afternoon and in the evening worked on FORTH, getting the interpreter fully working with double and single, negative and positive numbers. I seem to be storing double numbers 'upside-down' on the stack but that's no problem as long as I'm consistent.

66 days GA done - 10 weeks to go. Is paranoia abating?

Day 496

More FORTH - trouble with number conversion.

Wonder why going out on Monday made me so pissed off? I get so bored sitting in pubs nowadays. We kept going out to try and recreate the triffic nights out we'd had, and the only way to liven things up was to get really drunk. Probably where the problem started. The trouble trying to make life more interesting has caused!

So what can I do about it? Perhaps the problem'll be solved when everyone except J disappears next month. Who knows?

Day 495

Is paranoia just another attempt to make life more exciting?

Day 494

Worked on FORTH. M came round in the afternoon, in the evening we went out to the Green Man with her and J and S. It was all right I suppose but I was annoyed to hear about what a good time they had on Friday (no-one bothered to tell me that was happening).

Day 493

Carried FORTH onwards all day, got CPACK, CMOVE and WORD working.

Listened to The Resident Patient. Last of the series, unfortunately - what a good time to put it on, Sunday evening.

Day 492

Taped that last Masterson Inheritance I've been waiting for. Taping the Elven Bangle ep of Young Postmen now (11.38 pm).

Day 491

Got up and got straight to work on FORTH. By the evening had CONVERT fully working. BASE is still m/c rather than FORTH, but that can come later. Have now got 45 words working. Got further with the whole project this time than any of the others (BBC Micro, Amstrad DEBUG v1 & v2, Pascal FORTH and latest C FORTH - not to mention BASIC2 and QBASIC stack machines)

Day 490

Tidied up the # words. Went to Asda in the afternoon for a cheap cork notice board I fancied. Walked down the drinks aisle to test myself.

Day 489

Cashed my Giro, went into town. Put £20 in the building society. Made FORTH advances, programmed <#, #, #> and #S.

Day 488

During Quantum Leap M came round, talked till 10.30 over it and French & Saunders.

Giro tomorrow: today sent off enquiry about software NVQ. Doubt if it'll get anywhere but have got to do something, eh?

Day 487

Up at 7.15 to work on FORTH. Big developments, all very promising. Went into town with my brother to sign on, got a couple of FORTH books from the library.

In the evening watched KY-TV - why didn't they stick with Radio Active?

Eight weeks' abstinence completed today. Quite an achievement. While paranoia has abated considerably it still strikes after sunset, but less often. 'In the morning she was superb'.

But what about unemployment? If only some action could avail. Wish there could be some career developments.

Day 486

Experimented with FORTH, made a big leap.

Got to sign on tomorrow - perhaps there'll be something useful on the boards, eh?

Day 485

Listened to The Masterson Inheritance. Went into town to the library, got a couple of FORTH books and one on music synthesis. Charity Shield this afternoon - gets earlier and earlier eh?

Young Postmen on now.

Day 484

Gave M a ring but she'd gone to Winchester. Not sure if I wanted to go out anyway, OK we have some good laughs but nothing ever happens.

Day 483

Into town to the library, got a good FORTH book. In the afternoon programmed, chucked Reverse Polish ideas around.

Made more sound card advances, disassembled parts of the SBFMDRV.COM driver.

Day 482

Parents have gone for a week in France, so I'm staying at their house to keep an eye on it.

Thought about going back to the Workshop (nearly 6 months have elapsed) but with all the hassle it wasn't worth it really, was it? Only 4 weeks' decent work activity.

Day 481

More programming in the afternoon. In the evening, between The Bill and Quantum Leap M came round with useful information about the sound card, some of which ties in with what I've already discovered. Always encouraging.

Day 480

Not been writing much recently, have I? Things've been pretty quiet. Seven weeks' abstinence completed today.

Day 479

Claudius' birthday. Did some programming. Massive success in the Lingfield Sunday meeting, made £19 profit from a £14 stake - 141% profit.

Day 478

Taped The Masterson Inheritance. Went into town. Listened to decentish R4 play in the afternoon.

Day 477

New Viz today, up to recent standards I suppose. Did some successful C screen-poking experiments.

Day 476

Went to town in the afternoon to the library, got Peter 'Ego' Norton's m/c book.

Ran out of filters, searched, but had to use those cheap'n'nasty Rizla ones.

Lionel Nimrod very funny, especially the Rob. Smith clone joke.

Have done a third of the Great Abstinence today.

Day 475

Cashed my Giro, went into town. Bought the They Might Be Giants video - excellent.

Day 474

Smoked outside in the garden thinking about the Golden Age at uni and looking up at the evening sky.

Day 473

Went into town with Carl to sign on. Went to the library: the sound card chip is one of three YM types.

Improved the 3D maze. A rejection letter from GEC (after 2 months!)

Day 472

Wrote an m/c memory string search which goes through 1 MB in about 15 secs and a 3D maze program (functional with very good perspective).

Libs on 62% in Christchurch, set for 37% swing (still don't fully trust opinion polls despite Newbury).

Day 471

To Lakeside with M. Got the AdLib version of Populous which produced triffic music on my sound card, encouragingly enough.

40 days' abstinence completed so far.

Day 470

More sound card experiments. Went to the library, looked through manufacturers' chip catalogues to no avail.

No jobs in the weekly paper again. Tory scum survived a vote of confidence today, but let's hope it's the beginning of the end.

Day 469

More progress on sound card programming. Parents were away for Carl's graduation ceremony, so went round to their house to look in the loft for the old ZX81 sound card manual. Got distracted by finding The Phoenix and the Carpet, which I read all afternoon and evening.

Day 468

Went into town to the library, looked through chip catalogues to try and identify the sound card one. Carried on experimenting.

Out in the evening with M and J.

Day 467

Went to Southend to look at the sea view - you can see Kent too.

