The forecast didn't get this morning quite right. It was somewhere between misty and foggy (a light fog ?) at 8am, but that has now lifted, and the sun is shining. The weather forecasters, having got this morning wrong, have over corrected, and now say this sunshine is only a sunny spell, but it does seem to be a very long sunny spell ! There is still a very thin layer of cloud at the moment, but it is so thin the blue sky can be seen behind it. There seems to be a strong possibility that today will be like one of the summer days we didn't get in summer ! It is even going to get very warm. 27° C is predicted. It doesn't stop there. Tomorrow may feature even stronger sunshine, and the temperature may briefly hit 28° C.

   It is surprising just how a couple of extra degrees, and some sunshine changes everything. Yesterday was a very satisfying day. It didn't end as well as I hoped, but my day was quite productive - very productive when compared to many of my average days in the last 3 or 4 weeks.

 I have to admit that when I try and picture what I did first I can't make up my mind whether it was going to Poundstretcher, or doing some laundry. I think it was probably going to Poundstretcher because doing laundry by hand can be a hot and sweaty business. I have been known to wash a few bits and pieces to warm myself on cold winter days.  My principle purchases from Poundstretcher were bird feed, but I also bought some seeds and some hanging baskets.

  I did quite a big load of washing. I think it was 4 t-shirts plus underwear. I got it on the line in time to give it the best exposure to the sun, but now we are officially in Autumn (at least I think we are) the sun is a lot lower in the sky, and it could be said the sun sweeps along the washing line, rather than rising up to it all at once. I needed a short rest to cool down from doing that laundry (another reason for thinking I definitely did it after going shopping). Actually it may not have been that short.....

  I was still enthused with the idea of doing more, and the hanging baskets and seed I bought meant it had to be in the garden. I might have spent a couple of hours out there. It is funny how a little bit of this, and a little bit of that, and almost none of them that dramatic, can add up to a lot. The first little job was to screw a couple of hooks into the fence for the hanging baskets. The second thing was to fill the hanging baskets with compost, and then plant seeds in them.
  I hope I have planted the seeds at the right time. They were a mix of mini tulips and crocuses. I may have overdone it because I really have no idea what they will come up like, but if I read the seed packets correctly they are spring flowers, and now was the time to plant them. Being on hooks I can easily bring them inside to protect against winter frosts. If they all grow it should be a colourful display next year. It feels like a long term plan is slowly being realised. I just hope a mother fox doesn't try and move in and wreck the garden again.
  This mass of string and vines is my attempt to try and bend my self seeded tomato plans to my will. Once again I really underestimated how big and unruly tomato vines can get. Until I put these strings up many of the stems were laying on the ground where they could be nibbled by anything, and if nothing else just rot because they were in the damp. I suspect that I should have pruned the vines back a bit to send the nutrients to the fruits instead of more and more leaves.
  I was surprised to see that I actually had a crop of tomatoes almost fully grown, and waiting to ripen. They are grown from baby tomatoes seeds, from tomatoes that had started to go rotten a few years ago, and the original were planted in pots. The foxes knocked over the pots, and trampled the vines. I wrote them off as a failed experiment, and thought no more about it until some months ago the first new plants started to grow. The old entrance to to the foxes earth is right behind them, and while I wouldn't wish a pregnant fox to be homeless, I really hope that the vixen has another home, and will leave my garden alone this year.

  It seems hard to believe I could have spent so much time "gardening" yesterday. Maybe it just seemed longer than it actually was, or maybe it was all the little, 2 minute jobs that added up. Even checking and watering my basil plants took a minute or two.
 I apologise if I showed this picture a few days ago (when it was taken), but the last few days have been sort of busy on here. These are my three basil plants grown from some supermarket bought bunches of Basil. They looked a bit limp, and didn't seem to be doing much when I planted them. At that point they had been in water, and had started sprouting roots. I think they spent the first week growing those roots more, but now the stems are straight, and new leaves are growing. It is slow progress, but this morning it is easy to see the extra growth sine I took this picture.

  "Watering the Basil" reminds me of one other thing I did that kept me in the garden a few more tens of minutes. I got the hose out and gave the tomato plants, and the flower (although mostly weeds) bed at the bottom of the garden a good watering. What I hope are giant sunflowers were looking a bit limp before I watered them. This morning they look good and firm, and may have even grown another 2 or 3 inches.

  Finally I could relax and do nothing, but I didn't. I had more photos from Saturday night to process. I haven't actually got any more examples ready to show here, but I think the pictures I showed yesterday were fairly representative. I really came away with the view that I should have turned the power on my flash gun up much sooner than I did. The early pictures needed a lot of care to look presentable, but the later pictures, using much more flash, needed very little work.

  Apart from an occasional handful of peanuts, I avoided eating until dinnertime yesterday. Just before I ate dinner I checked my blood glucose. It had come down out of the danger area to 9.8mmol/l. That was still very high, and I wondered if I was being foolish having one of my bigger home grown potatoes as part of my dinner. I microwave baked it, and had it with some (ready steamed) marinated salmon, and some runner beans.

  I didn't use any butter on the potato, but I did give it a squirt of mayonnaise and a sprinkle of salt and white pepper.  By most metrics it would still be classified as a very healthy, and possibly low(ish) calorie meal, but that potato was all carbohydrates, and they can react badly on my blood glucose. On this occasion they didn't seem too bad, and I think provided I am careful I can enjoy more of my home grown potatoes.

  It is surprising what a bit of sun can do. Actually it was not really the sun here that heated the air yesterday. That probably blew in from warmer places, but even so, a few extra degrees on the thermometer meant I felt quite warm when I went to bed. Maybe the pepper on my dinner helped warm me as well. The overall result was that it felt far too warm to pull the duvet over me last night.

  I thought that after a fairly busy and productive day I could easily fall asleep soon after 9pm, and I did try to. I failed, and after an hour I turned the light back on and started reading. I read for at least an hour before trying for sleep again. I have no idea what time I fell asleep, but I feel sure it was after 11pm and before midnight. I seemed to sleep quite well for 2 or 3 (maybe 4 ?) hours before waking up feeling a bit cool. At that point I think the duvet only covered one arm and one leg. It still felt too warm to completely cover myself, but it was obvious the night was cooling a fair bit. At 6am I turned the heater on, but by 7pm it felt almost too warm, but it was time to get up.

  This morning my blood glucose is down to 8.3mmol/l, and that being slightly less than my monthly average was good, but after a few mornings up readings under 8.0mmol/l I am trying to aim for something like 7.5mmol/l or less. There are several reasons why I am unlikely to see that tomorrow. One reason is that I have already had a big breakfast of sausages. Now sausages are not bad by themselves, but later on this afternoon beer will enter the equation.

  You may have noticed that I didn't mention having a beer drinking with Jodie yesterday. She wanted to go to a Soho Village Fayre yesterday, but didn't tell me until mid morning. We should be cracking open a few bottles and cans this afternoon instead. My only other predicted pursuit today will be to go through more of the pictures I took of Blackheath village and heath after dark on Saturday night. In some ways I think I did a better job of those than the gig pictures !