Sue Townsend - The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3⁄4

I will get a paper-round and go private.

Second after Epiphany. Oxford Hilary Term starts

Mrs Lucas and my mother have had a row over the dog. Somehow it escaped from the house and trampled on Mrs Lucas’s wet concrete. My father offered to have the dog put down, but my mother started to cry so he said he wouldn’t. All the neighbours were out in the street washing their cars and listening. Sometimes I really hate that dog!

I remembered my resolution about helping the poor and ignorant today, so I took some of my old Beano annuals to a quite poor family who have moved into the next street. I know they are poor because they haveonly got a black and white telly. A boy answered the door. I explained why I had come. He looked at the annuals and said, ‘I’ve read ’em’, and slammed the door in my face. So much for helping the poor!

I have joined a group at school called the Good Samaritans. We go out into the community helping and stuff like that. We miss Maths on Monday afternoons.

Today we had a talk on the sort of things we will be doing. I have been put in the old age pensioners’ group. Nigel has got a dead yukky job looking after kids in a playgroup. He is as sick as a parrot.

I can’t wait for next Monday. I will get a cassette so I can tape all the old fogies’ stories about the war and stuff. I hope I get one with a good memory.

The dog is back at the vet’s. It has got concrete stuck on its paws. No wonder it was making such a row on the stairs last night. Pandora smiled at me in school dinner today, but I was choking on a piece of gristle so I couldn’t smile back. Just my luck!

Full Moon

My mother is looking for a job!

Now I could end up a delinquent roaming the streets and all that. And what will I do during the holidays?

I expect I will have to sit in a launderette all day to keep warm. I will be a latchkey kid, whatever that is. And who will look after the dog? And what will I have to eat all day? I will be forced to eat crisps and sweets until my skin is ruined and my teeth fall out. I think my mother is being very selfish. She won’t be any good in a job anyway. She isn’t very bright and she drinks too much at Christmas.

I rang my grandma up and told her, and she says I could stay at her house in the holidays, and go to the Evergreens’ meetings in the afternoons and stuff like that. I wish I hadn’t rung now. The Samaritans met today during break. The old people were shared out. I got an old man called Bert Baxter. He is eighty-nine so I don’t suppose I’ll have him for long. I’m going round to see him tomorrow. I hope he hasn’t got a dog. I’m fed up with dogs. They are either at the vet’s or standing in front of the television.

Mr and Mrs Lucas are getting a divorce! They are the first down our road. My mother went next door to comfort Mr Lucas. He must have been very upset because she was still there when my father came home from work. Mrs Lucas has gone somewhere in a taxi. I think she has left for ever because she has taken her socket set with her. Poor Mr Lucas, now he will have to do his own washing and stuff.

My father cooked the tea tonight. We had boil-in-the-bag curry and rice, it was the only thing left in the freezer apart from a bag of green stuff which has lost its label. My father made a joke about sending it to the public health inspector. My mother didn’t laugh. Perhaps she was thinking about poor Mr Lucas left on his own.

I went to see old Mr Baxter after tea. My father dropped me off on his way to play badminton. Mr Baxter’s house is hard to see from the road. It has got a massive overgrown privet hedge all round it. When I knocked on the door a dog started barking and growling and jumping up at the letter-box. I heard the sound of bottles being knocked over and a man swearing before I ran off. I hope I got the wrong number.

I saw Nigel on the way home. He told me Pandora’s father is a milkman! I have gone off her a bit.

Nobody was in when I got home so I fed the dog, looked at my spots and went to bed.

It is a dirty lie about Pandora’s father being a milkman! He is an accountant at the dairy. Pandora says she will duff Nigel up if he goes round committing libel. I am in love with her again.

Nigel has asked me to go to a disco at the youth club tomorrow night; it is being held to raise funds for a new packet of ping-pong balls. I don’t know if I will go because Nigel is a punk at weekends. Hismother lets him be one providing he wears a string vest under his bondage T-shirt.

My mother has got an interview for a job. She is practising her typing and not doing any cooking. So what will it be like if she gets the job? My father should put his foot down before we are a broken home.

That is the last time I go to a disco. Everybody there was a punk except me and Rick Lemon, the youth leader. Nigel was showing off all night. He ended up putting a safety pin through his ear. My father had to take him to the hospital in our car. Nigel’s parents haven’t got a car because his father’s got a steel plate in his head and his mother is only four feet eleven inches tall. It’s not surprising Nigel has turned out bad really, with a maniac and a midget for parents.

I still haven’t heard from Malcolm Muggeridge. Perhaps he is in a bad mood. Intellectuals like him and me often have bad moods. Ordinary people don’t understand us and say we are sulking, but we’re not.

Pandora has been to see Nigel in hospital. He has got a bit of blood poisoning from the safety pin. Pandora thinks Nigel is dead brave. I think he is dead stupid.

I have had a headache all day because of my mother’s rotten typing, but I’m not complaining. I must go to sleep now. I’ve got to go and see Bert Baxter tomorrow at his house. It was the right number WORSE LUCK!

Today was the most terrible day of my life. My mother has got a job doing her rotten typing in an insurance office! She starts on Monday! Mr Lucas works at the same place. He is going to give her a lift every day.

And my father is in a bad mood—he thinks his big-end is going.

But worst of all, Bert Baxter is not a nice old age pensioner! He drinks and smokes and has an alsatian dog called Sabre. Sabre was locked in the kitchen while I was cutting the massive hedge, but he didn’t stop growling once.

But even worse than that! Pandora is going out with Nigel!!!!! I think I will never get over this shock.

Third after Epiphany

10 AM . I am ill with all the worry, too weak to write much. Nobody has noticed I haven’t eaten any breakfast.

2 PM . Had two junior aspirins at midday and rallied a bit. Perhaps when I am famous and my diary is discovered people will understand the torment of being a 133/4-year-old undiscovered intellectual. 6 PM Pandora! My lost love!

Now I will never stroke your treacle hair! (Although my blue felt-tip is still at your disposal.)

8 PM . Pandora! Pandora! Pandora! w PM . Why? Why? Why?

Midnight . Had a crab-paste sandwich and a satsuma (for the good of my skin). Feel a bit better. I hope Nigel falls off his bike and is squashed flat by a lorry. I will never speak to him again. He knew I was in love with Pandora! If I’d had a racing bike for Christmas instead of a lousy digital stereo alarm clock, none of this would have happened.

I had to leave my sick-bed to visit Bert Baxter before school. It took me ages to get there, what with feeling weak and having to stop for a rest every now and again, but with the help of an old lady who had a long black moustache I made it to the front door. Bert Baxter was in bed but he threw the key down and I let myself in. Sabre was locked in the bathroom; he was growling and sounded as if he was ripping up towels or something.