In the afternoon started experimenting with the sound card, writing various values to registers. After tea managed to produce the first sound. I need a good technical AdLib book desperately.

Day 466

Did some reading.

Day 465

Up early, programmed, read. Got my old Your Computers down from the loft for inspiration in the afternoon.

Day 464

Went round to my parents' and mowed the lawn.

Another week of abstinence completed.

Day 463

Be needing a new diary volume soon - been on this one for over a year now.

Day 462

Went to town in the morning to put £15 in the building society. Bought the Maplin catalogue from Smiths.

Day 461

Interesting hints about what could happen if the Government lose the Christchurch by-election in 2 weeks' time.

Day 460

Went out in the evening with M, S and the latter's American mate from the Bronx Angelo.

Day 459

Into town for a haircut. In the afternoon wrote a programme to type out a file on the printer at 196 lines to the page. The print is too small to read comfortably, but would be useful for indexes etc.

Day 458

In the evening washed my hair prior to getting it cut tomorrow - should I go before or after signing on?

Day 457

Repeat of The Masterson Inheritance at ten, a massive improvement on the old Loose Ends schedule hole.

S came round about 4.30pm, had a long talk. She gave me some good jobs advice.

Day 456

Watched the last episode of Eldorado in the evening - final words 'You can't trust anyone these days, can you?'

Day 455

Watched a triffic but depressing film Roger & Me about a General Motors factory closing down in Flint in Michigan.

Weather's gone off rather: cool, grey and windy. Wish I could get some kind of career direction (the vision thing!).

Day 454

Went into town to the Jobcentre and the library. Went round to M's about five to get my null-modem adaptor back.

Day 453

Well, two years since the end of uni, and so two years of unemployment. Maybe 1993-94 will be like the third year there - pulling through with hard work to an unsatisfactory but tolerable conclusion?

Day 452

Got the computer table in place. Three weeks' abstinence today. I feel quite good for it. Carl being back makes things less boring too.

Day 451

It's two years since graduation.

Parents offered me a computer table: realising this would entail rearranging my room, made a plan on graph paper and cut out bits of cardboard for the furniture.

Day 450

Unusually went to town in the morning. Everyone who served me in shops was unusually pleasant.

Round to my parents' in the afternoon to welcome Carl home.

Day 449

Moved my computer back here from my parents' house.

Day 448

Successfully wrote Pascal routines to do double-height, double-width and quadruple characters in graphics mode (8x8 or 8x14). Pretty good. Listened to the 3rd Test - England not doing so badly as last time.

M's talking about doing a computer M.Sc. up north in September.

Day 447

Only 7½ hours' sleep, felt fine: perhaps I've been sleeping too long recently? Got my Giro. Australian woman in the post office reminded me uncannily of Janice, the alcoholic solicitor in Pris last night.

Day 446

Feeling rather weak recently, tired too, which is odd, what with getting 9½ hours' sleep most nights. I expect I need something to do in the day more than ever now.

M came round during Quantum Leap, talked till eleven.

Day 445

Into town to sign on. Every card seemed to have 'fully qualified' or 'experience essential' on it.

Day 444

Livened up Sunday abstinence by listening to Newshour on the World Service at 10pm. The Americans attacked Baghdad with missiles (high explosive only, 'luckily') on the grounds that Iraqis had planned to assassinate George Bush. Considering that G.B. is alive and well it seemed a massive over-reaction. Who's next, eh?

Got to sign on tomorrow: perhaps there'll be some good job cards. Getting up early today was definitely a good idea, think I'll do it again tomorrow.

Day 443

Listened to Knowing Me, Knowing You - lacks the nastiness of On The Hour.

I find these abstinent weekends a bit of a trial, but having gone out yesterday helps. I plan to get up early tomorrow so as to be properly tired tomorrow night. Got to sign on on Monday too.

It really is boring being unemployed, especially for nearly 2 years. Been thinking of writing to Weffolk University about computer courses: but even if I could afford it all / got on, that would still leave me unoccupied till Sep. 94, probably. So still some sort of job now seems to be required (although the consensus down the pub last night seemed to be I should get back into education). Perhaps if unemployment does (ever) go back down there'll be more choice. I wish the the careers books down the library were more helpful - I need a job suited to my experience/qualifications and where how you look isn't very important. What could it be?

Day 442

Did a bit of job-searching in the papers, nothing likely. M came round briefly, on her way to see about that branch manager's job.

Out with her and J later - as none of us were drinking it was rather a subdued evening.

Day 441

Watched Out of This World. Small imaginary betting loss at the races. Scanned free newspaper for jobs - none.

In the evening M came round and we went to the Cricketers for an hour. She depressed me talking about jobs; then I recovered slightly. Watched Prisoner Cell Block H.

Day 440

M came round in the evening, watched Rough Justice (now on C4 and masquerading as Trial & Error).

After nine days, getting used to the GA. But I reckon it'll be quite a bit longer before the solution of getting drunk stops occurring to me every time I'm bored in the evening.

Day 439

Met M outside the library. She had resolved to chuck C. She offered to lend me her Attila the Stockbroker CD which I liked so much, so I went round for it in the evening. We watched 999, of which M is inordinately fond.

Day 438

We lost the 2nd Test by an innings and 65 runs. Scanned diaries again for records. Got interested despite myself in details of uni life (mostly drinking tea in the diner and lager in my room). A few good moments though.

Updated the records list on disc to 2060 songs. Slightly less of a trial today again. About all I expect from Mondays to be honest.

Day 437

Catalogued an extra 11 videos, watched the cricket (some recovery by England). Read my 1990 diary to find when I bought various records with a view to continuing the list I used to keep, and which stopped in June 1990.

After six days' abstinence found today less of a trial than the others, but still rather dull.

Day 436

Finished cataloguing the videos, all 41 of them.

Day 435

Catalogued more videos, went into town in the afternoon to the library and a look in record shops.

Day 434

Went to town in the morning, put £10 out of my Giro in the building society.

