I must admit that I feel a bit vague as to what "mist" describes. It is easy to say it is less than fog, but then again it could be described as thin fog. It is where it starts from that I find hard to describe. Is it slightly hazy, or is it misty ? Judging by how far I can see this morning I would say it is a bit hazy rather than misty, but who am I to question these things ? One this is for sure, it wasn't quite as cold this morning. "Not quite" still gives plenty of leeway for when, like this morning, it is still bloody cold. Just because it is several degrees above frost doesn't make it any less cold feeling.

  The latest revision to the forecast says that the heavy cloud (hiding above the mist at the moment) will disperse at 10am, and hour earlier than in the screenshot above. After that there will be full on sunshine until sunset (maybe), but the best the forecast now offers is maybe one hour at 10° C, but more generally a chilly 9° C. Tomorrow may well be identical to today except for the mist. This is all in accordance of the gospel of The Met Office. If you are a fan of the BBC substitute a mix of medium to heavy clouds for sunshine. As I look out the window the BBC forecast currently seems more likely.

  Yesterday did not start well. Although my body seemed in good enough working order to get through the day, I felt very pissed off. Some would call it depression, but pissed off sounds a better, more earthy description. There were many reasons for it, but one, something I saw on one of the social media platforms of the internet, was a strong trigger. Prior to all that I was a bit peeved that my rotten guts the morning before meant I missed a walk in some nice sunshine.

  There was more sunshine yesterday, but I knew I would be missing out on that too. I had a choice for yesterday, but the selection of that choice was really made externally, and not by me. I had already agreed that Jodie could come over for a boozing session yesterday instead of today, and that was good and bad. It was bad in so much as I would miss another walk in sunshine, but because I was pissed off I was also looking forward to lots of strong beer (and worse). It was a bit of a paradox that the cure....no not the cure, but the mental anaesthesia was also the cause.

  Fortunately there was another outside influence that would act as a tie breaker. I was unexpectedly waiting for a delivery by Amazon that I was originally expecting today. I was pretty sure that it would not arrive until well past any time I might have been out if I had gone out for a walk, but you never quite know until it arrives. The last update I saw gave an estimate of delivery between 4.15pm and 6.15pm. It actually arrived at a fairly convenient time of about 7.20pm.
  Apart from one other item, my delivery was of two more aniseed based booze. I haven't had Pernod for decades. I used to like it a lot on moderate quantities, but then I discovered Ouzo. To be honest there is not a great deal of difference between the two, particularly when diluted with something like lemonade, but somehow Ouzo seemed more exotic - a feeling enhanced by the fact that few places stocked it. It seemed to be even rarer in pubs. I have now added these two bottles to my collection to stand with the Absinthe, and the half empty bottle of Pythagoras Ouzo. I can foresee there bottles remaining almost untouched until summer when they will go well with ice cold diet lemonade on the hot summer days.

  Most of the beers that Jodie was contributing to our boozing session were already here after she left them here on Thursday. There was one I was very suspicious of. It contained Zuzu* - a Japanese citrus fruit - and the last beer with that in was revolting, but yesterday's was quite nice. I think I could quite happily have drunk a full pint of it instead of the quarter of a pint after a small can was shared between the two of us.

* Wikipedia seems to think the spelling is Yozu, but most places on the internet recognise Zuzu as the usual spelling.

  A few of the beers we drank were 10% - very strong ! - but once again we were having half a can, or bottle, each. We still had enough to get a little drunk, but we both had a few extras along the way. It started when I poured myself half a shot glass - probably as little as half a standard pub measure - of Pernod and of Ouzo. Well, I had to check them to make sure they were OK ! Jodie doesn't like Aniseed, and so she didn't have any.

  Somehow that lead us on to doing a taste comparison between other bottle of booze. I had two bottles of blue Curaçao, and two bottles of Limoncello. In both cases one was quite old, and the other a lot less so.  The blue Curacao stood the test of time. The very old bottle of De Kuyper Curacao actually tasted a little better than the Aldi own brand version bought only a few years ago. The oldest bottle of Limoncello had gone off despite being maybe only 6 to 8 years old. The more recent bottle tasted lovely. One problem (for me) is these drinks have a lot of sugar in them, and I had to restrict myself to less than a full shot glass of each.

  By the end of the session, just before 6pm, I was feeling nicely drunk, and I was no longer feeling pissed off. At that point I had not prepared any dinner, but I did have an idea of what I might have. Apart from the liqueurs I had been very careful about what I ate in terms of sugar content. I intended to continue this trend, and my dinner was a rather strange dinner of spam on rice cakes (with a squirt of mayonnaise to make it less dry, and to help stick the spam to the rice cake). I couldn't recommend it as an everyday dinner, but it was sort of nice.

  Having eaten, and had a flick around the TV channels I was feeling a bit bored and a bit edgy. It was then that the booze overtook common sense, and I gorged on too many coconut rings, and ruined my sugar intake for the day. They were very nice though, and for a short period of time I was wallowing in a sort of luxury. It wasn't long after 8pm that I felt ready for some sleep. I brushed my teeth, and almost did it twice to get bits of coconut out from between my teeth. I then went to bed.

  I tried to read for a while, but that wasn't working, and so not much later than 8.30pm I turned over and tried to go to sleep. It didn't happen quickly, but I was just on the threshold of sleep when my bloody phone rang. I thought it was something important, and so I picked it up, but as soon as I saw it was Lee I put it down again and let it ring. He kept it ringing for a full 2 minutes. Maybe it was something important, but it was far, far more likely he was just bored again.

  I finally got to sleep sometime after 9pm, and I didn't sleep all that well. It was one of those nights where everything was wrong. I was either too hot or two cold. The mattress and pillow had lumps that were not there the previous night, and so on and so forth. I probably got 6 or 7hours of sleep in the night, and on a bright sunny day...and maybe a day without a hangover, that would be OK. I haven't got a painful hangover. In fact I am not sure how to describe it. It is just one of those hangovers that makes you feel tired and lethargic. It is like thinking is a major effort.

  On the whole, I don't feel good this morning, but only the other hand I don't feel bad. It is almost all in the head. Maybe if the promised sunshine ever arrives I will feel all excited and vital, but.... The very latest update to the forecast says that 11am (as it is right now) will no feature mist instead of sunshine, and that midday will only feature sunny spells. That will be followed by the promised sunshine...or will it ? I feel quite pessimistic about it at the moment.

  The only real negative physical thing this morning is the very predictable rise in my blood glucose. After being quite well controlled for a few days it has shot up to 9.3mmol/l again. I shall do my best to do something about it today, but I really don't feel in the right mood to at the martyr at the moment. Ideally I should fast until dinner time, but that isn't going to happen. Maybe I will have more span on rice cakes - I think they should be very safe. I put the entire blame on those very sweet coconut rings last night. I won't even put much blame on the small liqueurs I drank...just a ting bit of blame. Now it is time to see how the day works out, because I refuse to make any predictions now.