islandhippy

While clearing out the spare room this morning I found an old diary of mine from the early 1980s. I think Sue Townsend must have used this as inspiration for her Adrian Mole series of books:

Thursday 5 January 1984
[In London] After breakfast Mum took me shopping round Carnaby Street, we went by tube. It was great fun. Outside every shop there were Heavy Metal studs, hair spray and gel. I bought a T-shirt and had it printed while I waited. I also bought studs and white hair spray. We had pizza for lunch, it was nice but they tried to do us out of 30p. We were in a clothes shop when we met the Rosses. We chatted and had a cup of coffee. Mum and I went to The Museum of Mankind. It was small but good. We took a cab to Covent Garden and met Granny and the girls. Mum and Granny were hooked on buying clothes. Totally boring. We then looked round the market and went home by tube. A magnificent day.

Friday 6 January 1984
[In Willoughby on the Wolds] It was lovely to be back in my own bed again. Mum came in to wake me up and she lectured me on hi-fi equipment use or rather she wasted about 15 minutes. We rushed to get to Mr Francis, the dentist, but finally arrived 10 minutes early. It was just a check-up and Mr Francis said my teeth were perfect but I didn't brush them often enough or in the right way. I received my second lecture of the day. We then went shopping in the Victoria Centre. Holly had to get a present for her school friend and I had to buy a flipping toothbrush! We put Holly back in the car as she wasn't feeling too well. I went and bought a pair of ace stretch jeans. On the way back home we collected the dog from the milkman. In the afternoon we took down all the Christmas decorations and I sprayed my hair blue, white and purple and used a yellow hair gel. Mum and Dad went out for dinner. Not a brilliant day.

Saturday 7 January 1984
[In London] Dad and I wend back down to London, had breakfast and went on to The Boat Show. It was excellent. We then went to see Uncle Peter and he gave me some wooden Polish birds. We then went to Alexandra Palace where there was a huge antiques fair. Came back home and watched a James Bond film "You Only Live Twice". This was a fabulous, excellent, brilliant day.

Sunday 8 January 1984
[In Willoughby on the Wolds] In Church Holly and I both read prayers out as part of the sermon. It was also prize-giving so we received two books and a £2 gift voucher each. We had Bob and Leela over for lunch. In the evening Dad and I went to Andrew's house to look at his BBC computer. It was very good. I have also set up my Aurora race track with Holly. This was a great day.

I wrote four New Year's resolutions in the front of the diary:
1. Brush teeth twice a day
2. Read the Bible every day
3. Write my diary every day
4. Play tennis every day

What the hell was I like?! I was obviously a five-foot-tall tennis-mad religious nutter with stretch jeans, bad teeth and multi-coloured spiky hair.