In the evening watched The Bill and the Comic Strip - Oxford, just funnier than unfunny.

Day 433

Heavy rain in the afternoon so didn't go out, catalogued video tapes and looked at the jobs on teletext.

M rang at 7pm saying come out: went round, told her about the Great Abstinence. She wants to join the Air Force now. J arrived and we went into town. Her and M had an endless circular conversation about this bloke M works with and is thinking of chucking her boyfriend in favour of. I don't approve but didn't say much as M looked moody.

Odd coming home stone cold sober. M admired my resolve, she seemed impressed.

Day 432

After Out of This World went into town, got that Kingmaker album. Will have £15 extra pw with the Great Abstinence, might try and save some of it. (If they don't end up stopping my income support, that is). 1 day down, 135 to go till October 29th.

Good 'day at the races', made a £16 'profit' from 13 imaginary bets.

So far, so good.

Day 431

Rain had stopped by 10.20 so I foolishly decided not to take an umbrella when I went to sign on. It started again and I got soaked. Added to which the queue-ticket machine had broken down and had to be repaired. I hate that place. Came back, dried off. Tipped successfully, made a £6 'profit' with Southwell rained off.

Good Radio 4 play in the afternoon about (real) woman combatting cholera in Liverpool in the 19th century.

Am taking a break from drinking till October 29th (what a thought!)

Day 430

While listening to the Top 40 (bfp!) heard a triffic song Queen Jane by Kingmaker. Might be worth further investigation.

Got to sign on tomorrow.

Day 429

Worthington's reference in The Palace of Love.

Day 428

Disturbed night - felt better after it started getting light about 3.45 am.

Day 427

Checked stats and found that what I had previously suspected to be acid flashbacks were in truth withdrawal symptoms caused by large drops in alcohol consumption, which explained why they always happened on Sunday and Monday nights. Obvious really.

Bad day's imaginary 'racing' due to Southwell's last 5 races being abandoned.

Day 426

Tories in disarray after Lamont makes vicious resignation speech, also with only 27% in polls cf. Liberal 25%. (But never forget - according to polls Neil Kinnock is Prime Minister). Like Lawson and Howe only more convincing. Are we witnessing the first pale light of dawn after the long night of the Torycaust? J. Smith redeemed himself, too with a triffic sarcastic attack.

Made a £6 'profit' on 24 imaginary bets. Really looks as though I've hit on something here.

Day 425

M came round having been for a teacher assessment discussion at our old school, returning with discouraging tales of consumerism.

Took 7kg of cans to the metal recycling place, got £2.80. Also made a good 'profit' of about £10 on the imaginary betting - doing very well at the moment.

Report from the mental health people included comment 'No evidence of depression or psychosis'. Good-good-good. And two people did that assessment.

Day 424

In the evening watched a prog about computer developments: a bloke with a 'backwards' pedal bike with aerial, satellite link, handlebar keypad, head-up display, cellular phone etc. Amazing.

Day 423

Harvested a radish - quite a good size.

Day 422

Imaginary betting going well - 'lost' only 31p in the last 102 bets and have had 3 'profitable' days in the last four. Let's face it, if I can produce a profitable betting system it'd be a real breakthrough.

Rang M, her brother said she might be back in the evening. (She wasn't).

Day 421

Should I go into horticulture? It would be very unstressful. Nice positive sort of job, and people'll always need vegetables.

While remembering that, according to opinion polls, Neil Kinnock (brave fighter in the Dark Years of the Torycaust) is Prime Minister, we should note that Labour have a 24-point lead over the Tories, who are only 2 pts ahead of the Liberals, that John 'Goon/Buffoon' Major is the least popular prime minister 'in modern times' and that the Tories have only got the approval of 14% of people. (The one in seven dedicated Nazi fanatics).

Ah, but, I hear you cry (who am I talking to?), we've seen all this before in 1989 (1990?) when Lawson was ditched, the poll tax was provoking riots in Tunbridge Wells etc. But Thatcher was more popular then than J.B/G.M. is now, and she was chucked out 7 months later. (Thought: is Thatcher Morgoth and JB/GM Sauron?) But on the whole it's all very encouraging. Don't tell me there's nothing coming...

Day 420

Up early yet again, must be the early dawns. Got the Racing Post to read about the Derby yesterday. Cleaned up the house before my parents got back. Have enjoyed house-sitting - different to when I lived here.

Day 419

D rang up about 4.30, had a long talk about this and that.

Day 418

Yet another dream last night about starting a new year back at uni. Got up and watched Out of This World.

Day 417

Sunny, windy, nice Bank Holiday. Nicer than the 1991 one definitely, what a bore that was.

Parents having gone on holiday in the morning, am house-sitting at their place. Made all secure in the evening, applied alcohol to anxiety with good effect (short-term, anyway).

Day 416

I like the song E.R.N.I.E. on that Madness album I got yesterday, btw: 'A thousand winners every week...' When it comes to prospects of improvement I must admit E.R.N.I.E. is where I feel my best chance is. Given that job applications are 50p win bets at 100-1, if that, my (est.) 1100-1 weekly chance of my Premium Bonds coming up is more promising. Don't laugh, they might win me £250,000 next week. .

Depressing prevailing media opinion recently that socialism is finished. Is it fuck! I heard a vox pop in the afternoon with various young Euro-wankers saying their ambitions are just to 'make money'. Get rid of the lifeboats, the first-class passengers say there won't be any more icebergs. These materially-obsessed would-be capitalists don't realise that their launching-pad of prosperity was made possible by the socialism of the past. Imagine a Britain in which (Goddess forbid!) the Glorious Dawn of 1945 never happened! Even worse than one in which a gang of capitalist fanatics have done their worst to dismantle its legacy! The message to all those who wish a fair distribution of wealth is 'never give up'. 'When all around seemed dark as night.'

