I am not sure how yesterday was supposed to work out, but whatever it was, reality was different, and not in a good way. That's not to say any more than a tiny part of the day was awful. Most of it, apart from the "excitement" of shopping in Aldi, and using my Tesco credit card to pay for it for the first time ever, was rather dull. The real excitement happened early evening, and excitement is not actually a very apt word for it. Incidently, it amused me to think that I should be getting Tesco Clubcard points for using my Tesco credit card in Aldi !
  One of my purchases in Aldi was another pack of toilet paper - Honey And Almond fragranced ! As the writing at the top says, it is the cardboard tube in the middle that carries the fragrance, and so you are not wiping strange chemicals that form the artificial (presumably) fragrance across your delicate parts. I wonder what flavour will come next ?

  Yesterday was a day when my eating was partly controlled by external forces. I had a ham sandwich, with some Eastern European mustard on it for breakfast. That was not that unconventional, but it was a very late breakfast. I only managed to delay lunch by little more than an hour, and it consisted of two Tesco southern fried flavoured chicken steaks. I had bought them in Tesco last week, and I thought I had better use them up before I started on the stuff I had bought in the morning.

  The last time I had what I think was the same chicken steaks I seemed to see a large rise in my blood glucose despite the pack saying that they had very little sugar in them. A bit later still I had another sandwich. This time it was a cheese sandwich. I thought that I was living rather dangerously, and so my dinner was only one Satsuma orange, one nice apple, and a mediocre conference pear. The fruit would have contributed some sugar, but I hoped it wouldn't be too much.

  I spent most of the afternoon just being lazy. I was catching up on some news items from https://www.theregister.com/, and I also spent a fair bit of time just laying on my bed reading. It was after dinner, when putting my plate in the kitchen, when I had my "excitement". Actually "shock" is a far better word ! As I opened the door, and stepped into the kitchen I just caught a glimpse of a grey shadow running out of view behind some stuff.

  It seems I have another mouse, or if the doomsayers are right, a colony of mice back in my kitchen. I think on my approach it dived down behind the disused, not working, washing machine. It seemed too late to clean up a few old traps I had around, and I resolved to go out this morning to buy some new ones. These days I can bait them with seeds from the bird seed. I am sure that mice would like some grains of corn, and maybe other stuff that birds like too.
  It was an almost cheerful sunset last night, and simple weather lore said that today would probably be good even if the official weather forecast was predicting a very dull day, and still is - while the sun pours through my bedroom windows, and the room is nice and warm with no heating on !

  While the sunset was cheerful, I didn't really enjoy the evening. I was feel down about yet another mouse problem to deal with. Fortunately there were a few programmes on TV to distract me, but by 9pm I was in bed reading. I probably spent most of the evening with one ear cocked for any sinister rustle, or little teeth gnawing at something or another. It made me wonder if I would ever relax enough to get to sleep.

  Evidently I did relax enough, and I seemed to fall into a deep sleep at around 11pm (at a guess). I don't remember any more until my phone started ringing at about 2.30am. It was a very drunk sounding Sue. I haven't spoken to her since last October, and I have been trying to ignore her since then. She seems to have a great talent for getting herself in assorted troubles. The latest is that she recently fell in love with what can probably be described as a childhood sweetheart.

  He is 10 or 15 years younger than her though, and until a few weeks ago they hadn't talked for 20 years (or something like that). Somehow she fell in love with him when he phoned her up a few weeks ago. It was all very romantic, or should have been. The catch is that he was fresh out of prison, and on parole. He ended up staying at her place for 4 days, and missed reporting in to his parole officer (or whatever they do), and he is now back in prison for breaking the conditions of his parole.

  I'm not sure why she phoned me because she wasn't alone. Lee was visiting her, but I can imagine he was being boring, and was definitely so when he fell asleep, and started snoring while I was speaking to Sue. Speaking with Sue can end up with a very long phone call, and as an hour approached I made a point of finishing the call, and trying to get back to sleep. Sleep didn't happen very quickly because I had to go to the toilet just as I was about to snuggle down under the duvet. Instead I turned the heater up before going to the toilet. It seems very unusual to have a poo at 3.30am, but that is what I did.

  I got up at almost my average time of 7am, and as usual, one of the first things I did after a pee, was to check my blood glucose level. In an ideal world I would have been very careful what I ate yesterday so I could start this new month with a nice low reading. There were several things I ate yesterday that would have done me no favours. I have described most of them further up the page, but there was one thing that I didn't, but I did mention it yesterday morning. It was Aldi's chilli flavoured peanuts.

  I only had a smallish quantity of them (where "smallish quantity = less than the whole packet), and they too probably left their mark. This morning my blood glucose measured 8.5mmol/l. Previous to the first week or so of January that would either be good, or unremarkable, but after the lower readings I was getting in the last few weeks of January, a month where my average was a record low, it was a bit disappointing. I will try and be a bit more careful today.
  The reason I started writing so late today is that I have been out shopping in Poundland. As usual I bought all sorts of stuff, but the prime reason for going was to buy some clean new mousetraps. I have already put two out, baited with a pinch of bird seed, and almost crushed my thumb with a third one. To get them as sensitive as can be the trigger wire has to be placed very carefully. The third one was set to perfection....well sort of. I did little more than breath on it and it snapped onto my thumb. As you can probably imagine, it really stung, and my thumb was numb for 15 minutes or so.

  It has now gone midday, and the sun is still shining ! I ought to go out for a walk in it, but I'm not sure if I can be bothered. That is a bit of a shame because it should be feeling almost mild out there soon. Maybe I will lay on my bed, and see what grabs my attention most - the idea of going for a walk, or the book I am reading. Of course there is another factor to consider. Tomorrow is Wednesday, and at the minimum I will be taking a walk through the park to meet Angela in the pub at lunchtime. If I go the long way around that would be good enough to be called my first exercise of the month.