Clear skies this morning meant a rather cold morning. My outside thermometers agreed it was between 7 and 8° C before sunrise. There should be some sunny spells, and even full sunshine today, but the afternoon looks like it will be afflicted with a couple of hours of light rain. It is going to be a cold day with no more than 13° C expected. Tomorrow could be very sunny, but paradoxically it could feel like winter. The Met Office say 6am tomorrow could be down to 6° C, and the BBC say just 4° C while saying it will feel like just 2° C. It is possible that tomorrow morning could see the first frost of the autumn. The afternoon temperature may be no more than 11° C !

   Yesterday was not a good day at all. I have a feeling that I felt really bad for more reasons than a hangover and a lack of sleep, although of course both must take some of the blame. During my long period of insomnia in the early hours of yesterday, I was thrashing about in bed a lot trying to find that one magical position where I might fall asleep. That was an added reason to feel quite poorly.

  The trouble with tossing and turning so much in the night was that I think I triggered my so called "twisted rib" problem again. I think it is actually more of a twisted sternum problem. I am sure that back in 2013, while recovering from my quad heart bypass operation, it was my sternum that I damaged by carrying 10 times the weight my surgeon told me was the max I should carry for at least three months.

  I can almost offer some proof that my sternum remains damaged, and possibly split. While laying on my back, trying to snooze yesterday, my chest was clicking every time I breathed. By pressing down on my sternum I could stop that clicking. That clicking was completely painless, but it was still distracting me enough to stop me falling asleep. Pressing on my sternum using my hand seemed such an unnatural thing to do that It also stopped me falling asleep.

  That (probable) sternum problem, plus a handful of the usual aches and pains, added to the depressing effects of the weather, and other reasons for feeling depressed. It made for a miserable sort of day - just the thing you don't need when trying to be very careful about what, and how much you eat. On the whole I almost managed to eat sensibly. There were only two exceptions to this that I can think of.

  One was what I had for elevenses. It was bag of strong flavour corn puffs that I mentioned I had bought in Tesco on Thursday. Despite all the positive writing and stuff on the bag, they were a big disappointment. I didn't think they had much of a cheesy taste, although it might have been related to a slight cheese taste. I am still unsure if the sugar content was very low. The bag did say no added sugar, but some things have a lot of inherent sugar.

  The other big unknown was the bottle of beer I drank in the evening. It was a barrel ages Barley wine style beer, and as such it was quite sweet, and almost sugary. It could have been the entire source of my woes this morning (more about that further down the page). Of course, at the time, it was very delicious, and the reason why I cracked open such a special, wax sealed, bottle. (I just hope Jodie doesn't realise it has disappeared).

  I don't think I did a single useful thing yesterday. Hoovering the dining room carpet could have been a bit therapeutic, but I just didn't feel like doing anything like that. The most positive thing I did was to intensely rest while laying on my bed, either trying to read, or to snooze, while some of the rare sunshine was shining through the windows, and warming my bedroom up.

  I almost forgot that there was one slightly positive thing I did yesterday. It was to do a small backlog of washing up, but it's prime purpose was to wash up the Pyrex casserole dish I needed to cook my dinner in, so I am not sure if that counts or not. Dinner was a chicken and cauliflower stew that was fortified with too much gravy granules in the last step before serving. it was rather nice, but the excess gravy granules made it extremely thick and almost sticky.

  As usual, I ate my dinner while watching a bit of TV (the three Star Treks) and went to bed soon after the last Star Trek had finished at 8pm. I may have read for half an hour before turning the light out. For a short while, maybe no more than 5 minutes, I didn't think I would fall asleep, but then I found myself waking up 3 or 4 hours later. I did have one period of insomnia last night, but it was possibly less than an hour, and it might have been less.

  I can't seem to remember when I had the one series of linked dreams that left some memories behind. I keep thinking it might have been in the first long periods of sleep, but I am unsure. What I do remember is that it was a very weird dream, and my afterthought was that it was probably a series of shorter dreams with different backgrounds that make it seem so weird.

