08:35 BST

  Yesterday was almost 100% disgustingly horrible. It was actually only about 95% horrible because contrary to any expectation from the gloomy weather forecasts, there were at least 5 very short sunny spells yesterday. The rest of the time was gloomy, and cold feeling despite the temperature reaching 14° C.

  

  The latest revision to the forecast paints an even worse picture than the early version in the screenshot above. 6,7, and 8pm are now shown as featuring light rain. With luck there will still be some sunny spells at 3 and 4pm. The top afternoon temperature of 16° C should feel mild even with no sunshine. It's worth mentioning that the BBC weather forecast shows sunny spells for midday and 1pm, but no other time, and no rain is mentioned. It does agree that the afternoon high will be 16° C. The BBC forecast for tomorrow shows lots of sunshine or sunny periods, and a top temperature of 18° C. The Met Office shows a bright morning followed by a dull day, and an afternoon high of only 16° C. I bet both forecasts for tomorrow will be completely different in the morning. As I write this at 8.50am there is some hazy sunshine, and no forecast shows that.

  Yesterday was not a good day. In fact it was a terrible day. Although there were a few short sunny spells dotted throughout the day, it was mostly very dull, and particularly so in the morning. As I have mentioned before, it is the morning that sets the whole day for me.  I did try and come up with a few ideas of stuff that I could do, including some laundry, and even a gig in the evening, but I could raise the enthusiasm for neither.

  I spent much of the day just reading. Fortunately I resisted the temptation to relieve some of the monotony by eating...or by eating too much. I did have my almost normal breakfast of one packet of instant noodles. I then had an elevenses of just cheese on rice cakes. My lunch was two cans of soup. I chose soups with moderately low sugar contents (less than 2.5gm). It was my dinner that was less than ideal.

  I wanted something nice, and yet safe, because I needed something to cheer me up. I opted for a takeaway even though it is a bit of an extravagance that I really shouldn't do. What I really wanted was something like a Chinese or Indian, but I still had enough sense to go for the safer option of kebabs. Maybe I didn't have the sense to not have a lamb doner kebab. I have to admit I really enjoyed it, but I had a nasty feeling they had drizzled it was a syrupy based chilli sauce. It was good stuff, but it seemed to be very sweet as well as mildly hot.

  I had a two part dinner, and the second part was a chicken shish kebab. That felt a bit safer for some reason, but I feel sure it had the same sweet chilli sauce on it. The rest of my takeaway order I saved for today. It was grilled wings, and spicy wings with chips. The funny thing is that I don't recall the description saying they would come with chips.  Er, I'm almost forgetting the Kofta kebab that I ordered. That was actually a third part of my dinner. It seemed to be quite small, and more snack-like than the other dishes. One interesting thing is hat the pitta bread, which I didn't eat, seemed to be made with wholemeal flour. I've never seen that before.

  There was one of thing I did yesterday afternoon, and it was to watch two films. Both were very much "B" movie SciFi films. One was "The Day Mars Invaded Earth". It was filmed in black and white, and later digitised in poor resolution. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone except a masochist. The second was "A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell", apparently made in 1991. I hoped it would be very sexy, but I was badly let down in that department, and in fact in most departments ! You can read more about it here - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102569/

  Later on in the evening I nearly watched an episode of QI, but I found it had Johnny Vegas on it, and he make me feel ill. I turned off and got back to reading "Nightfall" by Isaac Asimov and Robert Silverberg. The same story has strongly influenced my dreams the previous night, and I wrote about t yesterday. The thing is that I half got it all wrong. I had assumed that this novel length version of an earlier short story (by Isaac Asimov on his own) included the original short story with extra detail leading up to the events of the short story, and than more story about the aftermath of those events.

  It seems I am probably wrong. All I have read so far adds information that would not agree with the details of the short story. In particular, in this long story there are several mentions of lights being switched on, and yet in the short story part of the main plot was darkness because lighting had not been invented on this world where 5 or 6 suns in the sky meant it was light 24 hours a day. It will be interesting when I get to the part of the novel that describes the events of the short story. It seems like it must have been completely re-written, and maybe that lessens the suspense, but on the other hand, both contributors to the full length novel are very skilled writers.

  The only thing that spoiled my sleep last night was some occasional mild stomach ache...or maybe it was just teh stink of the farts. It is the one and only good reason for living alone - because if I wasn't I soon would be after last nights gaseous emissions. Ideally I wanted to go to the toilet, but the bathroom felt far too cold to stay in there too long with nothing happening. I guess my sleep was not disturbed that much, and I did seem to be ready to get up quite early this morning.

  I did try having a lie in this morning, even after I had successfully been to the toilet, and stopped any hint of stomach aches, but there is only so long you can lie there without sleeping before it gets boring. There was a possible reason why I should be up early this morning. Sometime today, and I am waiting for a message about it, I should be getting a parcel delivery. It will be the new camera lens I mentioned almost a week ago. Although it could be some time before I will be using it, I am still very keen to try it out on my Nikon D80 camera, and see if it cures the slightly soft looking pictures than the lens it will be replacing takes.

 My fears about the chilli sauce on my kebabs last night seems to have been justified this morning. My blood glucose has dropped a fair amount since yesterday's appalling 9.8mmol/l, but 9.0mmol/l is still far higher than I am happy with. I can't wait for the next warm and sunny day when I can go out, exercise, and keep away from the fridge. Until then it will be a bit of a struggle, and a lot of self sacrifice to keep it even moderately lower than this morning.

  This morning it does seem brighter than I was expecting, and according to my thermometers it is already a fraction over 15° C - 4 or 5 hours earlier than the forecast predicts. Maybe it could be possible to go out today, but I am constrained my two things. The first being that I have no idea yet when my new lens will be delivered, and secondly I want to go out tonight, and it is no use getting myself tired during the day. I could almost cheerfully forget about tonight's gig. It is not even be as good as what had originally attracted me to it. It is Whitestar playing in The Coach And Horses in Beckenham, and originally it was billed to start at a very pleasant 7.30pm. It is now shown at 8pm, and that tips the balance a bit (but not as much as many gigs that start at or beyond 9pm - they kick the balance over and trash it). The added thing tonight is that Angela says she is going (unfortunately with lover boy), and would like me there to keep her company - something not easy to refuse !