London

In 1977 I had a Sabbatical year in London. It was a lively time involving some people I would not want to embarrass but as I am getting on I think the time has come for me to put up a version of the notes I made at the time. The events concerned did after all happen 45 years ago now.

I was given an office at the Institute of Psychiatry by Hans Eysenck (now deceased) but I did not see a great deal of him. He was a very quiet sort of a person. Not what one expects of the (then) world's most quoted living psychologist.

My Scottish wife was with me until about July when she had to return to Australia. When she left I was not inclined towards a monk-like existence so "let my hair down" a bit in the following months and made a lot of female friends

One of the more remarkable of these was Susan B. I met her at an Intervarsity Club (IVC) do. She is a medical practitioner by occupation (which shows that she was a pretty bright woman), was about 38 at the time (but could pass for being in the mid-20s) and is far and away the most beautiful woman I have ever known. Her looks just bowl everyone over. People just stop talking when she enters the room. She had the looks and figure of a top model (though at 5'7" she was a bit short to be a model) plus very white skin, long blonde hair and blue eyes. She also has a political outlook similar to mine.

Her beauty has had an unfortunate outcome, however. It means men are never honest with her. They will say and do anything to get into her pants. The result is that she has taken refuge in the bottle. She is a dipsomaniac (binge drinker).

I of course was my usual blunt self and she liked that greatly. In fact, when I returned to Australia, she followed me out here within a month or two and wanted me to marry her. It was a tough decision for me. Being pursued by a beautiful and gifted woman certainly is some sort of pinnacle. We really saw eye to eye, I really liked her, bedtimes would have been good, she would have made me much sought-after socially and, as I was a fairly heavy drinker myself at the time, the booze would not have been a great problem. I would just have had to keep her off it during the day and all would be well.

I think the main thing that made the decision for me was that I really liked my wife at the time (I still do). Not only was she invariably pleasant, cheerful, loving and easy-going but we had similar interests in the social and life-sciences and I also found her body more sexy: She had a great figure. I suppose I like sexiness more than beauty. The two have something in common but are far from the same. And my wife certainly made life much easier for me than Suzy would have.

Another real lady I met in London was Margaret T. I still correspond with her occasionally. She is about 10 years younger than me. I met her at an I.V.C. party as well. Her mother is the daughter of an Earl so has the title "Lady". The present Earl (who sat, of course, in the House of Lords at that time) is Margaret's uncle. It is a Victorian title but via another lineage she traces back her ancestry for about 1,000 years. Only the gentry can do that

Margaret is a really kind and gentle person -- 5'10" tall, slim, with very blue eyes, brown hair and quite a nice slim figure. I spent a day or two at her family's stately home. She wanted me to marry her too. But again at the time I preferred my good-hearted and sexy Scottish wife. It was a close-run thing, however, and I had Margaret in mind for many years afterwards.

Margaret at one time took me to see one of her uncles. I initially got that frozen reception that the English upper class reserve for someone who is not one of them but things changed rapidly as the conversation progressed. The English upper classes tend to be to the Right of Genghis Khan and this one was no exception. When I started defending various Right-wing views in a way more plausible than he had ever heard before I was very rapidly transformed into a very "sound" chap in his mind and we ended up getting on quite well.

At that time I think that I could have had almost any social "entree" that I wanted. England at that time was a very good place for someone with Rightist views. The upper class set the tone for the middle class and it is only in the Universities and among the working class that Left-wing views were normative. I moved in the best of circles while I was in England. I even attended a small private garden party in Kent at which Mrs Thatcher (then Leader of the Opposition) was a guest. I got to have a chat with her. There were of course some upper and middle class people in Britain who lean to the Left but they generally kept pretty quiet about it in company.

I met a very pretty little Perth (W.A.) girl in London too. I think her name was Debbie. I chatted her up on the Bayswater station of the London underground. She had just qualified as a medical practitioner and was having her big trip before starting work. She was very bright, good-natured and cheerful and was slim with a very nice set of breasts. I've got a topless photo of her somewhere to show just how nice.

She had blue eyes and blonde hair. She had quite a nice dress-sense, too: simple but attractive and probably fairly fashionable. We could have got on quite well if I had made a bit of an attempt at it but I suppose my wife again suited me better. Still, taking Debbie to bed every night would have been a bit of alright, as the Cockneys put it. She was, however, very attached to Perth and her family so I would have had to move there, I suppose. She would have been about 24 at the time -- when I was 34. The fact that I knocked back a pretty, good-natured young blonde with a good figure and a medical degree to boot does seem a bit hard to believe in retrospect, though. Most men would have busted a gut not to let one like that slip through their fingers. She was real quality. Maybe she was a bit short for me, though -- about 5'4".

We went out together only a few times, mostly to I.V.F. dos. I still remember her effect on the other (English) females at one of them. She looked so much better than they did that they were quite abashed: Like a young rose among withered gerberas. The fact that I was an academic must have helped them feel outclassed too.

When she had to move on from London (in accord with her itinerary) I just let her go. Still, getting the pants off TWO very attractive female medical practitioners in London in the space of a couple of months was rather incredible going. I obviously had what it takes in those days. Every dog has its day, as they say. No wonder I think London is a good place, I suppose.

I spent a few nights with one of the female research assistants (Diane?) from the Institute of Psychiatry too. She would have been in her early 20s with blue eyes, brown hair and not much of a figure. I was shocked by her poverty. Her clothes and shoes were really worn out and would have been thrown out by most Australians long ago. This was before Mrs Thatcher's reforms and England really was a poor country then. I gave the girl a good time anyway.

On one occasion I woke up in bed with her in the morning (and made love to her of course), then made love to Angela (see below) around lunch time and then made love to Margaret after tea. It was the only occasion ever that I managed such variety in such a short time.

The other female mentioned was a Goan (i.e. from Goa), Angela D. Another I.V.C. person. She was in her mid 20s, short and a bit on the ugly side but quite bright with a very bubbly personality. She really liked sex too. She always got very lubricated very quickly. Apparently I was, however, only the second man she had ever slept with.

Her house in Stretton was the most dirty and untidy I had ever seen. She must have thought she was still living in India. After I saw how she lived I tried to break off with her but she would have none of that. She followed me around the streets of London shouting at me about how cruel I was to leave her etc. A bit like the much later film "Fatal Attraction".

After a few dramas she eventually gave me up as a bad job, however. One of the dramas was to get me arrested by the London Police on some wild accusation but they soon let me go.