Contrary to what the weather forecast may show, it was bright and sunny for the first couple of daylight hours. Now it seems to have revert to the light gloom that is forecast. It looks like there has been a recent light shower too. The cloud will thicken at midday, and later on there will be light rain at variable times in the afternoon and early evening. The latest revision has added an extra hour of 11° C to that shown in the screenshot above. Tomorrow could be mostly dry, except for a couple of hours of light rain (Met Office) or feature rain or drizzle for most of the day (BBC forecast). Both forecasters agree that 10° C will be the best we can expect, and several degrees or more cooler at the ends of the day.

    The unexpected sunshine yesterday morning started off the day nicely, but overall it was a miserable day for all sorts of reasons. The principle problem was that I felt lousy. At times I wondered if I might have several different diseases, but it was all probably just the changing weather.

  I definitely ached yesterday, and it was almost the sort of aches and stiffness you might get from mild 'flu. I even had times when it felt like I might have a fever because I kept feeling cold. My medical thermometer showed my temperture to be perfectly normal. Maybe the early sunshine made me think it should be warmer than it was, and so I often had the heater off, or low, for too long.

  As I reported yesterday, I had a bad night, losing quite a bit of sleep, and so the idea of laying down, quietly reading was very attractive. I did a fair bit of that, but although I closed my eyes a few times, I didn't seem to be able to fall asleep for a snooze. Even laying down I could still feel an assortment of aches and pains. My right knee and right elbow were often troublesome, and from time to time my neck felt rather stiff and creaky.

  To add to my woes I was anxious about when a parcel delivery might arrive. I was frequently checking Hermes website, and all it would say was it was due to go out for delivery, and I would be informed when, and when it might arrive. I got no messages to inform me of when it had gone out, or when it might arrive, but eventually the website said it was expected to be delivered between 2pm and 4pm.

  It actually arrived at about 4.10pm, which was late, but not too bad. What was annoying was upon opening the parcel I found 12 bottles of Hot Pepper sauce, each individually wrapped in bubblewrap, but they were the wrong size. It was my mistake, I though the 85ml were the big bottles I prefer, and which very few shops in Catford regularly stock. The real big annoyance is that I didn't think the price was so bad - assuming it was for the 170ml bottles, but for 85ml bottles it was a real rip off, and I could have bought them cheaper in Tesco without all the stress of waiting all day for them to be delivered.

  What with the gloomy light outside, and the aches and pains, plus the disappointment of the delivery, I was feeling quite miserable. I was already feeling miserable enough earlier to have come close to an incredibly rare state (for me) of being off my food. Of course such a thing was impossible, but I didn't have much during the day. I had a few rice crackers with cheese, and I opened a bag of crisps. I had some crisps, but most of them are still in the bag, closed with a paper bulldog clip just a foot away from my keyboard as I type this, this morning.

  At some time in the afternoon, possibly mid afternoon, I spotted a menu I had saved for a Chinese takeaway, and more importantly, I spotted an internet address on it. A seed of an idea was planted in my brain, and with no desire to go and prepare something for dinner in a freezing cold kitchen, I decided to ignore the stupidity of it, and ordered a Chinese takeaway for dinner.

  There was a strong chance it would blow my blood glucose readings off the end of the scale, but I took a chance on four items. Maybe I was worried about it so much that I just had two items for my dinner, and kept the other two for tonight's dinner. Last night, while watching a tedious episode of Star Trek: Enterprise, I ate the roast pork chow mein, and the roast pork with green pepper in black bean sauce. Both were very nice, and just about filling enough to not give in to eating any of tonight's dinner as a third course last night.

  Half an hour after Star Trek: Enterprise finished I watched The Simpsons on ITV4+1. After that there was an hour wait for QI. I passed the hour reading, and then turned the TV back on. I watched about 5 minutes of QI before deciding that reading was more enjoyable. I read quite a bit - mainly because the book is a collection of short stories, and I read through to the end of a story. It seemed a good time to put the book down, and try for sleep. I think I was asleep by 10pm.