Day 415

In Our Price got Absolutely by Madness for a (these days) bargain £5.99.

Day 414

Listened to Feedback. No more The Village for a while!

Got the new Viz - let down by admissions of support for beardy Thatcherite fanatic Richard Branson and his tin-pot commercial radio station. And general sense of running out of ideas.

Day 413

A welcome job loss today - Norman Lamont was finally sacked. Useless incompetent bastard. Wonder if he still thinks high unemployment is a 'price worth paying', ha ha ha. The Tory scum are trying to put the enormous public debt down to public spending, when of course it's that taxes aren't high enough.. Bastards! Bastards! Bastards!

Watched the usual telly. Pris later.

Day 412

To the library: got out Desolation Road which I've noticed before. Reminded me of One Hundred Days of Solitude, with its generations bearing irritatingly similar Hispanic names, and climate and repetitive under-age sex.

Got rather depressed in the evening, cheered up with the advent of healing rain. Must ring M tomorrow.

Day 411

Carried on with the Odyssey.

Watched the telly version of And Now In Colour (It's a Mad, World etc). Like all Radio 4 to telly conversions the direct translations were bad and the new material better. Especially the Subbuteo sketch, very funny.

Day 410

Morning was very long but weather was nice. Read a lot of the Odyssey in the afternoon too.

Day 409

Beautiful weather. Read Tom Brown's Schooldays. A good day for a Sunday.

Day 408

Saturday isn't what it was, is it? Perhaps I'm getting too old for getting drunk every Saturday. Or perhaps worrying about Sunday has overshadowed it. To be honest, Friday isn't what it was either, especially now The Bill has moved.

Day 407

The evening dragged rather. But heard Dillie Keane (of Fascinating Aida) singing a heartfelt song on Kaleidoscope called Socialist Britain which brought tears to my eyes. Interesting that the acts of the current Torycaust are entirely negative, ie attempts to destroy welfare state, nationalised industries, council housing, local government, mines, shipyards, education, NHS etc. What positive things they have created I cannot think. Bastards!

Day 406

Rained continuously all day: had to go to the post office in it. Watched the usual telly plus Rik Mayall acting rather well in a play about a sodden game-show host. Indeed I forgot he was Rik Mayall.

Day 405

To the Post Office to cash my Giro, then round to my parents'.

Reading the SOCIAL SERVICES article in our old Children's Britannica was struck by the deterioration in society since the Torycaust began. This is a rotten, corrupt, greed-driven society where acquisitiveness is legitimised. 'And for my part, I shall not wholly fail of my task... if anything passes through this night that can still grow fair... again in days to come'. The Tories - Together We'll Crack Them.

Day 404

Nice day. Not so nice interview at the DHSS - have to write more speculative letters I think.

Nasty anti-transsexual play A Romance on Radio 4 in the afternoon.

Day 403

Into town to sign on. In the library by chance found a volume of Tolkien criticism which I got out. Thought about how to make a good impression at the DHSS interview tomorrow.

Day 402

Round to my parents'; mum sent me to the garden centre to to get garden lime. Got to sign on tomorrow.

Day 401

When I got back to my parents' house at 11pm watched The Bill which I'd videoed: a curiously unreal episode saying goodbye to Ted Roach ('You thought only T.R. had a bottle'). Perhaps being drunk enables one to see through bad acting.

Day 400

I see the Tory scum intend to abandon Government responsibility for a wide range of activities and turn it over to (Tory) private companies. This will be a charter for rampant corruption. I suggest the Cabinet be arrested as enemies of the State and thrown off the Tarpeian rock.

Yesterday watching my Madness video spotted a triffic moment in Sweetest Girl - the line 'When, when the government falls, you never can tell' is accompanied by them giving a thumbs-up, grinning widely and showered with streamers. The Torycaust must come to an end. Don't tell me there's nothing coming.

Day 399

Got £3 out of the Abbey National to cover yesterday's breakdown of discipline.

Haven't seen M for 2 weeks. Wonder why?

Day 398

Haven't seen M for quite a while. Perhaps she thinks it isn't worth contacting me if I can't afford to come out at weekends. Hope not!

Day 397

Didn't get to sleep till 3.30 am last night. Woke up to a hot sunny humid day.

Day 396

Faced up to financial reality and planned for the next Giro in 9 days' time. Went round to my parents', found my radish seeds planted a week ago had come up.

Listened to very good R4 play Focus by Arthur Miller.

Day 395

Nice pre-summery weather in the afternoon.

Day 394

Last night I played my Bob Dylan tape for the first time in ages, today my imaginary bet on Bob's Return won 14-1.

Day 393

My hope on Wednesday was granted. The Tories got an enormous beating. The Liberals overturned a 12,500 Tory majority at Newbury: they got a majority of 22,000! A massive 28% swing, bigger than Orpington.

The Tories were beaten out of sight in the council elections: they lost control in 15 counties, keeping only Buckinghamshire. Labour are now the largest party in Essex! The Liberal I voted for won, a rare thing in my experience. The Tories lost all the council seats here. It was on BBC1, which I watched after Pris last night, County Hall I mean, as 'Essex Man rejects Tories'.

The high-water-mark of optimism is the observation was that if a general election had gone the same way, Labour would be in power with an overal majority of 87, and the Liberals would have 56 seats. Of course you can't extrapolate local elections directly, but it's a good sign. The Tories lost control of counties they've had for 104 years!

Went into town, checked local results at County Hall.

Day 392

Went and voted. Told the women at the table they ought to move the Daily Mail off it or at least put it face down. It annoyed me and Carl at the General Election, and really isn't right. They did too.

Day 391

Cashed my Giro. County council elections tomorrow. Hope the Tories get a good beating.

Day 390

Watched Quantum Leap. Always more interesting when he's a woman.

Argued with my mum on the phone - bad enough being unemployed without having to argue about it all the time.

