The forecast is subtly changing hour by hour, and the change is for the better. The latest update has the full sunshine finishing at 10am instead of 11am, but now shows sunny spells continuing right through to sunset with an hour of full sunshine at 4pm. The only problem with this forecast is that it should be sunny right now, and it is actually lightly overcast. It doesn't look to me that the sun will break through at any time. Depending on which direction I look I could imagine some drizzle rather than sunshine ! Of course the forecast has been revised once again, and now looks worse. There should now be sunny spells, but once again full sunshine for 10 and 11am. After that there may be a few short sunny spells before sunset. By 9pm it will probably be raining. The afternoon temperature prediction still remains at just 16° C for as little as one hour. Tomorrow may see the temperature rise to 18° C, but until mid afternoon it will probably be raining almost non stop.
 
   Yesterday's sunshine should have spurred me on to do greater things, but the rot probably set in with the early morning grey and rain. My day was very similar to the day before. My finest achievement was to do some more laundry. I only washed two main items. One was just a t-shirt, and the other was a pair of "lounge pants", but there were minor items - many of them In the bottom of the wash bag was many pairs of socks. Many of them dating back to the time when I was trying different types or brands, or styles of socks to find the most comfortable to wear with my walking boots.

  I guess there were about three styles of sock, and maybe 4 pairs of each. I think each pair had only been worn once or twice, and in retrospect that may have been a mistake. It may be purely my imagination but I now think that socks can be "worn in" just like shoes/boots. Had I persevered, some of those socks would have been more comfortable after a couple of long walks. I have no idea how this can happen, but I am pretty sure some of the "rejected" socks are from the same packs as socks that I currently find comfortable.

  Anyway, socks are fiddly things to hand wash, and washing 24 individual socks in one batch tries my patience. Each one has to be washed inside and out, although once washed the socks remained as they were for rinsing and fabric conditioner. I was quite happy after I had finally hung them up to dry (indoors).

  The only other thing of note that I did was to spend more time experimenting on the songs from the CD that Michael lent me. They feature his son on guitar playing in The Railway in Bromley. Like most pub bands there was no proper mixing, and the recording was probably done on a Walkman with an external microphone. As usual with a pub band, much of the music is drowned by the drummer's hi-hats. There is also a sort of boominess to the sound as it bounces around the pub. On top of that, some of the louder bits are slightly over-recorded.

   I think any improvement I could make, made something else worse. What was starting to sound better when listening on headphones, which have a better frequency response than the small PC speakers I am using, sounded worse when played through the speakers. Ultimately I doubt I can perform any miracles to the sound, and any improvement I can make is going to be very minor. Perhaps one of the most useful things in this exercise is noting the full title of 4 out of 5 of the songs on the CD - the titles are just scribbled on the recordable CD with marker pen in abbreviated form.

  As dinner time approached I was torn between trying to invent some recipe, using stuff I have in the fridge and cupboard to rival the delicious corned beef hash I made the day before, and ordering something exciting on line. In the end I opted for an online order, and of course it had to be kebabs - except it wasn't just the usual shish kebabs. I was feeling rebellious (or something) and I ordered a "doner meat with chips". Previous experience showed that just this single meal can be quite filling, and provided I had not eaten too much before hand, it wouldn't inflict any great damage to my weight and blood glucose.

  The size of my order was specifically to qualify for a 20% discount, It also included tow shish kebabs, and one more "naughty" item grilled chicken wings with chips. I would have ordered them without chips, but that didn't seem to be an option. Even if it had it would probably have been ignored. Both shish kebabs came with pitta bread despite specifying no pitta bread. Fortunately the pitta bread was supplied separately from the kebabs, and dry. I put it in the freezer for possible use another day.

  I was in the right mood for several very large glasses of whisky last night. I think my lack of activity was making me feel something that is less than miserable, but far from happy. The only whisky I had open was whisky I don't really like, and I didn't want to open my last bottle of Haig. What I did have was an opened bottle of Bison Grass Vodka with enough left in it for a couple of small glasses (maybe about the size of a pub treble). This vodka has a strange taste that is not that nice, but not horrible, and best described as "interesting" (in inverted commas !). I suspect it is best drunk when near freezing, but I sort of enjoyed my two glasses.

  Those two glasses did nothing to help me get to sleep. Maybe I didn't drink them close enough to bedtime. I must have laid in bed for over an hour not feeling very tired, but eventually I fell asleep, and that was probably well after 11pm. I then slept until gone 3am - somewhat later than the first time I usually wake up in the night. After a wee I had great difficulty getting to sleep. Actually I think the problem was staying asleep. There were hints that I had drifted off to sleep for 10 minutes or more during the couple of hours that I thought I was awake.

 In the last couple of hours of sleep I had one of those peculiar dreams that was a strange distortion of reality. I dreamed I was back in the old Telecommunications school near Old Street tube station. It was the last day of a course, and I couldn't even really remember what the course was about, let alone any detail from it. This didn't matter because like a real life course I once did, I was doing it knowing that I was about to take voluntary redundancy.  One of the rituals at the end of these courses is handing in our locker keys. In the dream it was just done informally by leaving them in the locks of the lockers. I found that somehow I had three keys for three very small lockers. It was very close to home time when I realised I had no shirt or coat on. When I left I checked the cloakroom in case they were in there, but there was nothing to see. My last thoughts were of thinking it was going to be strange going down the Northern Line to London Bridge topless !

  This morning my blood glucose was a bit higher, but still under 8.0 - just ! It was 7.9mmol/l - not great, but still quite acceptable. I hadn't been to the toilet when I weighed myself, and it seemed I had gained 100gm, but a decent deposit in the toilet - even just a wee - would reduce that 100gm to zero, and might have even turned a small gain into a small loss. I will have plenty of opportunity to turn a small loss into a big gain today !

  In some ways it doesn't matter too much how I feel today because I can't even think about going out until the start of the afternoon, and by then I have usually settled into the wrong groove. As it happens, I don't really feel any better or worse than most mornings. I must admit that I probably do feel like going for a long(ish) walk today provided there is some sunshine this afternoon, but my first priority is to keep a close watch on my front door bell.

  I was expecting two deliveries today, but one has just turned up earlier than expected (but only 10 minutes earlier than the 1 hour slot I was expecting it in). The delivery that is now here is of my latest beer supplies. I now have 36 bottles of beer - some from New Zealand, and the rest from South Africa. As well as beer I also ordered some South African style meat snacks - flavoured dry meats.  They are actually made in the UK ! I guess I got them at wholesale prices because although they seem expensive at first. They are each about twice the price for 4 to 5 times the amount of the little bags that Tesco, etc, sell. In other words, half, or less than the price sold in the local shops.

  My second delivery is due between 12.32 and 13.32 today, and based on past experience that will mean 1pm.  The second deliver is from Star Bargains, and includes quite a few big bottles of soft drinks, some snacks, some pot noodles, and some kitchen paper (something I am currently using sparingly as the last roll is coming to an end). If I recall correctly there will be about 16kg of soft drinks - that is going to make for a very heavy box !

  Once that second delivery has arrived I will consider what to do next. I may have a pot noodle of lunch, or I may decide to go for a walk. A lot depends on exactly what the weather is doing at the time.  strong sunshine could lure me out provided it can keep shining from the moment I start to get ready until I am at least a few hundred yards from home. If it looks dull I will almost certainly stay in !