My garden thermometer said it was a whole 0.9° C warmer less cold than the forecast temperature. Either figure says bloody cold ! The forecast has changed a bit since I took the screenshot above. The main change concerns whether it is fog, mist, or neither. By my reckoning it has been misty from first light, and continues to be misty. I don't reckon it is thick enough to be called fog. The visibility is still around a quarter of a mile or more. One thing seems certain - it is going to be a very cold day. The maximum temperature may be no more than 4° C today - unless, like yesterday, the sun burns through the clouds. As usual when it is so cloudy, assuming it stays that way, there is a small chance of rain at any time until 9pm when it seems it will rain (although with just a 50% chance it may well stay dry). Tomorrow may see some sunny spells, and it should be a whole degree warmer !
   I'm not sure how to describe yesterday. I guess I would have to say that it wasn't bad for a Sunday. The sun coming out made it a happier time even if I made no use of the sunshine beyond luxuriating in it's warmth as it shone through my bedroom windows, and onto my bed where I was either reading or snoozing. I think it was generally reading, and I am not sure if I recall having a snooze or not.

  I was semi productive yesterday, although to say that I would have to take into account that some of that productivity was a waste of time and/or effort. I am really referring to my ongoing project to turn my mini PC into a new web server. In one respect I have managed that several times. It serves web pages beautifully, but I am having a great deal of trouble getting the File Transfer Program server working, and most significantly, configured for use.

  I need that FTP server so I can write these web pages on my main PC, and then upload them, using the FTP server, to where they will be served by the web server. I had a theory as to why the program I have been using OK on other, older equipment, has worked fine, but won't work on that slightly more modern PC. My theory for yesterday was that it was not happy because I had installed a 64 bit operating system. Yesterday I installed a 32 bit version of Linux Mint.

  Everything was fine. The web server was serving a copy of all the web pages on my current server. The FTP server was running, but once again, when I tried to use the admin program to set up the FTP server it crashed like it has every bloody time. I now have a new theory as to why it has always worked in the past, but will not work now. It all hinges on an abomination  called "systemd". It is a new thing that has caused an outrage in the Linux world. It controls all aspects of the operating system, is a bastard to configure manually, and effectively puts all it's eggs into one basket - which goes against the original tenets of Linux.

  I did some research and found that systemd was introduced into Linux Mint after version 18. I was using version 18.3, and I guess that is after 18.0, and seems to have systemd in it. Today, if nothing else distracts me, I shall start all over again with version 18.1. This is still supported, like all the versions of 18, for at least a few weeks yet, but I think, or I hope, it does not install systemd. Maybe the admin program, not being mucked about with by systemd, will work OK. If not I will have to go back to version 17. That is most definitely working serving these very web pages from an old Toshiba laptop that I am hoping to replace by the mini pc.

  The definitely more productive work I did yesterday was to prepare and cook my dinner (plus some bits for today). I started out by roasting 6 well seasoned chicken thighs. Three of them I had for dinner, and the other three are chilled ready to be reheated for today. While the chicken was roasting I washed and  cut up a couple of big potatoes. I gave them a good boiling in the microwave before mashing them up with some olive oil (because I didn't have any butter). The final thing was to boil up a few sprouts.

  It was a very nice dinner. The mash was a little lumpy, and a bit dry because I didn't want to add too much olive oil, but it was still nice. I only ate about half the mash, and so tonight's dinner is going to be very similar to last night. I might have roast carrots instead of sprout though. It was not a huge dinner, and so I felt justified in having a tub of low sugar/calorie ice cream for dessert. It was all semi healthy, as was my lunch. It was a about 6 pieces of fruit. I think I definitely had my "5 a day".

  TV was not exciting last night, but I found a few things to watch, and they kept me lightly amused until bed time. As usual, I read in bed for a while before turning the light out. Until about 4am I seemed to sleep quite well, but from 4am it felt like I was awake most of the time. I probably wasn't, but it seemed to feel that way. That could have been where I had a very strange dream. That dream was almost like an advert. An unnamed cheese company had invented a cheese that used, or included human DNA. No explanation for this was shown, but the catchline was "wouldn't you like a nibble of your favourite actress ?". The implication was that they could include the DNA of someone on request. The cheese was supplied as a sort of bar rather than a block. The whole dream probably lasted about as long as a short advert - maybe 30 seconds long, and I think it was all done using graphics and still pictures.



 I think it was about 5.30am when I gave up trying to sleep. This was OK because I wanted to be up early for my now regular early Monday morning shopping trip to Aldi. I started by doing my usual morning routine, and the most important part of this routine was to check my blood glucose level because my whole day revolves around what reading I get.

  My blood glucose started high at the start of the month, and one day was very high. Since then it has slowly dropped. I knew most of what I had eaten was almost safe, but it seems it was actually very safe. Yesterday it was 7.4mmol/l, and I didn't expect it to be that low, but to my great surprise it was down to 7.0mmol/l. This is further proof that I really know nothing at all about regulating my blood glucose level,, and all these low readings are just flukes. There is another possibility. It is well known that blood glucose goes up during illness. It is possible some of the high readings at the start of the month were due to illness, although what it was is anyone's guess. I must admit there were some days when I did feel rough, but not in any way that would suggest any particular illness beyond autumnitus !

  I left to go shopping at about 7.55am, and that was my first chance to evaluate the mist or fog without having to look through windows (most of which need an external clean). I took the picture on the left on my way to Aldi. The mist was enough to make the trees at the end of the road very blurry, but then the whole picture looks a bit blurry. I think there may have been some condensation on the lens after it was taken out of my warm and humid trouser pocket into the cold air.



  Aldi had only been open for about 5 minutes when I got there, but it did seem to be busier than usual. There is always a small rush when it first opens, and I should really have got that at about 8.20am when the first in have started to disperse. However, I did get the impression that this morning may have seen the start of the Xmas stampeded that makes the shops unbearable nearer to xmas.

  I seemed to spend a bit more this week, but some of that can be blamed on an extra 9 pack of toilet paper to add to my Brexit stash, and a pack of 4 cans of dry hopped golden ale. I bought another bag of baking potatoes (and this time I didn't forget to buy some butter for them). Also I made sure there weren't any weird shaped, unbakeable (because they are impossible to clean without cutting them up) potatoes. It all added up to two heavy bags, and a heavy rucksack to stagger home with.

  Walking to Aldi in the cold air didn't feel that bad. I may have even felt that it felt good, but maybe only because it is only a short walk, and that I would soon be back in the warm. I don't think I would be happy walking in the park in this morning's weather, and the afternoon may be only very marginally better.  Walking home with the heavy shopping really warmed me up. It didn't help that I left my coat done up inside the store. By the time I got to the checkout I was starting to overheat. By the time I was home I was sweating, but if I had undone my coat I would have froze !

  I have to admit that having got the shopping out of the way I feel very uninspired. I can imagine catching up on the sleep that I imagine I missed by getting up, and out so early this morning. I guess that sooner or later I will have another go at that mini pc project. One quick and easy thing I can do almost immediately is to download Linux Mint 18.1 to try that in the hope that systemd has not been sneaked into it.