There was probably some light rain in the early hours of this morning, but it is not raining now, and there are patches of blue sky among the clouds - some of which do seem to be quite dark looking clouds. It is possible we will get the a sunny spell or two, as forecast for 9am this morning. The 11am rain has disappeared in the latest revision, and so has the sunny spells for 2pm.  It still says dark cloud for 11am, but the chance of rain for that hour is now the same as most of today - just 10%. This morning was just 6° C (possibly as low as 5° C), and the afternoon high may be just 8° C. Tomorrow may feature a day of dark grey clouds, and a lot of rain, but it will be warmer with an afternoon temperature of 12° C. It's worth mentioning that the BBC weather forecast is saying sunny spells all day today.

  It is tempting to describe yesterday as good and bad, but good and stupid gets closer, and good and drunk probably hits the nail on the head. I don't recall having a lot of get-up-and-go yesterday morning, and there was reason to be in a serious mood. I was having trouble with my waterworks yesterday morning, and by that I mean my water heater, and not my bladder and other internal plumbing.

  It seemed that low water pressure was stopping my water heater from working properly.  The worry is that it could be the first hint of some real bothersome trouble up ahead. Yesterday morning the atmospheric pressure was very low, and while my electronic thermometer doesn't attempt to give any figures, it was showing a downward arrow to say the pressure was still dropping. That can affect water pressure, and affect the water heater too.

  Yesterday morning was the first time it happened in years, and what bothers me is if it started happening shortly before the diaphragm that controls the gas split, and I lost all hot water for a week or more until I had called in a plumber who diagnosed the problem, but said he couldn't fix it. Fortunately I followed what he did closely, and after finding the required diaphragm on the internet, plus a spare, I was able to fit it myself. It was a lot of messing about, but I guess I could do it again if yesterday was an early warning that the diaphragm was starting to fail.

  However, it did actually look like the water pressure was very low for a time. A couple of hours later the water pressure looked a bit higher, and I managed to wash my hair, and have a shower before the water started to go cold seconds before I had finished with it. This morning I had hot water with no problems except that it was probably a bit too hot after I turned up the gas pressure a little bit.

  After I was clean and dry (and dressed) I went out to get a bit of shopping from Tesco.For some reason I thought Aldi might bring too many temptations - particularly after Michael told me they had loads of discounted Xmas food when I saw him last Thursday.  Most, if not all that Xmas food is far to rich for me these days - Xmas pudding is nice, but stuffed to the gills with sugar and calories.

  Tesco was not without it's temptations, but I only gave in to one thing out of curiosity. That was a pack of cheese croquettes that were less than half price. I am sure they were not good for me, and a second very negative thing is that they were not nice at all. It didn't help that they split open while cooking, and it was obvious they they didn't have cheese in them, but some sort of white good with the merest hint of cheese flavour.

   Other than that, everything else I bought was fairly sensible. One thing I didn't buy was any Tesco mayonnaise. The shelves were, as Michael told me on Thursday, clean of any Tesco mayonnaise. Jodie said she thought she had seen on the news that this was another Brexit "dividend". Apparently it is made in Holland, as are other supermarkets own brand mayonnaise. I did note that Aldi had none in the last time I was there. I ended up buying a bottle of Heinz mayonnaise. It tastes like McDonalds quality and style (plastic), and I didn't dare look how much sugar is in it, but I will before I use any substantial amounts of it.

  The afternoon rain caused Jodie to turn up looking like a drowned rat for our beer tasting session. I would suggest it altered her taste buds. There were a couple of beers that seemed like they would be the sort of beers that she likes, but she declared them to be minging. She rapidly changed tack, and we drank more beers that I like - thicker, and much less sour tasting porters. One was a special Xmas beer flavoured with Ferrero Rochet (which I don't think I can spell) chocolate. Curiously enough I was not too keen on it at first. It seemed deliciously chocolately, but left a slight metallic after taste. I stopped noticing it after half a glass.

  Several of the beers we had were quite strong, and possibly one of them may have been very strong, but I was getting drunk by then, and we may have decided to have it another day. One other factor was that because of the rain, Jodie decided not to get some shopping on her way here, and came here straight from the station - so a bit earlier than expected. She also stayed a bit later, and didn't leave until 6.45pm to get the 6.59pm train. As usual we ended on a whiskey, but it was a larger one than usual.

  I don't think I was senselessly drunk at the end, but my inhibitions were seriously weakened. As planned I had part two of the previous night's Indian takeaway. It was very delicious, and I gave in to finishing the spares as well. It seems slightly odd that I didn't feel over full after my curry overload, and by the time I wanted to get some sleep I was barely aware of having eaten what was effectively a double portion.

  It wasn't all that long after eating that I gave up on TV and went to bed. I read in bed for maybe an hour, but I am sure it wasn't quite 9pm before I turned out the light, and tried to sleep. At first it seemed like I would not be able to get to sleep, but I doubt that in reality it took much longer than 20 minutes. From then on I slept tolerably well. I am unsure if it was good sleep or not. I remember that by 3am I was starting to feel quite chilly if I left any bit uncovered, and I turned the heater on full (so much for trying to reduce my electricity bill !!).

  I'm not really sure if remembering a load of dreaming, but not the detail of the dreams, is a sign of good or bad sleep. What I do know was that I did seem to dream a lot, although there is only two brief moments of probably two different dreams that I remember. Both involved the same dog - a bright red moderately long legged sausage dog (maybe it was a saveloy dog !!).

  I first saw this dog while walking through Hither Green for unknown reasons. Being bright red it sort of stuck out. It reappeared in another dream when I was walking down Brownhill Road towards Catford (my walk home from school many, many years ago). Suddenly the dog was walking by my side, and I though it must be a stray. Fortunately I was spared having to adopt it, or otherwise get it cared for, when we passed a house with the front door open, another dog, and a man. He called the dog, or just loudly said something to the effect of "there you are". I have a vague recollection of his apparent owner saying he was always going off for adventures by himself.

  I knew that my double helping of curry, some of the sweet beers, and maybe those horrible cheese croquettes, would have a bad effect on my blood glucose this morning, and I was right ! This morning it had shot up again. The only slightly good thing is that it had only just gone over the red line to 10.1mmol/l. In theory I shouldn't have had any breakfast, and I should have fasted until a light dinner, but I felt hungry. I gave in and had a bowl of instant Kimchi flavoured noodles, and it was one of the bigger, 100gm packets just to make things worse.

  Ideally I need a good distraction, maybe even being elsewhere, from eating at lunch time. Unfortunately it seems too cool outside to enjoy myself, and although the sun is trying to break through the clouds, it seems unlikely it will happen for any useful length of time, if indeed it manages it at all. It is not the weather to lure me out. It seems I will be home all day, and so I will have to find some distractions here. Maybe I'll do some more hoovering - at least it would be productive even if boring and hard work....