Friday 1 April 1988 Good Friday
I had a day out today helping my dad’s colleague deliver animal feed to farms in North Wales. My memory of the day is sketchy at best, although I do recall that the feed we delivered was in bags rather than in bulk.
Logic dictates then, that we were delivering to smaller farms both in terms of their physical size and the number of livestock under husbandry. The relatively small wagon was able to navigate smaller farm lanes, but obviously couldn’t carry as much product.
Anyway, that’s enough of the ins and outs of maintaining the supply of animal foodstuffs… when I arrived home, a postcard had arrived… from the DVLA.
Saturday 2 April 1988
Today, I was in attendance at Gay Meadow as Shrewsbury Town scored an important win over Leeds United in their quest to avoid relegation to the third division.
The goal was scored by one Victor Kasule who was a Scottish Ugandan winger. In his time at Shrewsbury Kasule earned himself a place as a cult hero, even though he only managed 4 goals in forty games for Town. It was some strike, described as “one of the most spectacular even seen at Gay Meadow” by Geoff Tibballs in his book Football Greatest Characters.
With other results being kind, Town leapfrogged Bournemouth and Sheffield United to reach fifth from bottom. With Bournemouth to play next Friday evening, Shrewsbury had their destiny very much in their own hands.
In other football news, Liverpool lost 2-1 at the City Ground in a rehearsal for their impending FA Cup semi-final at Hillsborough.
In a sad indictment of my social status, I went out in the evening. Not with my mates but with the Aged Ps and Mum’s cousin and her boyfriend.
Sunday 3 April 1988 Easter Sunday
We had dinner at our Auntie’s before home and an early night because I was travelling to Lancashire tomorrow to watch Shrewsbury away at Blackburn Rovers.
Monday 4 April 1988 Easter Bank Holiday
Today’s trip to Ewood Park, Blackburn was memorable for its match of two halves. Shrewsbury went in at half time having been thoroughly outmanoeuvred by 2-0. Somehow, they recovered to nick a draw with a second-half reversal of fortunes.
It was another precious point in Town’s battle for survival. Also, considering that if Blackburn had managed to hold onto their halftime lead, they would have gone top, a sterling effort.
In other football action, in the top-of-the-table clash at Anfield, Liverpool performed a bit of a Blackburn of their own, throwing away a 3-1 lead against ten-men Manchester United. Nothing to see here. Next!
Tuesday 5 April 1988
Today I, “did some homework, but by no means enough.” Exams were approaching, but I seemingly just did no care.
I did find space in my revision schedule to watch the BBC programme Open Air which featured Scott (Jason Donovan) from Neighbours. As we see from my entry from 2 March, I was a big fan of Neighbours so I would have been as giddy as a giddy thing watching this. (Yes, I know.)
Wednesday 6 April 1988
Today, in some alternative dimension, I did loads and loads of revision homework.
In the real world, of course, I did the square root of not very much.
Thursday 7 April 1988
And to think there was to be another week of this… i.e. doing not very much work towards my A Levels.
Friday 8 April 1988
I think that tonight, Shrewsbury Town just about ensured their Second Division safety by beating Bournemouth 2-1 at Gay Meadow. I went with my brother, and we got absolutely soaked because it really chucked it down.
When we had arrived home, it was time for Friday Night Live, which was great, as usual.
Saturday 9 April 1988
Today was the Grand National and, as usual, “I backed a donkey!” A cursory search reveals that a horse called Rhyme n Reason won the race ahead of just 8 other finishers from a field of forty. In terms of casualties, one horse, Smith’s Man died after bursting a blood vessel.
At White Hart Lane, Wimbledon defeated Luton Town 2-1 in their FA Cup semi-final whilst at Hillsborough, Liverpool prevailed by the same score over Nottingham Forest. So the final would be a clash of styles as the Culture Club would be facing the Crazy Gang on 14 May at Wembley.
Sunday 10 April 1988
Today I was happy that it was a nice day, but sad that there was no cricket to make it perfect.
Monday 11 April 1988
Today, Dad and I had an audition for ITV’s darts-based quiz, Bullseye. It’s quite hard to over state just how big a deal Bullseye was in the late 80s. Hosted by the convivial Jim Bowen a former Maths teacher and old school stand-up comedian it combined the answering of general knowledge questions with darts.
Contestants played in teams of two – one would throw the darts and the other would answer questions. The dart player would be faced with a board comprised of ten sectors – each one a general knowledge category – which they would attempt to hit to allow their team mate to answer a question to win cash. In the second half, the number of teams would be reduced to one and they would attempt to win prizes from Bully’s Prize Board. The show’s finale would see the winning team offered the chance to stake their prizes to win Bully’s Special Prize which would be ‘hiding behind Bully.’
Anyway, we didn’t get accepted, but we did have a grand day a day out in Birmingham.
Tuesday 12 April 1988
Today was the last but one day of the Easter break and I joked it was just about time to start my homework.
In reality, I had probably not done quite enough and was feeling a wee bit frustrated with myself. This is because at the start of the holiday, I would have had the very best intentions to do loads of revision. However, I would not have had a plan, so consequently, no suitable stimulus other than some vague possibility of failing my A Levels that I could motivate myself.
