Yesterday was the grand finale to the run
of decent weather we have had. It was bright and
sunny again, and the temperature rose to a warm
21°C. The last few hours of daylight were forecast
to be just sunny spells, and that was probably
right, but I didn't really notice any real dips in
brightness. What I did notice was that it did seem
to cool off a bit faster in the evening, but it
was possibly only a slight cooling down.
Today is now
forecast to be even cooler than when the
screenshot above was taken. The maximum
afternoon temperature is now predicted to be
no higher than 16° C. Another change is that
the first hour of full sunshine may not be
until midday. As I write this there is not a
hint of the sun in the sky, and it feels cold
and gloomy. The only small improvement in the
latest revision of the forecast is that now
the last hour of full sunshine could be 6pm.
After that there will only be sunny intervals
until sunset. Tomorrow should see the return
of full sunshine, except at the extremes of
daylight hours, and it should end up noce and
warm at 20° C. Today may seem bad, but it was
far worse on this day in 2017. The day started
with a frost, and although it was sunny, the
maximum temperature was just 10° C Brrrrr !
Early yesterday morning I didn't know if
I even felt like going out for a long
walk, but once I was washed and dressed
the idea became more appealing. Having
tackled the long climb up to Mountsfield
Park the day before I thought I would
see how I fared going up to Blythe Hill.
I'm not sure if it is actually higher,
but it certainly felt like it. The walk
from home to the highest point was
almost exactly one mile, but it felt
like a lot more !
I must admit that I stopped for
breath a few times on the way up the
hill, but it seems that just 10 to 15
seconds was all the time I needed to
take a deep breath, and continue on my
way. I have vague memory of it being
even harder work when I last went up
there. I guess, or I hope, I am slowly
getting fitter - or maybe I have lost a
bit of weight since that last time.
There is some
dispute over exactly how far I walked
yesterday, and I think it can be explained by
the fact that I forgot to pause the tracker
when I went inside a shop. I think the track
on the left, which says just 2.6 miles is
close to the correct figure. There is a glitch
on the right hand track, but it is hidden
under the "d" of "Catford Road". That is the
location of the shop I went into. 2.6 miles
doesn't sound very impressive, but there is a
reason why I didn't take a longer walk. I was
giving the boots I bought from Aldi back in
January (or was it last year ?) another try
out. I think they might be slightly improving,
but they remain uncomfortable. I suppose the
big improvement is that they didn't draw blood
this time.
Once again there seemed to be a lot of
haze, possibly from pollution, that spoiled
the distant views possible from the top of
Blythe Hill Fields. I have seen many mentions
of how the air above London, and in many other
places, is now clearer since the lockdown, but
these long distance views seem no better, and
maybe even worse than they were last time I
was on Blythe Hill Fields, or Mountsfield Park
(which I visited yesterday) a few years back.
The foreground to this picture looks
clear enough, but The Shard, seen on the left
of the picture in the distance, looks really
hazy, as do the other skyscrapers in the City
Of London. It is almost as if it was raining
over there, but the blue sky says it would
have been dry.
This picture looks slightly dull
because I am almost shooting into the sun. The
sun was off the top of the picture, but not by
that much. This is the view, looking south, of
the far steeper hill I went down as I
continued my walk. In the extreme distance are
the hills of north Surrey. I have definitely
seen them look sharper than that in the past.
For want of a better, or more
informative description, these are the horses
of Catford Hill. I presume that whoever lives
here likes horses. It was not far after this
point when I had to make a decision about how
much further I wanted to walk. Four or five
hundreds yards further along the road is the
entrance to The Pool River Linear Park. I
decided I would enter the park, and see how I
felt. I felt like my feet were very sore, and
so I just looped around to come out by the
shops, including Poundstretcher, on the south
side of the main road by Catford Bridge. One
thing I wanted to do was to see if there was
any queue to get into Poundstretcher - there
wasn't ! There was quite a long queue to get
into the Sainsbury's Local shop on the other
side of the main road. Luckily I didn't want
to go in there.
I did want to go in the little
supermarket the other side of Catford Bridge
station. There were no queues there, and
neither were there any bottles of Diet Coke in
there - my main reason to go there ! I didn't
come away empty handed though. I did buy a 2L
bottle of Vimto "Remix" which claimed to be
almost sugar free. I also bought some chick
peas in tomato sauce, which were a bit
expensive, but maybe OK as a novelty some
time. Some green and red bell peppers, and a
hunk of Polish smoked bacon also when into my
shopping basket.
