The latest revision to the forecast has removed the sunny spells from 9am, although curiously enough, when I look out the window it does seem possible the sun could peep through a few cracks in the clouds. The latest version for the afternoon shows sunny spells for 2pm, 4pm, and 5pm. 3pm is shown as full sunshine.....I have my doubts. If nothing else, it may be a warm afternoon with 14° C predicted, and it should stay dry. Tomorrow could see mostly light, but some heavy rain from 11am to 11pm, and it will be a little cooler at no more than 11° C.

  Yesterday was one of those days when the BBC weather forecast got it about right. All too often it tells a very different story to the Met Office. It is rare for the Met Office to get it 100% right, but it generally comes closer to reality than the BBC, but not for yesterday !
  Note how the BBC (Meteo Group) got the sunny spells about right, although they probably started and ended about 2 hours earlier, but even so they were more realistic than the hours of full sunshine the Met Office predicted ! This morning the BBC predict no sunshine at all - even if there is a sunny spell happening right now as I type this ! At least both forecasters agree that it will reach 14° C today.

  Yesterday was one of those days when time seemed to be passing so quickly that the day seemed half as long, and I had little time to relax. The paradox is that in some ways I didn't do all that much. Angela was feeling off colour, and so I couldn't meet her at lunchtime. I was going to go for a walk instead, but despite all the optimism of the weather forecast for lots of sunshine, I probably knew the weather was actually going to be poor for a walk.

  Probably the worst thing about the weather when it came to walking was the temperature hovering between warm and cold. The wind was chilly, but if I put on a coat I would probably overheat, and doubly so if the sun came out. Apart from frozen hands and face, it is sometimes more comfortable to walk in a thick coat when the temperature is well under 10° C. I did do a little bit of walking yesterday, and I did it with bare arms, but I must admit that was probably a bit too brave.

  I am finding it hard to describe yesterday in the right order. I think I did some washing up first, and then I did some laundry. It was only two t-shirts and a pair of underpants, and so did not take that long. I hung them on the washing line to dry, but it wasn't drying weather. In fact it is odd in that the wind on my bare arms, when I went out, seemed far stronger than the light breeze that just slightly jiggled my washing on the line. It was still very damp when I brought it in at about 5pm.

  The next thing I did was a bit of gardening, and when I say a bit I mean a tiny bit ! It was just a bit of tidying and some selective watering (just using a jug rather than bothering to use the hose). The assorted bulbs in my right hand flower bed as steadily growing, but doing it very slowly. It is because they won't be seeing any sunshine in that part of the garden (like most of the garden) until summer is here. There are many other seeds and bulbs I have planted that don't seem to be doing anything yet, and I shouldn't be expecting to do anything yet, but it would still be nice to see some movement.

  One of the things I did was to select some flat pieces of old concrete, or even broken flagstones, to improve and modify my garden path. I think my ultimate aim is to bend it around the big tree stump. it will involve a lot of earth moving (a lot for me that is - a proper builder would do it while drinking his cup of tea). I will also rake out a load of stones from the lawn, and use those as a sort of foundation for the paving stones. The weather and my own temperament will have to be very good when I start that job.
  I meant to show this spam mail yesterday, or maybe the day before that, but kept forgetting. For a start, regarding what it says on the back of the envelope, it is a bloody inappropriate time. I'm not dead yet, even if I feel like it sometimes. It is also, I'm sure, a complete ripoff. I base that on the idea that if a company, producing glossy brochures is involved, then they must be taking a big cut for themselves before the council crematory does the actual burning job. My method is even cheaper - a pile of wood and a pint or two of paraffin. It would be good for the garden as well !

  Back to yesterday's job or actions, and very early in the afternoon I did go out for a walk, but it was only to go shopping. To say "only shopping" rather under rates it, that is by my own standards. I went in three shops, one after another. It is rare for me to go into two different shops on one outing. I suppose that is mainly because I can usually get everything I want from just one shop - usually a supermarket.

  The fist shop I went to was The Metro Food Centre. This Greek/Turkish/Indian run place, best abbreviated to MFC, is a place I have only recently started to use, and mainly on account of their fresh produce. I wanted some ingredients for a Greek salad based up pictures and descriptions from Angela. I suspect it is more a family recipe rather than strictly Greek, but I fancied making one (and show a picture to Angela for some extra "brownie points"). I was able to get everything I needed except for some rocket.

