Today is going to be dull, although the latest revision to the forecast now says there could be a few sunny spells just before sunset. It is going to take until about 4pm for the temperature to peak at no more than 10° C. It doesn't look it, but apparently it will probably be dry today. Tomorrow is predicted to feature lighter cloud, but as yes no sunshine has appeared in the predictions for tomorrow, but it could still reach 11° C by early afternoon.

   About the only thing of note that I did yesterday morning was to finish the laundry that I had started the day before, and abandoned. There were quite a few items in this wash, and I took a break halfway through. I guess it is a reflection of more poor condition that I took that break. On the other hand it was less that I was exhausted, and more that I thought I might be. With hindsight I think I could easily have gritted my teeth, and done it in one go. Maybe the fact that I had plenty of time, and no need to rush, contributed to doing it in two stages.

  The main thing in the afternoon was Sue coming over to have her VHS tape digitised. I had suggested that 1pm might be a good time to get here, but she was almost 2 hours late, and had to resort to getting a cab here. I think she said it cost her £16, and that is considerably cheaper than when I once went to her place by cab 3 or 4 years ago. I might have been charged a lot more because I think it was on a bank holiday.

  When Sue finally arrived I took her tape, and did the transfer. She had suggested that there were only 4 or 5 songs on it, but the whole thing was 90 minutes long ! It was a camcorder recording of the band Warehouse recorded in the late lamented Rutland Tavern on Perry Hill. I have to say that it was a pretty fair recording. The auto white balance hadn't been set, and the picture looked very "warm", but the focus was generally good, and the sound was quite good. The band themselves were a typical pub band. They played a whole string of covers, and did it quite competently.

  Sue really liked them, but I suspect that was only because they were one of the first bands she saw playing there, and it is like always cherishing your first kiss. In my jaded view they seemed unremarkable, but I would be happy to watch them, or I should say I would have been quite happy to watch them. The don't exist any more.

  A decently set up codec could have easily have fitted the full 90 minutes on one DVD, but the quick and simple encoder that is part of the software for the video capture box is evidently set up internally to be just fast. It was indeed fast, but the quality of the DVD was very dubious. I had to burn 2 DVDs because it could not fit on one disk. Sue didn't see my brief check using my own DVD player and 40" TV, but I think she will be happy with it.

  I still have the "master" digital files that I will work on as a project sometime - maybe even today.  My intention is to break the recording down to individual songs, and then select what seem to be the best, and discard the rest. I also hope to improve the video quality a bit. The colour temperature definitely needs altering to give more natural colour faces, and a little light sharpening make help. I can then assemble the songs as separate named chapters on just one DVD. I will use better quality codec to do the conversion to DVD compatible files. It will be slower, but the results shouldn't show any degradation of the picture compared to the original tape.

  Sue was here for quite a long time. I entertained her with some of my own video recordings as she babbled away. Like most of us she has had little human contact over the last year, although I think she has had more than I have had. She took advantage to say lots of things she hadn't had any opportunity to say to anyone face to face for ages. Fortunately she was obviously happy, and so I didn't get to hear too many things that were depressing. Like Jodie she managed to get ready too late to get the intended train, and so stayed a bit longer.

  It was actually good that she missed that train, and then left with plenty of time to get the next, because she seemed to get lost. She followed my instruction up to the point when she was supposed to go over the railway bridge. She didn't, and ended up initially on Catford Bridge station wondering why the trains were going to Hayes. Fortunately she phones me and I was able to direct her to Catford station, where she still had a 10 minute wait for the Sevenoaks train which shoe would have got as far as St Mary Cray.

  I had my dinner rather late last night, and that after eating nothing since about lunchtime when I had a light lunch. Maybe it was good that I consumed the last of my cans of Guinness during the afternoon. I think I got through about 6 cans - which I would guess would be equivalent to about four and a half pints. I need to buy more Guinness soon ! My dinner was no more than some Cumberland sausages. I even found some TV to watch while eating dinner.

  I think I watched about an episode and a half of QI, but after that I headed to bed. I read for a while before turning the light out and trying for sleep. It was one of those nights where I seemed to be awake trying to get to sleep, and sleep apparently not coming, except huge chunks of time seemed to pass without me realising it. It was sometime between 3 and 4am when I last was laying in bed feeling sort of uncomfortable, and believing I would never fall asleep. It felt like I had merely blinked once and it was full daylight outside.

  It was almost 7am, and roughly an hour later than I have usually been getting up lately. I guess that is fair because I probably went to sleep an hour later than usual. I guess it was the sunshine yesterday, even though I didn't go out in it, that is responsible for my usual aches and pains to be quite light this morning. That gives me more scope to worry about another pain - possible toothache. I hope it is just another occasion when I have been a bit careless trying to did a bit of food out from between two teeth, and  I have damaged the gum. It does seem to have been going on a bit long for that, but I live in hope. It is not an agonising toothache, and more like an occasional intrusive tingle.

  The best news is that my blood glucose level has fallen to 8.8mmol/l from 9.1mmol/l. That is not a very big drop at all, but it is a change in the right direction. The bad news is that I sort of feel as blue as the sky isn't today. That is probably an exaggeration. I don't feel deeply depressed, but just lightly. The grey sky does nothing to draw me outside, and there is not a lot to do inside....well actually there is if I am in the right sort of mood to do it. There is Sue's video to work on, but I am not sure if I feel particularly creative at the moment.

  I could, and possibly will, spend a fair amount of time reading, or more correctly, re-reading "Mars" by Ben Bova. It is part of a trilogy of fairly big books. Reading all three again will soak up a fair bit of time. We might even have another spring day by the time I finish all three ! A more immediate thing to do is to take out all the empty cans and bottles from recent boozing sessions, and put them in the green wheelie bin. At the moment many have escaped from the bin in the kitchen, and are laying on the kitchen floor. I ought to tip the waste food collection in the garden waste/compost bin as well because it is starting to pong !