  I slept OK until about 1am. During that time I had a dream that I part remember. It was unusual for me that it seemed to based on theatre and plays, and even tried to bring in a bit of Shakespeare by the back door. The part I remember was an empty theatre with part of the stage having a sort of thin plywood box covering a part of it. Another part hard a sort of paper tent covering it.

  An actor was saying something from behind the plywood, and he asked me if I could still hear him. I said his voice was a bit muffled, but easy to hear. He then moved to behind the paper tent-like screen, and asked if he was any clearer. I said as clear as day. He then appeared, and I told him that if he wanted to chat with another actor while a play was in progress he had to be at least in the wings, and preferably in a dressing room - because, as Shakespeare said...... At that point I ran out of words, but I had this sort of idea that Shakespeare had words for describing actors in the wings, and those in the dressing rooms, but even in the cold light of day I can't imagine it wasn't just pure fantasy.

  From 1am I just couldn't get back to sleep for over an hour, but once I did fall asleep I seemed to sleep well until about 4am. I woke up from a dream that I had been asked to do some work in a telephone exchange. It was a building I spent many a happy day in over 30 years ago, and of course after all that time it was not surprising that much of it had changed. I still recognised it in the dream, but there was a lot of modern telecoms equipment I did not recognise. Fortunately my job was "procedures".

  I asked when was the last time the emergency generator was tested, and was told no one could remember. I explained that back in the day when we were confident it was in perfect working order we would test it by throwing the main breakers to simulate a power cut. It would always cut in within a minute or so of starting almost instantly, and then we would run it for about half an hour to make sure all the lubricant was circulating over all parts. I suggested we used the test start button to test it rather than just cutting the power. We didn't do it then, but it was scheduled for the next day.

  I was then distracted by "work" when, like in many exchanges I visited or worked in, people had hobbies they followed in slack time, In the dream I discovered that one man had an old fashioned cash register that he was rebuilding. In the state I saw it all that he had to do was to fashion a few missing or broken buttons. The strange thing is that those cash register wee purely mechanical and powered by the human using it, but this one had a sort of umbilical cord to a big wooden box which was, in turn, plugged into the mains. It was a mechanical computer that could identify coins, and sort them out into the correct parts of the cash drawers. I looked in my pocket and found a few old coins that it could sort.

  I can't remember if that dream stopped or just faded out when I woke up at 6.20am. Ordinarily I would have got up then, but my bedrrom was feeling nice and warm (I had turned the heater on full when I woke up at 4am), and I seemed to feel comfortable (or at least didn't seem to need a pee). I turned over and thought that maybe I might sleep for half an hour. I actually slept for over another hour. When I woke up the idea of going for a pee seemed non urgent, but still very desirable.

  I was working on the miserable assumption that my Chinese takeaway would have fouled up my blood glucose, but maybe it didn't. The Contour meter gave a reading of 8.3mmol/l. That was a surprise because it is almost low, and definitely below average. The GlucoRX meter showed and even lower reading of just 7.2mmol/l, and that is amazingly low. Of course, as it seems to do on 9 out of 10 occasions, the Viva Chek meter went totally insane and said 9.6mmol/l. A second attempt gave a reading of 8.8mmol/l - still a lot higher than the other two, but at least it was in the sane town.

  Maybe I won't worry too much about tonight's dinner of Singapore fried rice and Szechuan Chicken. Both should be very spicy, and with luck neither will have any added sugar. There is one complication about this dinner, and that is whether I will have it tonight. Last night the idea of going to a gig was just fantasy. Tonight there are some good reasons why I should try to get to a gig. Chain are playing in The Partridge pub. There are pros of cons for this gig. The worst negative thing is always the very late start and the very poor lighting.

  The pros include Chris temporary re-joining Chain for this gig, and the fact there are a lot of nearby gigs that will draw some of the worst crowds away from a pub that can get ram packed. As much as I would like to go, there are some other reasons why it is probably unlikely. The weather forecast have added more and heavier rain to the forecast, and it may not finish before I would want to go out to get the bus to Bromley. It will probably be quite chilly as well - probably only about 8ﾟ C, and that may be rather too cold for my chest. Maybe I'll decide to be a hero at the last moment, but.....