This morning hasn't started quite as bad as forecast. Instead of being grey, the clouds are thin and milky white, and now and again leak some hazy sunshine. This is possibly how most of the day will be, but the current revision to the forecast now shows 4 hours of sunny spells before sunset. Unfortunately the maximum temperature is now forecast to be a degree lower at 18° C. Most of tomorrow may feature either full sunshine or sunny spells, and maybe the temperature may briefly reach 19° C. At the moment it is no more than a wish, but notice the amount of sunshine promised for Wednesday onwards in the screenshot of the early forecast this morning.

  Yesterday seemed like another nice day - although not really nice in terms of the weather - it was generally dull. I think I would only have to push the boundaries a bit to say that yesterday was almost an active day ! The most active activity was just a walk to a local shop.

  Yesterday morning I wrote I was considering the possibility of a walk, but had decided I probably wouldn't go on. Well of course there is walking, and there is walking, and the latter includes a walk to and from the little supermarket on Catford Bridge. Such a short walk should have been easy, but I found my legs feeling stiff. My initial thoughts about that were a bit gloomy, but this morning I remembered that even when I was doing a lot of walking, it would often be the case that my legs wouldn't free up until I had walked half a mile, and even a mile in some cases. Maybe my legs are not as bad as I thought they were.

  The main reason for going to the mini supermarket was to get more instant noodles after I found most of my favourites were behind the temporary walls put up while some sort of work is being carried on in Tesco. I also have different favourites in the mini supermarket, and they are the Polish instant noodles, and in particular the tomato and beetroot flavoured instant noodles.

  I also got some mushroom flavoured noodles, plus some of those small "salad" pots. I got a couple of couscous and a couple of bulgar wheat pots, but no lentils this time. In addition I got a little snack pot of two different types of olives with mushroom and artichoke. The latter was curiously nice, or maybe I just couldn't put it down. I doubt it was terribly healthy, although having said that, some olive oil in the diet is supposed to be good for you in some unexplained way (possibly only said by olive growers).

  It was as good as lunch time when I got home again, and I think I probably over indulged in some of the stuff I had just bought. I gave it maybe half an hour to settle before doing some laundry I had left soaking in detergent after my morning shower. It was only one t-shirt, one pair of lounge pants, and some underwear, and I finished the job in one go. I had started it, after my shower, under the delusion it might dry in some sunshine, albeit later in the afternoon.

  I don't think that washing saw any sunshine at all while it was on the washing line, but it was warm, and there was enough breeze to jiggle it about as it hung on the washing line. When I brought it in, maybe around 7pm, it was mostly dry, although the bottom of the lounge pants did still feel very wet. The t-shirt would have been mildly unpleasant at first, but was just dry enough if I had wanted to wear it straight away. I guess if I were a proper housewife with an ironing board, ironing it would have been easily enough to get it warm and perfectly dry. I do own an iron, but sadly I don't own an ironing board.

  Probably the highlight of the day was the grand opening of the Soup beer cans with Jodie.
  It is, of course, a ridiculous concept, and that is probably why I have now shown this same picture three times now - just in case you don't believe there is such a thing as Soup beer. It is brewed by The Garage Brewery in Barcelona (Spain), and they use extra oats, plus extra glucose, or some similar sweetener, to make soupy looking beer. I think it was possibly just a one off experiment because I believe they are an experimental brewery.

  I feel sure the cans are not in the right order, but there are two cans of 6% beer, one can of 7% beer, and the other is 8%. The terrible thing is that they all taste almost identical to each other, and overall it is an unpleasant taste to my palate. Jodie actually described the muck as "pleasant".

  We didn't seem to drink much yesterday afternoon. We shared the 440ml cans, having half each, and that probably doesn't add up to much more than a pint and a quarter each. I topped on about 3/4 pint of a German pilsner style beer. Oddly enough I didn't fully enjoy even that. I found it had a slightly musty, yeasty sort of taste. In terms of beer tasting it was not a good session, but overall it was a pleasant diversion for a Sunday afternoon.