Day 389

Nice day weather-wise. Watched Live And Let Die, from which bits had been cut, irritatingly. In the evening more LotR appendices. Realised that Éowyn is 23 in LotR, same age as me.

Day 388

Finished Lord of the Rings again. Now leafing leisurely-ly through the Appendices, which as I think I've said before, are a sort of reward for so much reading.

Bank Holiday tomorrow, May Day Bank Holiday in fact, so at least I haven't got to sign on. (I hope).

Day 387

American attitude to the Serbs continues to amaze me with its hypocrisy. Jews suffer at hands of Nazis, so they're great. Serbs suffer similarly and are seen as scum of the earth. Odd eh?

Oh yes. A gift in the morning: an opinion pollster rang up in the morning with questions about radio and Carlton-Thatchervision, GMTV etc. He asked me what I thought of Carlton-Thatchervision, when I said it would take a while he said fine. So I dictated a succinct statement about Th**r's grudge against Thames over Death on the Rock and their consequent replacement with a more compliant operator. It's not often I get people ringing up asking my views!

More women priests fuss.

Day 386

That tennis player Monica Seles, who turns out to be Serbian, got stabbed in the back (how appropriate!) on court in Germany by an East German, no doubt a neo-Nazi Ustashe fanatic.

Day 385

M came round with Colin, told her about the Great Abstinence. I pointed out I didn't intend to start till after my birthday, on June 1st, in fact. Colin said, 'So you're going to drink yourself silly till then?' Nice bloke! Wish I saw him more often.

Day 384

Went to the behavioural therapy appointment. After 45 minutes' talking, he told me I was not paranoid as I knew my fears were unreasonable. He said I was suffering from an 'intrusive rumination' - nice phrase, sounds about right. He also told me, basically, that it would go away if I knocked off drink for 3-6 months. I told him his words were hard but clear.

Lovely weather, btw: sunny and windy. More Latin in the afternoon, did a bit of pondering about the possibility of a Great Abstinence. I thought about waiting till after my birthday and perhaps doing June 1 - September 21 - 112 days, over 3½ months and with only one drink-likely anniversary, July 4th/6th. And I could celebrate Bilbo's/Frodo's birthday at the end of it. (!) But a GA would be 6 times as long as my Finals abstinence and probably pretty hard, certainly at first. Sounds like a good idea really though.

Day 383

Got the paper early instead of at lunchtime, for a change. Didn't notice the lack at lunchtime. Also for a change, didn't watch the news at tea-time - completely sick of David Owen's face.

Day 382

Rang up the behavioural therapy people - appointment on Wednesday as I suspected.

There was a thunderstorm at 1 pm and a triffic 2-hour version of The Eagle Has Landed on Radio 4 an hour later.

Day 381

Recycled French lager bottles at Asda. The car park was nearly full: evidently Sunday shopping is more popular than the Christian fanatics would have us believe.

Lots of fuss about yesterday's bombs. Why? Only one person died - bad news for his family of course, but the Tories have killed off far more people than the IRA ever will: by homelessness, starvation, freezing to death, despair and (most infamously of all) the Falklands. Any group who'll callously kill thousands in support of their election campaign are beyond condemnation. It is that crime that is the worst in Th**r's long list of evil deeds.

Day 380

It rained all evening: 'not even to wreak vengeance would a Trevanyi set forth in the rain'.

Big bomb in London today, after that small one at the oil terminal on Tyneside in the week.

Day 379

I see the Croats have committed a terrible massacre in Bosnia; hope Chancellor Kohl is pleased with what he's sponsored.

Haven't been to the pub for 5 weeks, I've gone right off that sort of thing.

Day 378

Giro came - increased to £68.40 from £67.20, ie 60p/wk - wow. Foolishly mentioned this when M came round to return my rucksack - had to pay her £3.75 for petrol on Monday.

Watched The Comic Strip: quite a good one about telly detectives, unfortunately with the same dull running joke about the Professionals that they used in The Bullshitters.

Day 377

No Giro today owing to signing on late yesterday. In the afternoon did a spot of astrological research on Hitler.

Day 376

Went to the DHSS. They kept me waiting for ages but it was OK. The woman behind the desk was German: I felt like saying 'What are foreigners doing working with 4½ million unemployed?' but didn't.

Day 375

Up at 5.45 am: M picked me up at 7.30. Got the ferry at Dover, had a calmish but windy crossing. Drove to Saint-Omer, got 49 bottles of beer and wine for my parents. Then to Dunkirk. As I said to M, it didn't look as if the beach had been strafed 53 years ago during Britain's most successful failure. Saw the memorial. Then drove to Cap Blanc Nez to look at the bunkers and shell craters; we could see England across the sea and I speculated it was where Hitler, and Napoleon before him, came to look at the 20-mile stretch of water that halted both their conquests. It was quite impressive. I got a bit of chalk off the ground.

Back to Calais for the ferry: sat in the bow bar watching the lights of Dover approach. Home by 10.35pm. Thanked M for persuading me to come.

Day 374

Listened to Monday's episode of The Archers (which I missed) in the repeat. Read the paper

A very good day for a Sunday. Of course the winter Sundays are long over and that improves things. Worked on fancy screen clears for my C screen savers.

Day 373

In the afternoon successfully converted my Pascal EGA dump program to C, first time. Watched a bit of You Rang M'lord, listened to Week Ending.

Read in the paper how good they think Th**r is in E. Europe, they must be stark staring bonkers. In the corner of the same page it said that a sixth of Britain's people live on income support, that is the achievement of that vile, evil, thieving, lying hypocritical excuse for a woman the spiv nations ought to bear in mind.

More unpleasant events in Bosnia; being on the Serbs' side is rather like liking Reb in Pris: both are entitled to restitution for past suffering, but they will keep going too far. But how anyone can line up with the Germans like the US and the Croats have. The Croats, they were Nazi puppets after all.

