It has been very dull, but is now a bit brighter. This is in line with the early forecast of dark cloud until 9am, and then light cloud. This morning has started off very chilly, and the best we can hope for is maybe a brief peak of 11° C this afternoon. Maybe that won't happen because it looks like it was based upon sunshine from 3pm, but the latest revision to the forecast now shows just sunny spells, or maybe even sunny intervals, for this afternoon. In broad terms, the forecast for tomorrow looks very similar to today.

  My right knee definitely showed an improvement yesterday. It was still a bit stiff from time to time, but it was rarely painful. In fact the only time I can remember it being painful was just for a brief moment as I stood up after sitting at my PC for long periods (where long could be as little as half an hour, but often more). It seemed wise to rest my leg a bit more, but there was less opportunity for it yesterday.

  I guess nothing really happened until the afternoon. That is when I did some minimal preparations for the beer drinking session - clearing a few items off the dining room table, and polishing a few glasses. It must have been around 2pm when I had a chat with my neighbour Michael from round the corner. He very kindly bought me some bottles of Diet Coke while he was shopping in Tesco, and we chatted in the road for 15 or so minutes when he delivered the bottles to me. He also gave me a bottle of beer.
  These are a few of the beers we were going to drink yesterday afternoon. I think that in the end it was only the beer on the left, the Postman's Knock, rich ruby porter, that we drank. We drank several others not pictured here. The beer Michael gave me was the Tring "Side Pocket". He gave it to me as the result of a misunderstanding. He thought he was giving it to me as an exchange for a beer I left on his front doorstep, but I didn't leave him one there. It must have been his next door neighbour on this occasion.

  The beer drinking session ended with a few whiskies. I had two identical gift packs (probably from after Xmas supermarket sales) of whiskies from a small brewery in Scotland (allegedly). The whisky in each 5ml bottle was matured in a different type of cask. One was in rum casks, another in bourbon casks, and the third in sherry casks. There were small differences in taste, and I think the whisky matured in rum casks was very slightly nicer, but to be honest there was very little in it.

  It was no later than halfway through the boozing session when I decided that I fancied a takeaway for dinner. The basic idea was that I would order some shish kebabs because by not eating the pitta bread they are just grilled meat with salad. As a result they are low calorie, and very low sugar content. There was one flaw in my plan, and it came about because somehow we had talked about saveloys.

  Before Jodie became vegetarian she used to like saveloys. I liked them too, and I guess I still do, although I am sure they taste different to how they did many years ago. When I came to order my shish kebabs I still had saveloys echoing around in my mind, and because the place I was ordering from was also a chip shop, I ordered a saveloy as well. Somehow I "accidently" ordered a portion of chips with it too !

  When it all arrived I started on the saveloy and chips. It was nice, and satisfied my need, but as tends to be usual now, the portion of chips was huge ! I only ate half or less of them last night. I then ate a chicken shish kebab. Previous stuff bought from the shop was good, or so I seem to remember, but last night's chicken shish was not as good. It seemed to be a bit smaller, and the salad was not as good as usual. I suspect that the usual chef was not working last night, and it was done by an amateur.

  I was quite keen to go to bed last night, but I didn't seem to feel very tired when I did go to bed, and I didn't seem to feel drunk at all. One reason for going to bed early was because I am really enjoying the book I am reading, and I wanted to read another short chapter or two before going to bed. I'm not sure when I put the book down, but I know it took some time before I fell asleep.

  One good thing about most of last night is that my right knee gave very little trouble. It was easy to find a semi comfortable position, but I had to be careful not to twist or bend it too much when wriggling into that comfortable position. If anything it was my chest that was complaining more last night - albeit only in short  occasional spasms of pain. As usual, when I say chest I really mean my rib cage - at least I think I do.

  Unlike my more usual rib/chest pains I have developed a new one recently. If I reach out, maybe just to pick up a glass, for instance, from the side of my bed using my right arm, I get a brief burning pain on the top left of my rib cage ( a little below the collar bone). That happened a few time during the night, but prior to last night I have invoked that brief pain by doing as little as grabbing the toothpaste tube from the shelf.

  While my knee gave little trouble, I still didn't sleep well again. I think that it was around midnight, and I might have been asleep for 2 hours, when I woke up feeling cold. The outside temperature had dropped a lot lower than recent nights, and I needed to turn the heating up to compensate. I then seemed to struggle through the rest of the night feeling too hot or a bit cold. For all the lack of sleep, real or imagined, I seemed to wake up just before dawn as if it was time to get up. It took some effort to go back to sleep for another hour and a bit.

  I think at least 80% of the blame can be laid before the chips I ate. My blood glucose level had shot up into the danger zone, 10.3mmol/l. It made my breakfast absolutely insane - the other half of the portion of chips ! I'm not sure if I have the courage to check it tomorrow morning. I feel relatively OK physically, but I feel quite depressed this morning. The only positive thing I can say is that I can identify most, if not all the varied reasons for my depression.

  The day starting off cold and dull is a good enough reason to feel depressed at any time. Obviously my ever increasing blood glucose level is not good, and the remedy, more fasting and exercise, is not terribly inspiring. My knee is a bother too. One of my few pleasures these days is walking, but if my knee is going to fail on me that won't be possible. What may be the final piece of the jigsaw is that I believe that Angela now does most of her work at home. I'm surprised it has taken this long to sort that out because she mostly works on a computer, and as such could do her work anywhere with an internet connection. The result of working from home is that she will not be going to the pub at lunchtimes - once the pubs re-open. I was hoping to start meeting her again at lunchtimes, but it now feels like I will never see her again.

  Today I am starting the day in a semi lazy way, but I have put 3 t-shirts, and some underwear to soak in detergent, and I will finish washing them soon. I really ought to go out for a walk this afternoon when it is supposed to be sunny, or really just sunny spells, but it is not going to be very warm. In fact it is going to be a very awkward temperature - too cool without a coat when the sun is in, and boiling hot in a coat when the sun is out ! I'm not sure I will be going out at this rate, and I have no idea what else I might do - apart from burying my face in my book until I reach the end of it.