It was a relief to get home, take my
boots off, and check my feet. They were rather
sore, but unlike the last time I wore them (I
think) there was no blood or blisters visible.
Maybe if I persist I can get them worn in and
comfortable, but I can't wear them if I intend
to walk more than a couple of miles. The best
way of wearing them in would be if it was
still possible to do a basic 1.5 mile walk to
the pub to meet Angela for a lunchtime drink,
and then back home. Lots of small walks like
that could do the trick, but I despair that I
will never be doing that again even when the
pubs do eventually re-open. For what ever
reason, it seems Angela has written me out of
her life.
Once I had my boots, and outdoor
clothes off I felt mostly OK. I did feel very
hungry though, but I put off eating until I
had transferred the screenshots off my mobile
phones, and pictures from my camera to my PC.
Once I had done that I ate a Sainsbury's Greek
salad with some smoked chicken slices (also
bought on my way home from the little
supermarket). I then edit the pictures, and
also a video before going into extreme lazy
mode.
This video was
taken when I had finally reached the top
of Blythe Hill Fields. I expressed
"wonder" that I had only walked a single
mile (almost exactly) because I was
knackered, but it did feel good to be on
top of the world - or so the views seemed
to show. I could have made the look
around, after saying my piece to camera, a
bit better, but with the bright sunshine
glaring off the viewfinder, I couldn't
really see what I was pointing the camera
at !
My original plan was to have a
chunk of mini grill/oven cooked Polish
smoked bacon (not the chunk I had bought
earlier, but one bought a week ago) for
dinner - possibly with baked beans - but I
thought that I should waste a good run of
walks that help bring my blood glucose and
weight down, on a very taste, but far from
healthy dinner. The only option was
another kebab takeaway. I was expecting
some delays because it was a Friday night,
and indeed my meal turned up about half an
hour late.
I noted that the restaurant had
changed the free bottle of drink with
orders over £25 to orders over £30. That
change backfired for me because although I
ordered enough for free delivery, I didn't
pile on any more to get a free bottle of
drink. Last night I ate my two meals in
the right order. I had the "special
chicken kebab" which features extra
grilled vegetables, for my dinner last
night, while it was hot, and I'll have the
ordinary chicken shish kebab for dinner
tonight - cold.
I had a funny old sleep last night.
I seemed to sleep well, but only after a
sort of struggle to get to sleep.
Initially it was because I was bored with
TV and went to bed quite early. Initially
I was reading, but my eyes seemed to be
drooping. I assumed I would fall asleep
soon after turning out the light, but it
seemed to take ages to fall asleep. Once I
did get to sleep I possibly slept for 4
hours, and after going for a wee it took,
or seemed to take, ages before I could get
back to sleep again. The best bit of my
sleep was probably soon before waking up.
It was another erotic dream. I seem to be
having a few of them lately. The worst bit
was that while the dream was erotic,
nothing actually happened....which might
mean something, but I would rather not
dwell on it !
I don't really feel that good this
morning. It is nothing specific, and
probably has more to do with the change of
weather than anything else (it is still
cold and gloomy outside). My health
indicators tell a different story. My
weight was good this morning. I have lost
about 2kg from the annoying peak of a week
or two ago, but still have about a
kilogramme to go before I hit a new low.
My blood glucose was 7.3mmol/l, and while
I would prefer it to be 6.3, it still
compares well with my average for the
month (so far) of 8.3mmol/l. My blood
pressure was a little bit higher than
usual this morning, but I attribute that
to my blood pressure meter showing an
error the first time I used it. I have no
idea why it doesn't use the battery level
indicator to show the batteries need
changing, but it never does. It just shows
a big "E" instead of a reading. That
always causes my blood pressure to jump -
almost up to "normal" - but after taking a
few deep breaths, and trying again it was
low enough to record. My pulse Oximeter
said my blood oxygenation was 99%, and so
I conclude my lungs are still working
well. (It would have been interesting to
see what sort of reading I would have got
if I had taken the meter up to the top of
Blythe Hill with me).
I really don't know what I am going
to do today. I am thinking of giving
walking a rest, or at least to be less
ambitious. I might do some shopping
instead. One thing I am thinking of is to
go to Poundstretcher to see if I can find
a watering can for the garden. I could
also get some bleach, and cans of sugar
free soft drinks while I am in there. I
could also take a short walk in the park
while I am in the vicinity. In the
meantime I feel like going back to bed !
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