Day 372

Nice-sounding date. Went into town, sorted out the excursion document. Made another attempt on FORTH, using A86 this time. Why do I keep trying to write things from the keyboard when forward planning works so much better?

I got very bored in the afternoon despite going round to my parents' and helping restore the front room to pre-fire state by carrying books downstairs. Exactly a month since the fire. Quickly I've forgotten.

Was depressed about 7.30pm but cheered up after a walk, and good progress on a C 'analogue' clock prog. M rang about 9.15 to ask if everything was sorted.

Day 371

Went into town. Got forms for an excursion document (I thought you could only get them at ports) and visitor's passport, and 140 francs for £20. Searched fruitlessly all day for my birth certificate: M rang to give details of the ticket, which you need to check for excursion documents.

In the evening went round to Dad's teacher friend Mr B to get the document signed. Exhausting day!

Day 370

M came round about 4pm and spent about 2 hours trying to persuade me to come to France with her next week for a day-trip.

After watching QED I remembered that I had to sign on on Monday, when the trip is. I rang her up to discuss it, I decided to pretend I'd forgotten and sign on on Tuesday instead. So I will have to get some French money and a visitor's passport AQAP. Set things in motion tomorrow, in fact. I just hope it can be done in time.

Day 369

Worked on an assembler version of the disc free space program - tricky multiplication. Sorted it out: even conversion to K (SHR 10) and to M (SHR another 10) - the latter scaled up by multiplying by 10 before the divide and putting in a decimal point. Sophisticated stuff. Format leaves a bit to be desired, but content before style. (Important to remember that in this false age).

Not seen M today, she reckoned I was making 'a big mistake' in not coming yesterday.

Day 368

More assembler. In the evening I was watching a documentary about hares and Eostra when M rang up wanting me to come down the Green Man with J and her and her brother and 'loads of his friends'. I declined on the grounds I'd had it with the Green Man. What an enantiodroma.

Must post that mentalness questionnaire. I really am feeling down at the moment, which is odd as I'm drinking less than I have been. How did it happen / And who was to blame? And more importantly, what can I do to change it?

Day 367

Did some computing. M rang after dinner, went round and stayed till 6.30 doing lots of computing. Evocative Blue Savannah being played by her brother.

Day 366

Sorted out the file handle problem. Worked out the formula for distance and angular size: distance = ½ width/tan ½𝜃 .

A letter from the behavioural therapy people, offering an appointment on the 29th (nearly 2 months after I first went). Also a 'How Mental Are You?' questionnaire to send off. (Actually anxious people are less likely to be mental).

Day 365

Today being Good Friday it was hardly the same as usual. Got up in time to catch the end of Way Out West. It rained all day: didn't go out. I just don't seem to get the urge to go out at weekends any more. I think I appreciate Tuesday and Thursday more than Friday and Saturday these days.

Wrote a 500-byte .COM file for date/time report. Now moving on to file buffers.

Ate a large tea, watched Red Dwarf V, drank lager, carried on reading LotR.

Day 364

Got the TBASIC working. S came round and we had a good talk. I told her about the language library placement, and our night out with Stacey and Gemma - the latter, I said, earning more than Roberta F and twice as well off because she hasn't lost all her friends. 'No, Gemma never had any friends in the first place' said S wittily.

In the evening wrote a neat 180-byte available memory program using my general-purpose BIN2ASC routine.

S rang up about 8.45 to invite me out with her and Roberta (!), but I declined, wanting a quiet evening. An hour later Roberta phoned with the same request! To which I made the same reply.

Day 363

Finished typing in that C titchy BASIC interpreter: worked hard all day debugging it. Listened to Charles Augustus Milverton - especially good, particularly Holmes and his 'hated rival'! Went to the recycling place with 8kg of cans, got £3.20. That's 23kg so far.

I have been unemployed 21 months 1 day. 33% of the unemployed blame Thatcher, apparently. 81% 'hardly ever go out'. I can well believe it.

Wednesdays aren't usually very exciting. A Giro came today but being in funds I left cashing it till tomorrow.

Day 362

ELVES' NEW YEAR. Assembler experimentation (successful).

Day 361

Did some graphs for the presentation Carl's got to do for his interview tomorrow.

Came across a triffic and easy bin-to-hex routine in that old ZX81 m/c book: simply get each nybble and OR it in a byte with 30h to get the hex digit. The success of this encouraged me to rationalise my bin-to-dec 32-bit routine, first to fill a buffer from the left and then to work with pointers. Works well.

Monday never is very exciting but at least I achieved something constructive today.

Day 360

Out all day with M on bike ride to Raindon, didn't get back till 6.20.

Still in difficulties in m/c over binary to ASCII conversion - I want a simple routine to take 4 bytes at BVAL and produce up to 10 digits at STRBUF.

'I build people's houses - I expect I know what I'm doing and I have a house when I've finished' - that's what an Irish bricklayer said at that peace rally in London today. But what the solution is in N. Ireland is not an easy question to answer. I suppose some sort of joint sovereignty might be a step in the right direction.

Got to sign on tomorrow.

Day 359

Grand National. Mercury setting at the start time, so I had 50p each way on Won't Be Gone Long, a Mercurial name with orange colours. The race was a fiasco, with 2 false starts. On the second most of the riders weren't aware of the false start and raced all the way round. In the end the race was declared void, all bets to be returned. Mercury is of course patron of tricksters and thieves!

I see there's some crackpot plan to give $1,000m of aid to Russia. Half of that'll go to the Mafia, the other half to 'entrepreneurs' who are after all much the same thing. This is a difficult time for socialists, still the imbalance of wealth world-wide will go on increasing.

Day 358

M came round and gave me interview advice - 'think shops' she said as she departed.

Left at 3.30, unnaturally clean and smart. The interview was quite short but there were no unnecessary pauses. Back at 4.50: M came round for a post-mortem. She reckoned that only 3 people (including me) went for the job. But interviews are like exams, you don't know the outcome till you get the letter

Did some unusually effective graphics C and text-'collapse' assembly programming. Everything sweet as a nut, woman and computer in perfect harmony.

