I think the forecast for 8° C is very optimistic. The reality is closer to 6° C, but the forecast sunshine, that does seem to be happening, should warm things up a bit. By 1pm we can expect 13° C, but also the start of a rainy afternoon with the rain extending to at least 7pm. Of course I should have checked the latest revision. That shows only a couple of sunny spells at 9 and 11am followed by several hours of dullness before the rain now starts at 3pm. Such a big change strongly suggests that today's weather forecast is not worth the paper it's printed on, and we can expect something completely different. Maybe the BBC forecast will be closer to reality - after refreshing the page it starts at 9am. 9am, and 9am only features sunny spells. Just light rain starts at 2pm, and continues until 7pm. They agree that the afternoon should see 13° C. Both forecasters show tomorrow as being sunny, although the BBC says mostly sunny spells, and the Met Office offer full on sunshine. Both agree on 11° C.

   Yesterday didn't turn out as expected, and in some ways it may have turned out better than expected. I had started writing so late yesterday morning, and maybe I was writing slower than usual (but still making just as many, if not more spelling errors) because I ended up with not a great deal of time to get myself washed and dressed to go out into the glorious sunshine.
  I did my now usual route to the pub - a walk to the station to pick up a copy of The Metro, and then a train to Ladywell station. There is a small area that is like woodland between the station and the main part of Ladywell Fields, and that seemed to offer a photo opportunity of autumn leaves among the sparse trees.
  This was the view I tried to show from the previous Wednesday. On that occasion the sky was about the same blue, but a solitary cloud had placed itself in front of the sun, and although it was still bright, there were no dark shadows. The strange lumpy shadow in the bottom right of the photo is me !
  This view is more to the west of the previous picture. That faced north. To the west a few whispy bits of cloud can be seen, but the sky is still deeply blue. The shadows in the foreground look a bit thin, but that is because the sun is still partly shining through almost leafless trees.

  I didn't actually invite Angela to meet me in the pub, but I did give a strong hint I would be there if she had checked social media. Even so, I was not expecting to see her, and didn't see her. Even without Angela it is still a nice lunch hour in the pub. I can chat to Asia, the barmaid, and there are usually other regulars who pop in now and then, and I can sahre a comment with. Of course, at times it can be very quiet in the pub !
  Sometimes I wonder how the pub makes any money ! When I took the snap above there were only two people visible in this direction, but there were two people behind me. This was a very quiet moment, and Asia took the opportunity to pop upstairs to heat her lunch in the microwave up there. A short while before this there was a group of three people standing at the bar, and shortly afterwards anther three people came in.

  It must have been just as I was getting to the end of my first pint that Jodie rang me. She was due to come over in the afternoon for a beer tasting session. She can't come today because she is off to a gig somewhere, but originally she thought yesterday was going to be OK until she found she had to stay in to wait delivery of a new kitchen door for her late parents house.

  In one respect that was good. I wasn't particularly looking forward to doing a double drinking shift. It made the rest of the afternoon more relaxed, and I could stay for a third pint of Guinness. In the quieter moment, of which there were quite a few, I tried to do the crosswords in The Metro - it is the reason I get it when I go to the pub in these Angela-less days. I made quick progress on the quick crossword, and as usual, I completely finished it. The cryptic crossword though....
  .... I only solved a couple of clues. I pride myself on usually doing many more, and occasionally completing the cryptic crossword, but now and then they publish a real bugger - either that or I am just not in the right frame of mind. I did seem to have the concentration to read most of the meagre amount of news in this thin newspaper. It was strange how bland and uninteresting the news I read was. I stopped following the news with a passion when every newscast was about Covid. Somehow it doesn't seem to have affected my life not knowing what is going on outside of Catford. Yesterday I stupidly expected that I would read something dramatic or exciting, but it seems nothing is happening in Brexit Britain.

  Like last week I decided not to bother with trying to get a train part of the way home. I could have checked the times of the trains, and left the pub at a suitable time to go back via Ladywell station, but in reality it is almost as quick to just walk straight home. The sun was already low in the sky when I left the pub, and while it was dazzling (I was walking towards it all the way home) it seemed to carry no heat. I could have, and maybe should have, done my coat up, but I left it open, and suffered the consequences.

  I assume it was the cold, and nothing more sinister, that soon got my chest, and a few other bits aching. I had a choice - I could slow down, and if it was something like angina the pains would calm down, or if it wasn't I would be spending more time in the cold. I chose the kill or cure option of trying to walk even faster. I doubt my increase of speed was enough to measure, but it did feel like I was getting home faster. It did feel a bit more uncomfortable like that, and there was always the worry that something bad might happen.