  The essence of the dream was that I appeared to be staying in a hotel, and because it was so busy I ended up having to share my room with a rock band. That seemed fun, but the consequences got almost funny. I can't remember enough details to describe the steps  in all the changes, but the essential thing is that my room got bigger and bigger until it was the size of a ballroom.

  One my concerns in the dream(s) was that the position of my bed kept changing. It started off next to a wall with a window in it, but gradually moved away from the wall. The space between the wall and the bed was filled with chairs of various descriptions, and the other side of the bed was almost next to a large table that was a sort dividing thing in the centre of the room. If I wanted to get into bed I would have to climb in from the bottom of the bed.

  On the other side of the table the lead singer of the band decided it was easier to crap into a waste bin rather than find the toilets. In what I suspect was the next short dream a new toilet block was built in one end of the room which was now about 50ft long, and maybe 30ft wide. In what was probably another short dream, one of the members of the band had a day job as a scaffolder, and was using scaffolding to build two more beds so another two members of the band could stay in the same room.

  It is both annoying, but good that all I can remember of these dreams are just snapshots rather than any long dialogue, or I would be spending all day trying to describe it all. While I can't remember when in the night I had these dreams, I do know that the last dream, which was similar in style, but not quite an extension of the long dreams, was just before I woke up and got up. I seem to recall enjoying it, but now I can't remember any details worth mentioning. Maybe the real good thing about it was a confirmation that I had managed to get back to sleep when I thought I had woken up too early, although maybe the real confirmation was that the clock had jumped forward around an hour.

  There was no good news when I checked my blood glucose level this morning. In fact it was rather bad news. The very highest reading was on my newest meter. It read an alarming 9.9mmol/l - that is only just under the red line ! The other meters were not quite that bad. The older meter read 9.5mmol/l, and the oldest read just 9.2mmol/l. The use of the word "just" makes it seem like it is not too bad, but even that figure is very much unwanted.

  The worst thing about these high readings is that I am unsure how they are this high. It doesn't seem like I can pin all the blame on the barrel ages barley wine style beer. The whole point about it being barrel aged is that it gives time for the yeast to carry on working converting sugar into alcohol to make a very strong beer (it was at least 10% and probably more). In theory it should have had a low sugar content despite it having a syrupy, and sweet feel to it.

  If I can't blame the barley wine style beer, then there has to be something else causing these high blood glucose readings. One good possibility is that my body is fighting some sort of disease. This theory falls down on a lack of other symptoms, but maybe there are some easily overlooked mild symptoms. My body temperature seems about normal, but my blood pressure does seem a very small bit higher than typical, although it is still well below any reading that would be considered above normal.

  One thing I have noticed is a return to an easily provoked cough. I am not generally coughing, but I can be triggered to. Using some strong mouthwash last night was enough to trigger quite a coughing fit as it dried out at the back of my throat. Maybe stirring up a bit of dust as I was preparing my morning pills was a possible reason for some quite vigorous coughing. Oddly enough, one thing that didn't cause me to cough, although it often does, was eating my phyically hot, and very spicy instant noodles for breakfast.

  Maybe if I have an illness it is all in my my. There is still the fact that since taking Angela's wedding photos I have not felt like using any of my big cameras (although I still use a pocket sized camera for train spotting on my one a week outings to the pub on a Wednesday lunch time. However, I definitely can raise any enthusiasm to go to any gigs, and tehse days I go to them more for the photo taking than the music. Maybe I am more deeply depressed than I think I am, although I like to think I am severely depressed - because it would be interesting.

  I am unsure what I will be doing today. I don't fancy going out in the midday rain , and I don't fancy going out in the cold, and I don't fancy going out in the dark to go to a gig, although there are a few I might ordinarily go to. I guess I am staying in and trying to concentrate on the idea of being very careful about what I eat, although the very idea makes me feel hungry !