Thanks to the clouds this morning started off fairly mild, although the consensus of my outside thermometers reckon it was closer to 11° C than the forecast 12° C. It would seem we are heading into the same scenario as yesterday. The latest revision to the forecast shows the last sunny spells to now be at 2pm, and 1pm might see no sunshine. The rain is now expected as early as 7pm, and I would not be surprised if another revision moved it another hour earlier. The afternoon temperature should still reach 17° C. Tomorrow morning will start with rain, but it might be over soon after sunrise. From late morning until sunset there could be sunny spells, although the experience with the yesterday's forecast suggests it will probably turn to snow or something. It is possible that tomorrow could see the afternoon temperature reach 18° C.

  Yesterday was not very productive, but a lot more productive than the previous day, and probably the day before that. The most satisfying achievement yesterday was looking after my blood glucose level. I didn't completely fast, as originally intended, but I did eat very carefully, and the final result was good.

  Possibly the major thing I did yesterday was to finally go out and get some shopping. I bought stuff in both Savers and Poundstretcher. I ended up with quite a few candles at the end of this double shopping trip. Poundstretcher had some "Halloween flavoured" candles in little screwtop jars, and they were fairly cheap. I bought three pairs of them in three assorted flavours - two of them allegedly ghoulish, but without the boxes they came in to tell you so, they were just scented candles.

  The difficult thing to find was hay fever tablets. For most the hay fever season is well over, but mine is now getting underway. I have never been tested, but my doctor agreed with my hypothesis that I was sensitive to fungal spores. With early autumn being the peak season for toadstools and other fungi, there are loads of spores floating about. I finally found the tablets I wanted, Loratadine, tucked away on the bottom of a shelf in Savers.

  In Poundstretcher I found some cheap instant noodles. They were described as "hot chicken" and so obviously superior to just chicken or even roast chicken......probably. They were just 39p a packet, and I bought 4 of them. Of course the catch is that they were only 60gm packets. Typical instant noodles are 80gm, and some of the spicy ones I buy in Tesco are 105gm. A single packet seemed no more than a mouthful......

  After I got back from the shops my appetite changed with the weather. It was still sunny when I went out, and it was a bit marginal, but I felt comfortable without a coat. As I came home the sun was behind a black cloud, and heavy looking clouds were piling up in the sky. It wasn't long before the first rain fell. I had been assuming that many more hours of sunshine would warm my front rooms up.

  Instead of becoming warm my front rooms remained chilly feeling, and there was no prospect of the sun warming them up. At that point I had eating nothing, and it seemed like some hot food was needed despite any affect it would have on my blood glucose level. I opted to eat two of the small packets of instant noodles I had bought earlier. I have to say that my joke about "hot chicken flavour" being superior to ordinary chicken turned out to be no joke. They were very nice, although I can't put my finger on exactly why.

  I had a rest after eating, but maybe 45 minutes later I resumed a job I had started after I had had a shower in the morning. It was some laundry - a hand towel, a t-shirt, and a few items of underwear. After my shower I had left it soaking in detergent. After the usual 3 rinses I tried an experiment. I have had a bottle of Lenor fabric conditioner sitting in the bathroom for years.

  It was set aside when I found that Aldi's on brand fabric conditioner smelled better. I am running very slightly low on Aldi fabric conditioner, and so I thought I would give the Lenor another go. I found that after sitting there for maybe 5 years it had turned into a sort of gel, but I still used it. The one thing I deliberately did was to use it very sparingly. The theory was that the smell might have been too strong when I used to use it because I used too much. I will find out if the experiment worked when I put away the towel, as a for instance, later today.

  With the washing done, and hung on the clothes horse to dry overnight, aided by a fan blowing air on it, I did hardly anything else for the rest of the day. I think it was around 3 or 4pm  had a snack of 5 Marmite rice cakes with corned beef on a couple of them, and cheese on the others. The corned beef seemed to taste very nice with the Marmite flavour. Usually I would only have 4 rice cakes at a time, mainly because 4 fit more comfortably on a plate, but five used up the rest of the packet.

  When dinner time came along it seemed almost like I had already eaten as much as I had intended to eat for the whole day. I don't know how I did it, but I decided not to have a dinner, but then I decided that maybe I could have half a packet of peanuts to chew on. They were washed down with three cans of Guinness. There was almost no entertainment on TV last night, and so I ended up in bed early, although I didn't try for sleep that early.

  I may have read in bed for about an hour before trying for sleep. I have to admit it was so nice being under the duvet compared to trying to keep warm in uncomfortable thick clothing. I can't seem to remember much about my sleep last night. I think I fell asleep fairly quickly after I turned the light out. I think I got up to pee the usual amount of times. I know I dreamed a lot, and that one dream featured a pub, but I can't remember any more than that.

  This morning I did another two stage getting up. I woke up sometime between 5 and 6am, and got up for long enough to go for a pee, and take screenshots of the latest weather forecasts. I then went back to bed, and as usual in these situations, I laid there for some time thinking that nothing was happening, and then suddenly the clock said it was getting near 8am !

  I was a bit disappointed when I checked my blood glucose. Yesterday morning it was sitting on the red line at 10.0mmol/l. After being so careful yesterday I was hoping for a great big improvement, but all I got was a plain vanilla big improvement. 8.6mmol/l would be fine at any other time, but I was hoping I might have got a reading under 8.00mmol/l. Maybe I might do better today...or maybe not. I have started the day with a double helping of instant noodles. Morning is the best time for it, and in theory it should stop me feeling hungry later, but today is not an ordinary day.

  This afternoon should be a beer tasting session with Jodie. Today we will have a couple of strong beers I put aside until a good day. With my beer fridge looking a bit sparse today is a good day to have a few of the beers I have set aside.  By the time Jodie goes home I could well be feeling tipsy, and that can do funny things to my appetite...