  Once Jodie had left I had my dinner of a diced lamb and sprouts stew. That was almost nice, but I did over do the Habernero chillie flakes. It was good being hot, but it was also bad because it overrode the delicate taste of the lamb. Maybe because it was hot that I wanted a dessert. I had two slightly crinkled oranges bought from the little supermarket on Catford Bridge. They were slightly dry inside, and not as nice as some oranges. I have a suspicion that they were of a type of orange that is considered not cosmetically good enough for most supermarkets, but they did have one plus point - they did seem to peel easily.

  Yesterday afternoon and evening seemed to be the time for not enjoying anything. While eating, and for maybe half an hour after, I watched two of series 12 of Red Dwarf. The last few series of Red Dwarf, and series 12 may have been the very last, were specially commissioned by Dave, and while a brave effort to try and capture how good Red Dwarf was, they rarely have the full vibe. I guess if they had shown a third episode last night I would probably have watched it (and moaned about it later) but they only showed 2, and that seemed enough.

  It was well before sunset when, having turned off the TV, I went to bed. Initially I thought I would spend a lot of time reading, but it was not long before I felt like putting the book down, and turning out the light. Sunset was at 8.53pm PM last night, and judging by the light seen around the curtains, it was still not quite sunset when I fell asleep. Let's call it 8.45pm because it makes the maths easier.

  At 10:45pm, or exactly 2 hours later, I woke up feeling like I had had a really good sleep. It was almost disappoint to see there was still an hour and a quarter of the old day left. Having not drunk that much beer - in terms of pints, but still enough to get mildly drunk - I only needed a small pee, and I was soon back to sleep. Apart from feeling a bit cold again at around 3am, and turning the heater on, I seemed to have a very comfortable night. I wasn't keeping score, but I have only a vague idea I may have only woken to pee twice more before I got up.

  I was sleeping so well that it it was almost 7am before I got up this morning. It was nice to get up with only a slight amount of stiff and creakiness. I assume I slept well from the ease of doing it, and the length of it, but somehow I don't feel terribly refreshed this morning. It might be just the weather, but I can't blame the weather for yet another dangerously high blood glucose reading this morning. Fresh batteries should have ruled low battery voltage causing my meter to give incorrect readings. I still have my doubts about the test strips I am using, but the real blame should probably be laid on the two oranges I ate late at night, and those Soup beers. 10.8mmol/l is still a seriously high reading and I ought to try extra hard to do something about it today.

  I have already failed in one respect. I started that awful cod liver oil capsule taste with the occasional burp earlier, and gave in and had a single portion of instant noodles to stop it. I guess there was also the call of the brand new packets I had just bought, but really, to blame that, I should have had the beetroot flavour - one of my favourites that I haven't had for a long while.

  My thermometers agree it is 15° C and rising outside, but the grey light now finding it hard to seep through the greyer looking clouds that have recently gathered, looks cold. It is putting me off the one thing I ought to do today, and that is to get out, and at the very least, go and take some pictures of trains while putting a few more miles on my Freedom Pass. Ideally I would be doing a 5 mile walk, and in some fantasy place doing it as a very fast walk, but I can't really face thinking about that. Maybe I'll hop on a train, with camera in hand later....or maybe I won't.
 This morning is the great Cream Soda taste test. The Tesco, sugar free, cream soda was obviously bought from Tesco. The Barrs "American" Cream Soda was bought in the supermarket on Catford Bridge yesterday. The Tesco, when bought with a Clubcard is 6 cans for £1.80, or 30p a can. The Barrs was, as it says on the tin, 59p per tin. Both are nice enough, but the American influence definitely comes through in the Barrs version. It is close to tasting too sweet, and the vanilla flavour possibly more artificial tasting. The Tesco flavour is less over the top, and it would be my choice. Maybe neither is as good as R Whites cream soda, but I expect my taste buds have changed beyond recognition since I were a kid !