Wednesday 13 April 1988
Having just defeated them in the FA Cup, Liverpool played Nottingham Forest at Anfield tonight. The 5-0 victory was described by Sir Tom Finney thus, ‘It was the finest exhibition I’ve seen the whole time I’ve played and watched the game. You couldn’t see it bettered anywhere, not even in Brazil. The moves they put together were fantastic.’
Thursday 14 April 1988
Well, there’s a thing. Today it was back to college… on a Thursday!?
Anyway, enough of that nonsense. I noted that I thought there were 5 weeks left and I also noted that it was just as boring as ever. Hmm.
Friday 15 April 1988
We had been handed a specimen Mechanics (part of our Maths course) to do over the Easter break and obviously must have handed it in yesterday because today we got it back. My A Level Maths teacher must have been pulling her hair out as she was marking mine because I had managed the rather poor score of just 41 from 100 plus marks.
Saturday 16 April 1988
There was no league football today because the Football League was celebrating its 100th birthday over the weekend. The celebratory event was a major disappointment.
Today, we had the opening round and the quarter-finals. Each game was of a forty-minute duration. Of the first 8 games, half were scoreless and decided by penalty shootouts.
Into the quarter finals, the entertainment quotient did not rise significantly with another scoreless draw and a grand total of just 5 goals. Around 45,000 people populated Wembley Stadium for the day’s events.
Sunday 17 April 1988
The semi-finalists, Tranmere Rovers and Nottingham Forest, plus Sheffield Wednesday and Manchester United for a place in the final. After a 2-2 draw Forest progressed to play Wednesday who had prevailed over Manchester United by a score of 2-1.
The final saw a win for Forest in a penalty shootout after another goalless draw. A lucky 17,000 bore witness to the day’s frolics. In my diary, I merely wrote the word, “YAWN!” to express my enjoyment of the spectacle.
Monday 18 April 1988
Today I mostly came home on the 2:40 bus, arriving in the kitchen at five past three.
At the time of writing my diary entry, I reported that I hadn’t done any [school] work in the afternoon. I must have felt guilty at that, as I resorted to the hairshirt punishment of “No telly tonight.”
Tuesday 19 April 1988
Today, my thoughts turned to my impending driving test. I was not confident on that score.
Neither was I particularly confident in respect of a) my ability to motivate myself to do the necessary revision for my A Levels and, by extension, b) my A Levels themselves.
Wednesday 20 April 1988
In football news, we saw the propensity for scoreless draws continue as Liverpool played out a goalless 90 minutes at Carrow Road. Norwich, I noted, became the only team not to concede a goal versus Liverpool this season having achieved a similar result at Anfield back in November 1987.
Thursday 21 April 1988
This was the day before my driving test and, boy, was I worried? “Seriously worried,” in fact. I had a lesson this evening, which I suppose was intended to help calm my nerves. Whether it did or not is another matter.
What did at least take my mind off my impending doom was watching Black Adder II which was repeated on BBC 2.
Friday 22 April 1988
Mine was an early appointment – 09:45. As a result, I had to miss the first part of college. I arrived in town as usual and met my instructor, before driving up to the test centre on Bell Lane, Abbey Foregate.
With my heart in my mouth, I tried to rationalise things, telling myself that this wasn’t forever. Also, pass or fail, by 11 am I would be back in college. My irrational thoughts skipped to the fact that I would have to read a car number plate at about 3 miles distance – surely, I would fail before I even had the chance to show the examiner my motoring prowess.
As it was, I need not have worried as I passed. This was despite a brief 35-40 mile-an-hour oversight as I came into the 30-mph zone on the Telford Way roundabout in Monkmoor after travelling across from Heathgates roundabout.
I went all French in my diary, writing, “Je suis passé!” Excited, much!
Saturday 23 April 1988
I celebrated my driving test pass by another day trip to Birmingham. To Villa Park in actual fact as Shrewsbury Town were aiming to grab another point in their quest to avoid relegation to the third division. The hosts were aiming for at least a point themselves in order to get out of Division Two and return to the first division.
As it was, Warren Aspinall scored the only goal of the game and Villa claimed all three points.
I remembered the day more for the behaviour of the West Midlands police in managing us country cousins. The Witton Lane End at Villa Park was split into a series of lateral pens which were separated by gates which remained locked until the furthest pen with people in it was deemed full. Then you could move into the adjacent pen and so on.
It was not when the people in the pen felt it was full though, it was, as I said, when they deemed it full. Consequently, it was a hot and sweaty afternoon in those pens.
Sunday 24 April 1988
More football news as Luton Town beat Arsenal in the Littlewoods (League) Cup Final at Wembley. Brian Stein opened the scoring for Luton before 15 minutes had elapsed. It remained at that score until four second-half minutes when Martin Hayes equalised before Alan Smith put the Gunners in front.
With 8 minutes remaining, Danny Wilson equalised for Luton before Stein popped up to score his second and his team’s winning third goal in the ninetieth minute.
In other news, “I got annoyed,” although I did not comment to explain why. It must have been them bloody A Levels.
Monday 25 – Saturday 30 April 1988
Covered with one entry on Saturday – “[Liverpool] drew 1-1 with Chelsea.”
So, there you go, that was April. In fact, that was pretty much my diary for 1988 until the end of September when I embarked on university life.