  All that happened is I got home feeling pretty bad, but as soon as I warmed up I got better. I was still worried that it might leave a legacy like it seemed to when coming home in the cold last Saturday. My chest still felt very slightly sore several times later in the day, but it was fine when I went to bed in the evening - the secret was keeping warm. It would probably have been a great idea to have some hot soup when I got home, but for some reason I rejected that idea in favour of luncheon meat slices on rice cakes, and the last seeded roll from my burger experiments the previous day.

  It might have been the three pints of Guinness, or the walk, but I felt very tired after I had eaten. Maybe it was that I had slept less well than I thought I had the night before. I transferred the pictures I have shown today from my phone to my PC, but couldn't find the enthusiasm or energy, or something to do anything with them at that point. Instead I laid on my bed, read half a page from the book I am reading, and then fell asleep. It was gone 4pm, and almost completely dark outside when I woke up.

  I had two jobs to do once I was awake. One was to select and edit (mostly just shrinking the size down to fit on my page) the photos I have shown here. The other was to continue washing a hand towel and some underwear I had left soaking in detergent after I finished showering in the morning. I ended up finishing that laundry in small steps - some of them during commercial breaks during the TV I watched a bit later. I suppose that is one good thing about satellite channels, often owned by Sky, their ad breaks come thick and fast. It does allow doing something useful while you ignore the adverts, but otherwise they are a complete pain in the arse.

  I finally finished the laundry, and hung it up to dry overnight on the clothes horse in the front room. I have had no heating on in that room since last spring, and it is pretty chilly in there now that sunshine is so rare, and the sun is so low in the sky. I left the fan on, and the door open all night, and I am not sure everything is dry yet.

  It was probably mostly between commercial breaks that I did the photo selecting and editing. The main event of the evening was dinner. It was the second half of the takeaway I had the previous night. I have to say it was most delicious, but with that comes consequences. The main course of grilled chicken was actually grilled then deep fried in batter, then sliced into strips, and finally cooked in a very sticky syrup like gravy with a few other vegetables. This time that "gravy" seemed very sweet and sticky. It was almost definitely syrup rather than something thickened with cornflour. I am not sure that the grilled ribs were very innocent.

  I watched my usual TV programmes, and then at 9pm there was a showing of QI on Dave. I didn't notice it in the listings or I wouldn't have turned it on, but once it started, and I saw one of the guests was Johnny Vegas I turned the TV off. I can't stand that thick git ! I retired to bed, and read for a while, but I think I may have fallen asleep very easily at around 10pm.

  I know I woke up between midnight and 1am. What makes me remember it was that my PC's screensaver was showing it as 12:41 AM.My phone was showing it more correctly as 00:41. If I remember correctly, I didn't even get out of bed to go for a pee. In fact it feels like I went for a pee less times than usual last night. Now that is odd because after that Chinese takeaway meal my blood glucose was very high !

  It was probably around 4am when my sleep seemed to deteriorate. I was waking up about once an hour after that, and there were long periods between sleeps. It was almost as if I had sufficient sleep, but that can't be right because as I type this I am yawning, and thinking how nice it would be to go back to bed ! I know I had them, but apart from something akin to trying to make out shapes in a thick fog, I can remember a single thing about them.

  As I said, that very delicious Chinese takeaway had it's consequences. This morning my blood glucose has exactly hit the red line, 10.0mmol/l. While I was hoping I might have got off a bit more likely, I knew it was going to be pretty dreadful. It is because there is such an obvious reason for it that I am not going to worry about it. About the only thing I am going to do is to make sure I have a mostly precooked dinner ready for a final heating at dinner time.

  Preparing and pre-cooking that dinner is going to be one of my main jobs today. It is possible I might pop out to Tesco to buy some more strong beers to get me through another session with Michael and his new phone this afternoon. In theory there should be little to do to it, although I may give him a lesson on using the "files" app to move pictures and videos to the 64GB memory card I fitted for him. What could be more interesting is that Michael may remember to bring over some old tablets and phone to see if I can extract pictures from them, and copy them to the new phone. I believe one tablet is actually an Apple iPad. It will be interesting to see if I can copy anything from that, or even charge it because I think it is old enough to use the old 30 pin connector. I haven't got a lead for that, but hopefully Michael will still have a charger. Maybe I can transfer pictures from it via bluetooth.