A good day, beautiful weather too.

Day 357

It rained solidly until dinner; watched a Norman Wisdom film at my parents' with Carl.

In the afternoon to town, got a shirt from C&A for £12 (instead of the usual £6, felt like something of better quality for a change) and a good C book from the library.

Watched the last Minder: feel the Australian episodes weren't up to the excellent standard of the rest of the series.

Wonder how things'll go with the job. There could be zero or more other applicants and zero or more of them could have better chances. I rate my chance as zero or greater, or as we ought to say, nought or greater.

Day 356

Woke up with an iron purpose. Put makeup on, went into town. As soon as I spotted anyone at the luggage counter I marched up to it and said I'd heard there was a sales position going there, was that still true? The bloke agreed it was, gave me an application form and a counter to fill it in on. He must've mistaken me for a person of consequence!

Computed in the afternoon, more Mah Jongg than assembler, I regret to report.

M came round at about 4.30, talked on the doorstep. Haven't seen much of each other recently, wonder why? I must admit it was really fear of her bad opinion that made me go for the job. I estimate my chance of getting it as quite low, but higher than if I hadn't applied. Yet another unbearable hope.

Day 355

More assembler. M rang up about 5pm with less than encouraging job information. Is it really worth while getting all dressed up just to collect an application form? Of course they're not to know that isn't how I normally dress.

Day 354

Walked into town with Carl.

A86 arrived - seemingly very good, certainly better than using DEBUG.

Bit of a slide at the moment. What are my ambitions? I can push and push at issues like that but there's no response. Odd.

Day 353

Perhaps this luggage job will work out.

A86 may arrive tomorrow. With a proper assembler I could do wonderful things - solid BinAsc / AscBin routines for one.

Day 352

A bit of programming. On Monday I may be offered intolerable hope in the form of info about that job from M.

In the afternoon walked into town to the library. Took further looks ahead in the Pris book.

Day 351

As Carl is coming back from uni tomorrow, went round to my parents' and moved my computer and associated stuff out of his room and back here.

Massive pro-Nazi anti-Serb bias seen in the news, as usual. Quite clearly the conflict in what still is as far as I'm concerned Yugoslavia was exascerbated by Germany bouncing the EEC into recognising Croatia. Considering Croatia was a Nazi puppet state during the war and the Croat Ustashe and Muslims enthusiastically slaughtered Serbs then, you can hardly not see dismal parallels. In some way the Serbs are entitled to restitution. But 'at some specified time the murders must stop.'

A sentiment that seems to be popularly felt Ireland-wise: the kid killed in Warrington last week was buried today, loads of flowers outside the British Embassy in Dublin. What with those 5 blokes killed in Ulster yesterday everyone seems to have terrorism on their mind. But how even an approximation to the just solution is to be brought about in Northern Ireland is hard to see.

J rang up after tea: having a cold I wasn't keen to go out. She wasn't too apprehensive about the 150 planned redundancies where she works.

Day 350

Computed and cleaned in the morning. In the afternoon went round to M's to to take back her cover discs. She mentioned an (unadvertised) job at Debenhams selling luggage. She outlined at great length the qualities required, or rather, how far short I fell of them. I asked her to find out whether they wanted someone with experience.

Day 349

Went into town, then as fast as I could back to the post office to cash my giro and post C's dissertation. I was under the impression it closed at noon - as it happened I was wrong but as I had to wait about 200 years I was just in time for the collection anyway.

40 pages, C paid me £20 to type it. It would've cost him £40 at least to do it professionally. If I spend £8.22 inc VAT on A86 I'll have plenty of dosh left - and won't need to spend the Giro money yet.

2000 people turn out in Dublin to protest against the IRA, Warrington etc. Heartening.

Day 348

In the evening watched The Bill and Harry Enfield. Nice weather. Can't think of anything else to say about today.

Day 347

Grey rain in the morning, sun in the afternoon. Rode into town to sign on. Worked on First Publisher in the afternoon, discovered unforeseen good bits.

That drunken tosser Yeltsin has seized control of the media. The Romans gave up a republic to a dictator in order to save it: and of course they never got it back. They had 400 years of Emperors and then were conquered.

Day 346

In the afternoon back to my parents', cleaned the top shelf in the front room and everything on it, fitted a new shelf in the cupboard under the stairs.

I've had a serious decline since December and the language library, which just followed up the October paranoia. Things have not been going well in the last 6 months, or in the last 20 months come to that. I've lost almost all sense of direction, and if it wasn't for M I'd be nowhere. She could be off in 6 months. I imagine that I have got to do something soon. But what? What can I do? Something positive eh.

Day 345

To Lakeside with M. In the evening to my parents', played backgammon vs. my mother.

I see Yeltsin has effectively declared dictatorship in Russia. Hopefully he will be brought down. Why Clinton is supporting him I don't know.

Bombs in Warrington again. What is there there that the IRA reckon is so important?

There seems to be a lot of anti-Government sentiment about now. Mind you, in 1989 they were miles behind in the polls, then again they only got themselves out of that by ditching T*****r. Even the tabloids seem to be against the Tory bastards now. Is this the turn of the tide? Once again, who knows.

Day 344

Did a spot of computing. M came round in the afternoon; we went into town and then back to hers, while she fitted an energy-efficient light bulb.

Out in the evening with M and J; met Stacey H and Gemma from primary school. SH is on £25,000 pa! 14 times what I've got, who'd believe it? Despite the opportunity to redistribute wealth I declined a drink from Gemma, to general surprise. Had a good time.

Back at 11.10, ran Skyglobe to make sense of the stars I'd seen earlier, did a bit more of investigation into command-line compilers, ERRORLEVEL's and syntax checks with C and Fortran.

Day 343

Haven't had a decent night's sleep for a while. Round to my parents' again, did a lot of cleaning up in the kitchen.

