This morning's forecast has already been revised to show that it is a sunny morning, but there are still lots of clouds in the sky. It seems that today may well end up as a slightly cooler version of yesterday. Both the original (above) and the latest revision agree that it will be no more than 21° C. Both also agree that rain will start at 11am, and continue until 6pm. Some of that rain may be heavy, and once again thunderstorms are predicted. This time for 11am and midday, but most thunderstorm prediction have come to nothing here. (Some places, like along the Kent coast) have definitely had some. Once the rain finishes, assuming it starts, there could be some sunny spells until sunset. Current predictions for tomorrow say that it will be similar to today.

  Yesterday morning I had high hopes that I might suddenly decide to go out for a walk. I felt I should do, but I didn't feel in the right mood for it. It's hard to say why I felt like that. The weather was OK, and I felt reasonably OK, but maybe I was bored going over the same routes, and I couldn't think of somewhere new to explore. In the end it got later and later, and the inspiration never arrived so I stayed at home.

  I wasn't that idle though. In fact I was quite busy for a while. I hand washed a few item, and I cleared a small backlog of washing up left soaking in the sink. I did those jobs one after another, and then went straight on to do some gardening. Like usually happens, I spend longer, and did more, then I thought I would, or even intended to do. I started of just dead heading some flowers. I think I am getting the hang of this now because the Campanulas continue to produce new flowers every time I dead head them. I hope the seed heads I am saving have ripened enough to contain viable seeds.

  Next up was quite a bit of weeding. I seem to be getting the weeds under control now, but I should be more vigilant and pull them up more frequently. My theory is that if I pull them up before they have flowered the amount of seeds in the ground will gradually diminish because they are not being renewed. I think it is working, but maybe I'll have to wait until next year to see if I have the problem under control.

  One job I have been meaning to do for a while, and which I did yesterday, was to use a fork to prick the bald patches of the lawn, and put down more seed. The seed packet claims that within 14 days I will be rewarded with lush green grass. I didn't believe that initially because I had seeded hard ground, and until the last week or two the ground was very hard, and very dry. Since getting my hose, and watering the lawn, I did note the last lot of seed did grow in that 14 days. As I was preparing the ground, and sowing the seed, it didn't look like it would rain, and so I got the hose out. An hour or so later it did rain, and the garden got a double watering.

  My final job was to dig up my potato plants. The tops were very yellow, and it was time to harvest my little crop. I got quite a useful haul. It is a shame that I prefer not to consume concentrated carbohydrates, but they will still be very useful during this time when I am not doing any shopping (except online). There were a few small potatoes that were partly green because they had been exposed to the sun. I decided to replant them in the hope that there is enough time to grow another crops before winter sets in.
   When I finally came in it felt like I had done a reasonable amount of labour for the day, and I could get back to reading and relaxing. I couldn't fully relax because I had cooking to do. I did take a few minutes before I went in the garden to start cooking a Fray Bentos steak and kidney pie for lunch. It was a slightly extravagant thing to do calorie wise, but I was expecting to enjoy it so much that it wouldn't matter. I was wrong. I have had a few of these pies in the last few years, and I think every one has failed to equal my childhood memories of the. The pie I had yesterday seemed only to have two pea sized bits of kidney in it, and I don't think there was a solid piece of beef in it - just a sort of brown gooey gravy.

  If my dinner was a big disappointment I will be disappointed about 5 times in the future because that is how many pies I have in stock at the moment. Dinner was not disappointing. It was a special concoction of diced, precooked bacon in a tin of tomatoes, and half a can of sweetcorn. I gave the mix a good microwaving to partly breakdown the tomatoes. The long period of microwaving helped dry out the tomato juice that the tomatoes come in. That meal would not win any awards, but I thought it was delicious, and could only be improved by using beans instead of sweetcorn.

  With hot food inside of me, and the weather a few degrees warmer, I had my bedroom window open for most of the afternoon, and into early afternoon, but I decided against sleeping with it open. That turned out to be a good idea because after a fair sleep it was rather cool this morning. It is not so bad this morning, but last night I could definitely feel my gardening muscles complaining. I am unsure what special muscles are involved in gardening, but evidently I don't use them enough at other times. They weren't painful as such unless I made certain movements last night.

  This morning I can feel those muscles simmering under the surface, but they are basically comfortable. Perhaps the worst bit of me is my right knee. It is so easy to get sore just by sitting still at my PC. I'm not sure if it is actually the knee joint because the pain is at the back of the leg, and sometimes seems to be the lower half of the back thigh muscles. Whatever it is, I need to get up and stretch it a few times before I continue reading or writing on my PC.

  This morning my main indicators are still all in the green. My blood pressure is a few points higher than most mornings, but it is still well under target without any effort. What I found most surprising is that after a day of eating rather well, and almost without any care, my blood glucose is just 8.0mmol/l. It is higher than my personal target, but lower then expected. Even my weight seems OK this morning. It may be up 100gms or so, but the whole kilograms stays the same number.

  With the sun still shining through a cloudy sky I feel like I want to go out, but there are still all those clouds in the sky. The idea that it could start to rain, and rain heavily, at 11am doesn't seem that far fetched at the moment. I might (but probably wouldn't) put up with a walk in light rain, but I am rather less keen in heavy rain. Having said that, a walk in a thunderstorm could be briefly exhilarating. The chances are that I will be staying in again. At least it give my feet another day to recover from some of the pounding they have had recently.