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.