This morning features almost clear skies and good sunshine. By my reckoning the temperature has already risen a degree above the forecast to 18° C. The latest revision to the forecast still says the temperature should rise to 25° C this afternoon, but has replaced some periods of sunshine with sunny spells, and part of the afternoon with just white cloud. Tomorrow starts with sunny spells, but ends with full sunshine. The temperature should reach just 23° C in the afternoon. The BBC generally agrees with the Met Office about tomorrow, but says the afternoon temperature should reach 25° C. Friday looks interesting. The Met Office currently says dull with light rain. The BBC has gone over the top again with forecast for thunderstorms through the day. The BBC like thunderstorms !

  If I had been able to give a real prediction for what I would do yesterday it would have been wrong. I had no idea what I would end up doing. It all started with hand washing a bath towel. As I mentioned yesterday, I had started the job the day before, and had to finish it yesterday.

  Yesterday was bright and dry, and so drying that towel on the washing line would be the thing to do, but there was a problem. Admittedly it was a minor problem, but I turned it into a major problem. That initial problem was a lot of stinging nettles overhanging the garden path. If I had long trousers and boots on it would have been no problem at all, but I would be wearing flip flops and shorts !

  The first thing to do was to put on a pair of boots. Having done that I also put on a short. i then did another job first. It was to cut up several cardboard boxes that I had just chucked into my old workshop to get them out of the way. I sliced them up with a box cutter into pieces about A4 size - but some were a bit bigger, and some a bit smaller. It made a stack of cardboard about 8 or 9 inched high that I deposited in the recycling bin.

  Next it was time to tackle those stinging nettles. I donned a pair of thick-ish gardening gloves and pulled them up. I also pulled up a lot of other stuff growing where my lawn should be. It included a bramble shoot that was getting out of control - it was nearly 6 ft long ! As I dumped it in the garden waste bin I saw that the far end actually had some ripe blackberries on it. I hadn't noticed them before then. I also pulled a lot of high weeds under where I would be hanging the towel to dry.

  There were a few more scattered weeds that I pulled up. I could have gone even further, but I was starting to sweat in the sunshine. I went back indoors, and was about to head up to the bathroom where I was washing the bath towel, but I noticed how many small bits of cardboard had been shed onto the floor as I cut up the boxes. I would usually have got the hoover out, but I couldn't be bothered to go upstairs to get it, and used a broom, plus dustpan and brush. It seemed to do almost as good a job as the hoover. By that time I really was hot and sweaty.

  I had to have a rest before I finished the towel. Once I had cooled off a bit I did the final four rinses (making about 8 in all), and then hung the towel up to dry. It would still be a few hours before the sun had moved far enough west to shine on the towel, but once it did the towel was soon hot and dry - except for the very bottom where the sun hadn't quite reached when I brought it in around 5pm. I was surprised to find the bottom edge still very damp. I left it on the clothes horse overnight, and it is perfectly dry and ready to use this morning.

  One thing I didn't do was to each much through the day. Maybe I felt too busy to snack or something. I did have a fairly light lunch at about 1pm. It was just 4 rice cakes with cheese and white onion on them, plus a squirt of mayonnaise to hold the cheese on like glue. It is worth noting that I did have a double helping of two small packs of instant noodles for breakfast. They were a brand who make a nice spicy flavour noodles that I very often buy and eat, but yesterday they were chicken flavour. They weren't exactly bland, but they failed to excite. I would buy them again if that was all there was, but with more exciting flavours to eat I will ignore them in future.

   The afternoon also included a snooze, and that helped pass half an hour or more. All too soon it was TV time with the usual three Star Treks. All were less than inspiring, although what always seemed to be the worst series, Deep Space Nine, was the best on offer last night. I think it was when they had themselves got sick of all the religious stuff, and went for more "space action".....although, having said that, I can't seem to remember a single thing about the plot !

  I waited until just gone 6pm before I had my dinner. It was pork casserole, cooked in the slow cooker over the course of two days. It's ingredients included red cabbage and a couple of small red onions. To thicken it up I added some gravy granules - a mix of chicken and beef flavours. It was nice, but not that nice. The trouble is that pork can be a very bland meat that is best roasted, fried or grilled.

  One thing I am forgetting happened earlier. It was to take a couple of test shots taken with my trusted Nikon D300s camera, but with my new wide angle lens on it, and another shot taken with my new Nikon D610 camera with my tried and trusted medium zoom lens.
  This picture of the towel hanging on the line was taken with the Nikon D300s with the new wide angle lens. I've cropped the picture so it is the equivalent to using some extra zoom. I am not sure I am happy with it. The image looks a bit soft, but when I zoomed in I could see the weave of the towel material, although it was fuzzy.
  I made an instant mess when taking this picture. I had left the white balance set to indoor incandescent light. Daylight contains much more blue, and to a lesser extent green. I thought I had corrected the wrong colour temperature, but when seeing the two images together it is obvious this lower one is still very blue. On the other hand, it is a very sharp image, and zooming in on the original so only a small patch of towel, maybe a foot square, it was still modestly sharp. That new camera, combined with my best lens, is a cracking combination - providing I set it up right !

  Back to last night, and after the third Star Trek had ended I did very little for an hour except for taking a couple of Paracetamol tablets. I only had a few moderate aches, but I knew i would find more, and they would feel stronger once I was laying in bed, in the dark. They seemed to work a treat. I am not sure when I turned the light out, maybe not long after 9pm, but I seemed to fall asleep very easily.

  I seemed to sleep very well last night. I can only remember waking for a pee twice in the night, and after each I was asleep again in minutes. Had I been awake more in the night I might have remembered a few more dreams, but I do remember the essence of one of the last dreams I had. It seemed like a very long dream, and most details have now evaporated except for some of the bigger details.

  One part of the dream was showing someone into my front room. We had to pass a couple of racks of electronic equipment bought or salvaged from a telephone exchange. It seemed like it was in working order, but I am not sure what it was doing. A bit later it seemed like I was actually living in an old telephone exchange. I was with a few people. I can't remember what we were doing, but all of a sudden i heard a sort bong - similar to a noise a mobile phone might make, but I quickly realised it was something else.

  It might have been in an adjacent room, or maybe just across the room from where I was with those other people, but there was a "test desk" - used for testing lines and stuff in a telephone exchange.