08:32 BST

  As far as I can remember, or as far as I observed, yesterday was a dry day - except for a few flakes of snow at around 9am, and a brief fall of light hail in the early afternoon. It was also sunny from time to time, but it was a cold day made worse by an icy wind. The afternoon temperature only reached 8° C for a very short time, and like the day before, the temperature really dropped during the night.

  

  Just before 8am, when 2° C was forecast, one of my thermometers said it was 0.9° C, and the most optimistic one said 1.5° C (they are at different heights, and temperature can change in the space of just a few feet when the air is still). At the moment it is bright and sunny, and the temperature is now rising. I noted 2.4° C a few minutes ago. Sadly it seems the sun may only shine for a couple of hours, and so the temperature may only rise to 8° C again. Light rain is expected for a couple of hours from 6 to 7pm. A few clouds may keep the temperature up a little bit tonight, but it will stall have dropped to just 2° C by 7am tomorrow morning. There may be a bit more sunshine tomorrow, and that could raise the temperature to a more comfortable 10° C provided the wind is light - which it might be.
  I didn't think I had eaten anything particularly challenging the day before yesterday, but it still took quite a few visits to the toilet, the last being almost at 1pm, before I felt comfortable to go out - comfortable, but not totally convinced it was definitely all over. Fortunately it was, and the highlight of yesterday, a drinking session in two pubs was a pleasurable event.

  About the only thing that occupied my time yesterday morning was reading, and most of that was on the internet, although I did read half a dozen pages of the book I am currently reading. At 12 minutes to 2pm (plus or minus a minute or two) I set out to walk to the Catford Wetherspoons pub to meet Kevin for a drink, and catchup after a 2 year wait for Covid to die down. I got to the pub at about 5 minutes to 2pm - which was fortunate.

  I bought a pint of an Italian recipe English porter style beer that was actually brewed by Shepherd Neams brewers in Faversham because the Italian head brewer was unable to come here to supervise the brewing. It initially had too much of a burnt toast for my liking, but it wasn't bad once I had got the flavour - which took at least half a pint. One of the problem with drink beer with Jodie is that we share a small bottle, and so have less than half a pint to try and get the flavour. That can be good when it is a horrid beer, but spoils what might be a good beer.

  Kevin arrived just after 2pm, and found that the bar was closed for unspecified reasons. Kevin's arrival was shortly followed by the main duty manager who would normally only be there for the evening session. Kevin knew her by name, but couldn't prise out the reason for the early closing, but did find that the place will remain closed until after the weekend. It is all a bit of a mystery, but very soon gallows humour decreed that it had to be a dead body in the kitchen !

  Kevin offered two suggestions. Either we jump on a bus to go to the Lewisham Wetherpooons, or maybe see what was happening in The Catford Bridge Tavern. I am not a great lover of Wetherspoons, but the Catford one is handily local, but the same can't be said about the one in Lewisham. There was also the fact that I didn't fancy a busy and noisy place that would make communications hard, and would distract from my other "entertainment".

  Like on Wednesday, which was the first of two possible days to meet up with Kevin, I had my laptop with me to show off a few things. I opted for The Catford Bridge Tavern. It was very quiet in there, and it is not surprising because they have got rid of all their handpumps because they weren't selling enough real ale to justify stocking it. The reason they didn't sell enough, and why there were few people in the pub, was that their prices are too high. It is a delicate balancing act - trying to get the price versus the amount of sales right. Many pubs lose faith that cheaper beer can fill the pub, and make a bigger profit, and end up closing down. I can potentially see that happening to The Catford Bridge Tavern.

  The easy choice of beer was Guinness, and I think I ended up having three pints in there. At £5.48 a pint it was more expensive than I am used to, but I guess it wasn't too extortionate. Anyway, I was good to have a few beers with Kevin, and I was feeling good about my laptop. It was it's second outing since buying it last June (for £120), and the first time it was used for a long time away from a power connection. I was most happy that the battery lasted around two and a half hours before it started flashing up just 6 minute of power left. I didn't push it further, and closed it down at that point.

  It was a typical thing when drinking with Kevin - talking for an everlasting time outside the pub after deciding to call it a day and go home. It was a bit inconvenient yesterday. For one thing it was bloody cold when standing around in the wind, and that cold was bringing on a very strong desire to have a pee. After 10 minutes or so I forced the conversation to come to an end, and started for home. I felt inclined to do a very fast walk, and it was a relief, literally, to get indoor, taken my coat off, and run upstairs for a pee. I sometimes find it amazing just how fast I can walk given a suitable incentive !

  It was just after 6pm when I got home, and so we had had an almost 4 hours session. I was glad that I had precooked my dinner, and all I had to do was to pop the plate into the microwave for 2 minutes before my dinner was ready to eat. The only major error was that I forgot that I had pre(over)cooked some beans (deliberately because I like them over cooked), and opened a can of peas instead. Oh well, I'll have those beans sometime today. My dinner was Cumberland sausage s with boiled new potatoes, and the small can of garden peas. It went down a treat after the earlier Guinness.

  I missed the start, but I managed to see most of the final episode of The Prisoner being shown on The Horror channel. It doesn't seem very long since they started to show the series, and I think they must have shown the abbreviated collection of episodes. It may be only the episodes that appeared on DVD - which make you wonder if playing the DVDs was all they did rather than playing proper broadcast tapes. Who knows....

  I then watched an episode of The Simpsons on Channel 4+1. After that I felt very tired. That was a bit premature considering it was only 7.30pm at that point. I had turned off the TV, and I laid on my bed to read a bit more of the book that I was reading. As I read my eyes kept closing, and so I got up, brushed my teeth ready for bed, but read some stuff off the internet. I then went to bed to continue reading my book. By 9pm I was fast asleep, and for at least 5 hours I seemed to sleep really well...sort of.

 I think in the 5 hours I probably woke up for a pee once, but that is more because I think I must have rather than having any clear memory of it. What I do remember is that I seemed to be having a dream that was like a short repeated episode with minor variations. I think I was still dreaming the same basic thing much later in the morning, but I could have been dreaming about the dreaming, and thinking of alternative narratives for the dream. The stupid thing is that having all my dreams supposedly being the same, or a similar plot over and over again, I find I can't remember a single thing about it now.

  My sleep came in smaller segments in the later hours of the morning, but that is normal it seems. What isn't normal is that I think I woke up three times with cramp in my right leg or foot. I feel fortunate that I have sort of trained myself (somehow) to wake in an instant, and get out of bed as soon as I feel the first twinge. Putting weight on my legs usually cures the cramp before it gets agonising.

  I think it was 5am when I turned my heater up full before going back to sleep. By 7pm it had taken off the worst of  the chill on the this very cold morning. It allowed one more period of what was probably good sleep, and then I seemed to wake up very suddenly knowing it was time to get up. It was only about 10 minutes later that I seemed to be having an action replay of the stomach upset (for what of a better name) that I had the morning before. Then with freshly washed hands, I checked my blood glucose. It was a very satisfactory 7.8mmol/l, and my running average, albeit for only two days, is a record low. Of course there is more than plenty of enough time this month to completely mess that up.

  Two minutes after checking my blood I had to make another visit to the toilet. This is good and bad. The good is that getting it all over with in the morning means I shouldn't have to let it influence me in what I do later in the day. Of course with much of the day being cold and grey, and with rain this evening, I doubt I will be wanting to go out anywhere, although I have considered another try and going to Dartford station to tick off one more station on my "Limits of my Freedom Pass" quest.