Once again, yesterday started very wet, but
from mid morning to early afternoon it was
frequently bright and sunny. Later in the
afternoon it got very dull again, but I don't
really recall any rain falling. The day started
very cool, and it didn't really warm up beyond
about 14° C.
The headline feature this
morning is how cold it is. The forecast
predicts 8° C, and one of my thermometers said
7.7° C. At this rate it feels it won't be too
long before we get the first frost. The good
news is that this morning is bright and sunny.
It will start to cloud over around midday, and
by 2pm it could be very dull. Actually the
forecast has just been updates, and now brings
these times forward by an hour. There is
just a very small chance of rain late in the
afternoon. The afternoon temperature will
probably be no higher than 12° C. Tomorrow
will only see various shades of grey, but the
temperature may rise to 15° C.
I definitely didn't feel keen to go for
a walk yesterday, but I also definitely wanted
to see what had been done to "The Bridge Of
Doom" in the Linear Park. I thought I would
just do a short walk to see the bridge, and
then come home again. I didn't even bother to
put on my proper boots when I went out. I just
wore a pair of cheap and cheerful trainers.
For this walk I put a coat on - the
first time I have worn a coat since late
spring (or maybe earlier). It felt very chilly
out, and a strong wind made it feel more
chilly still. I started out with my coat done
up, but even before I got to the bridge I was
starting to feel warm under the coat.
As can be seen in the map to the left,
my walk was a bit longer than just to the
bridge and back. Once I started walking it
felt fine to walk a full 3 miles. After I got
to the halfway point, and turned around, the
sun was on my back. My black, leather look,
jacket absorbed the heat from the sun, and I
started to feel quite hot under that jacket.
My face still felt chilled, but my arms were
starting to sweat.
I took quite a few pictures on this
walk, mostly of the bridge, but I think there
were other snaps I took. I haven't "processed"
them yet, and I can't recall what else I
snapped apart from the bridge. I'll try and
process those pictures today, and I'll
probably show a few tomorrow. What I did do,
and I have processed it, was to shoot some
very wobbly video. I should have used one of
my spare mobile phones clamped into my servo
controlled steady cam unit for nice stable
video, but I didn't.
My walk over the bridge, and near
it. There are some new info boards
on the bridge with a link to a web
site. I tried that link yesterday,
but it seemed like the web site was
still mostly empty. I have some
close ups of the QR codes, and I may
check them using a mobile phone to
see if they point to a different web
address.
Once upon a time a three
mile walk would tax me a lot, and leave me
feeling tired for much of the afternoon.
Thanks to relentless practice, and pushing my
walks up to as much as 6 miles on a few rare
occasions, and more typically around 4 miles,
I didn't feel totally knackered when I got
home. One of the things I did straight after
getting home was to select some more tomatoes
to ripen indoors. This does seem to be
working.
The top picture
shows the first lot I put behind my
bedroom window to ripen in what ever sun
there was. The picture was taken about
yesterday afternoon when they had been
there for about 24 hours. Quite a few are
turning red. The second picture is of the
second lot. As can be seen, one tomato was
almost already ripe. Quite why just one on
the same vine should ripen ahead of the
others is a mystery to me. I've just
checked, and three tomatoes were ripe
enough to come off the vine by the
lightest of pulls.
My afternoon project was to check a
few old computer bits. I had a motherboard
I wanted to check to see if it was usable.
It needs a capacitor changed because it is
starting to bulge, but otherwise it seems
to be OK. It has a 3GHz Pentium 4
processor on it. In this day and age it is
not very fast, but should still be very
usable. Unfortunately I don't think it can
compete with the AMD processor in my
current PC. There is also a problem with
this motherboard with regard to memory. It
has only two memory slots, and the most
amount of RAM I can slot in only adds up
to 1GB. Some modern web sites could use
most of that by themselves (because they
are so crappily written).
The other thing I checked was an
old Compaq desktop machine. I have no idea
where it came from, but it looks as if at
some point I had taken the motherboard
out, and then just left it loose inside
the case. The motherboard is a
comparatively modern design. It has ports
for up to 6 SATA drives, and 4 memory card
slots. I have memory sticks to load it up
to 8GB. Unfortunately I don't know what
the processor is because it won't start
up. There is nothing obviously wrong with
it, and it looks like I will probably have
to scrap it. The case, and other hardware
may still be useful though.
"Playing" with computers can be
very time consuming - particularly when
not having a simple goal, and just being
curious. I didn't really do anything else
all afternoon, and partly into the
evening. It is why I never got around to
"processing" the pictures I took
yesterday. It was also almost consuming
enough to distract me from food, although
before I started I did have two cans of
tomato soup.
My dinner was a curious affair. I
had two cans of stuffed vine leaves. One
was a fair bit after it's use by date. I
decided I would open it and see how it
looked (and smelled) It looked fine except
for congealed fat - mostly because it had
been stored upside down, and the fat that
usually sinks to the bottom was at the
top. One can seemed a bit insubstantial
for dinner when eaten on it's own. I added
the second tin, and so my entire dinner
was just vine leaves wrapped around rice.
I can't say it was particularly nice, but
it wasn't nasty in any way.
I followed the vine leaves up with
some rice crackers and cheese. A few hours
later I went to bed. As usual I read in
bed before going to sleep (or trying to).
Last night was slightly different. I was
getting near the end of the book, and kept
on reading until I had finished the book.
That meant that I didn't get to sleep
until just after 11pm. I seemed to sleep
OK last night. I think I can remember
being awake for maybe 20 minutes in the
early hours of the morning, but it is such
a vague memory that it could easily have
been a dream.
This morning I feel about normal -
the new normal - a selection of mild aches
and stiffness ! My blood glucose is up to
8.2mmol/l this morning. That is a bit
high, but still basically OK provided it
is a bit lower tomorrow. My weight is more
bothersome. I have yet to properly go to
the toilet, but if I had my weight would
look very slightly better. As it stands it
is like I have put on another couple of
hundred grams. Until I finally force on a
face mask, and go shopping, this is going
to be a regular occurrence as my choice of
food gets less and less as I use up the
last of my stock.
I don't know what I shall be doing
today. A walk would be good for me, but it
is too cold now, and by the time it is
slightly more tolerable it will most
likely be very grey and miserable outside.
I am inclined to do more work at home. I
do have a little bit of laundry to do, but
I'll have to dry it indoors. That could be
an excuse to use a heater - I'll be a bit
warmer, but the electricity will start to
rise.
There are two other things that I
may do. One is the strim the lawn. It is
getting very thick and lush after the
recent rains, and probably need to be
brought under control. The other thing is
to play with computer stuff a bit more. If
I can clear a few inches of workspace in
my old workshop, I should be able to
change the bulging capacitor on the
motherboard that otherwise seems OK. I
could then build that in a spare
computer.....for, errr, something or
another. Maybe it would be good enough to
keep me "on the air" while I overhaul my
current computer.
1