Day 342

Stayed at my parents' last night so I could help with the big clean-up today. Washed many things, including jars of spices. M came round in the afternoon with chocs for my parents, a nice thought. Also gasman, loss adjuster, local paper bloke, electrician and plumber.

The fire has done wonders for my paranoia by giving me something real to think about.

Government in All Sorts of Trouble over the budget and pay deals.

Day 341

Was at my parents' typing up my brother's dissertation when a fire broke out in the kitchen. The cooker hood caught fire and, being plastic, burnt like fuck and gave off thick black smoke. Me and my mother could not control the fire so I rang the fire brigade. I was calm, as I reckoned the fire had gone out already.

The woman next door came home. 'Have you had a fire?' she said. I looked around at the two fire-engines parked outside and the smoke-blackened net curtains. 'Yes,' I said.

But all the neighbours were very helpful and kind, it restored my faith in human nature. I feel a lot better now, having competently dealt with a real crisis rather than apprehended a hundred imaginary ones. I'm not so useless after all!

The fire put the Budget in the shade (nothing that really affects me). The whole thing was quite exciting, and a true Adventure. Nancy and Bilbo, I hope, will continue to be proud of me.

Day 340

Had a brainwave regarding extended batch language: parameter %0 is the path and name of the batch file. EBFD %0.bat gives EBFD the name of the file and lets it read the extended commands out of it. The beauty of the scheme is that the user need only type BATCHIT rather than EBFD COMMFILE.CMF, say, because it is to all intents and purposes a normal batch file.

M rang about 6.30, wanting to know if I could find £40 to go on a boating holiday her brother was arranging. I would've loved to've gone but £40 is 119% of a week's money - £60 to M, £205 to J, £1400 to the Prime Minister. Seems rather unfair since we'd all get the same holiday. Anyway, I had to decline

Evening dragged rather: been doing a lot of computing recently.

Day 339

Worked on the visual version of Chase The Lady, using my CHTABLE routine which prints out characters 8x size by looking up the EGA character table.

Beautiful Spring night with clear stars and that indefinable smell you get in Spring and Summer.

Day 338

Did a lot of programming again. Sorted out the prob with Chase The Lady - remind me to use array range bounds checking in future.

Listened to Neil Kinnock interview, what a tragedy. He said how much the many letters of commiseration had helped. I am proud to recall that I wrote one of those letters. And, as I said then, Neil Kinnock's name will always be remembered as one who kept up the fight during the dark years of Thatcherism. Perhaps he will be vindicated sooner than we think, as the selfishness, greed and callousness the Tories encouraged begin to catch up with them. Don't tell me there's nothing coming...

Day 337

More trouble in Russia, that drunken capitalist fanatic tosser Yeltsin storming out of parliament like Charles I. No wonder Russia's going down the tubes. In 1989 Alexi Sayle was complaining that the USSR would be turned into a 'cheap tatty version of the West': I was angry with his cynicism. Now I know he was right. (He still wasn't one of the Young Ones though).

Did a lot of programming. I see Lloyd's insurance are in trouble again, the 'Names' complaining about malpractice etc. They should learn to take the consequences of gambling.

Day 336

Computed constantly, seething with ideas from the shareware catalogue. Throughout the day worked on programming the computer to play Chase The Lady, with some success

Weather lovely again, beautiful warm spring night too with clear stars.

Day 335

A Giro arrived: went to Sainsbury's. Having lots of cash bought PCW to catch up on the latest developments - free shareware catalogue with an assembler and Mah-Jongg prog I'd like to be able to afford. It's given me loads of good ideas.

Day 334

Walked into town with M at 2.30 to buy a coat. After going to C&A, M&S, BHS, Debenhams, Next, the Co-op, Mister Byrite, Millets and C&A again I finally found one I liked. Discussed Maastricht.

Day 333

Walked into town for net curtains, then signed on, accepted a copy of the MUE (Mugsborough Un-Employed) newsletter outside the DHSS.

Realised that as I signed on today I should get paid on Wednesday. Complicated stuff these benefits.

Government defeated in symbolic Maastricht vote. Let's hope we get the Social Chapter. Dodgy news from Germany, far right gains in Frankfurt local elections. Round up all one-bollocked unemployed painters with toothbrush moustaches.

Day 332

Up at 10.30 feeling queasy after last night's excesses. Went for a walk, was cheered by fresh air. Read the paper and the Martin Bormann book I got from the library yesterday.

In the afternoon reorganised my bookshelves.

Day 331

Soup for dinner, went into town. Finding I'd forgotten my library ticket, went home for it. Programming and darts in the afternoon, Chinese take-away blowout at my parents' for tea.

In the evening lager and The Tombs of Atuan. I have been unemployed now for 20 months.

Day 330

In the afternoon it was announced Nicholas Ridley is dead, since he died of lung cancer I won't say 'good thing too' but will confine myself to this comment: John Buffoon Major said he was unique, I say, at least there aren't any more like him.

The Obscurer was full of anti-Serbian propaganda today. And I see John Patten wants more 'Christian morals' in education, well, he can start by stopping handing schools over to second-hand car dealers.

J rang up to ask if I was coming out, but I couldn't afford it.

Day 329

Up at 10.45, did some more programming. M came round about 4.30, talked about programming. She tried to persuade me to come out tonight with her and J, and as I was under the impression I had a fiver somewhere I was tempted to go, but when I discovered I hadn't, I decided against it.

Re-reading What Katy Did . No Pris tonight due to snooker, again.

Day 328

Went round to mum's and borrowed £25 for this no-Giro week.

I see the prime minister of Poland is complaining about Western Europe 'blocking competition'. We should say 'If you're mad enough to implement the hypocritical, greed-crazed, divisive, fanatical, rotten thieving Thatcherite policies that've destroyed this country, don't expect us to bail you out when it inevitably fails.'