  I next went to Savers for some vitamins. I needed some more cod liver oil capsule, and some multivitamins. The Cod Liver oil tablets were different to the ones I have been using, and I thought that maybe they were weaker, but a closer reading of the label showed that they were 50% cod liver Oil, and 50% fish body oil, but still a 1000mg dose. When I checked the capsules I have been using I noticed they were 100% fish body oil, and no actual cod live oil. It is mildly possible that these new ones may be better for me - mainly in terms of oil for my stiff joints.

  I had to go in Tesco with my shopping bag already starting to feel heavy, to get a bag of rocket. Of course I didn't just stop at rocket, and I ended up buying more tins of chicken soup (Tesco's own brand with it's very low sugar content), two half price tubs of 4 bean salad, and a coriander plant in a pot. I bought a bunch of rather sad looking coriander in MFC, but the pot from Tesco is alive, and hopefully I can nurture it through the summer to produce lots more coriander. I think it was just £1.25, and the pot it is in is probably worth 75p.

  By the time I was home I was surprised how late it was. I think it was around 2pm, and it felt like time had flashed by. I had a sort of light lunch of a can of bacon in giant beans. I'm sure it was the same can as the one I bought from MFC a week or so ago, but it didn't seem as good. It didn't seem to be that bacony. The trouble is that there are several very similar looking cans, and none of them have any English on them. It is possible that I had giant beans with oxtail or something. It was nice, but not that nice.

  I only rested for about an hour, and it was hardly resting at at all, before I started the long preparation of my dinner. I had spring onion, and rocket to chop, and selecting the best from the wilted coriander to chop up. Then there were cherry tomatoes to slice (just into two halves), and a red chilly to de-seed and slice. New potatoes to clean and boil, and also eggs to hard boil. The latter was interesting because I have never hard boiled eggs in a microwave before.

  I started the eggs in cold tap water to allow them to heat up slowly, and so not explode, and in that respect is was all very successful. I didn't cook the first two eggs for long enough. They were cooked through, and in some ways it was perfection because the very centre of the yolk was still soft, but not runny. The problem was the white didn't seem to be hard enough to hold together as I tried to peel the shell off. I made a bit of a mess of the first two. They were still usable though. The second two I gave an extra couple of  minutes, and one of them peeled fairly easily. The shells did seem very thin though.
  This was the finished dinner (actually part one of two). I drizzled some good olive oil and a sprinkle of balsamic vinegar on it. One ingredient I forget to mention was some diced Feta cheese, and another was Greek olives. It was rather nice, and the initial portion was small and carefully(ish) placed to make a good photo to show Angela (she gave it full marks !). The second half was just dumped on the plate with zero finesse !

 I had a sweet of a couple of nice oranges. Shopping in MFC, and the little (probably Turkish) supermarket on Catford Bridge, has shown me the stupidity of buying some things, and oranges in particular from the likes of Aldi or Tesco.

  The last bag of large oranges I bought from Aldi, last Monday, were very unsatisfactory. The immediate problem was that they had thick skins that were a bigger to peel. No matter how careful they always had a load of not nice tasting pith left on them, and no amount of careful picking away with finger nails could get all that pith off.

  By contrast the two oranges in the picture, bought from MFC, peeled easily, and most of the pith came away with the peel, although of course not all of it. The actual flesh inside tasted so much nicer, and "orangey". The Aldi oranges were somewhat drier inside, and the taste was far less exciting.

  The only real problem is that these "newly discovered " oranges are far too nice, but they carry the penalty of a fair bit of natural sugar content. I can just about tolerate it, but it leaves no room for any other dodgy choices of food and stuff.

  The day seemed to go past very quickly, and the evening did two. I have no idea what time I fell asleep, but I think it was probably fairly early. I do know that I woke up at five minutes to midnight for a pee, and it felt like I had been sleeping for hours. I seemed to have a few long period of sleep, but maybe only the last one featured any dreams. I remember having dreams, but I can't seem to recall what they were about.

  This morning, a combination of "mostly harmless foods", perhaps excluding the oranges, means that this morning my blood glucose is a satisfactory 7.9mmol/l, although on reflection maybe it is not quite satisfactory when I have set myself a target of 7.5mmol/l or less. It is only good in relation to the readings I was getting a couple of months ago. One thing is for certain, all that vegetable fibre means I am most definitely not constipated this morning !

  The only definite thing today, and even "definite" has an element of doubt, is another Thursday beer tasting session with Jodie. I guess I will also have the fun of preparing another "Mediterranean style" salad to go with a couple of roast chicken thighs. I have more oranges I could possibly eat for a sweet, but I might give them a miss today.