Much of yesterday was very nice. It was only around midday that it was close to horrible. The sky became very dull, and there was a sprinkle of light rain. After that it became mostly bright, with a lot of sunny spells - slightly better than the morning. It never felt hot, but the sunshine did feel nice and warm. I was not in sight of any thermometers, but I think the afternoon temperature was probably slightly higher  than the forecast 18° C.
       

  It is bright and sunny with a clear blue sky as I write this, but the forecast says it won't last for more than a couple of hours. From midday there will be light cloud until the end of the day, although the BBC say the cloud could turn dark for a few hours at the end of the afternoon, but both forecasters say it should stay dry. The highest temperature could be a disappointing 17° C, although the BBC say a slight more optimistic, but still disappointing 18° C. Tomorrow we skip back to April, or earlier. There may be no sunshine, and sometimes the cloud will be grey or very grey, and there may be occasional splashes of generally light rain. The temperature will struggle to reach a chilly 15° C,

   Yesterday, or at least a lot of it, was very enjoyable, but it was a very tiring day. The main event was going to the top of Hilly Fields to see 4 bands playing as part of the Brockley Max festival. Two of the bands were very good, one, a solo singer/guitarist, was quite good, and the other I did not care for.

  My aim was to get to Hilly Fields at about 3pm, and I think I probably got there at about 2:55pm. It should have been straightforward getting there. I took a train to Ladywell, and then a few minutes walking took me to a bus stop where I could get the 484 bus. I only had to wait 6 minutes for the bus, but things went wrong once I was on it. I knew it should have been only two stops, but the second was called Cliffview, and for some reason I was looking out for Hillcrest Road.

  I didn't get off at the Cliffview stop, and thirty second later the bus had hit the top of the hill, and started going down the other side of the hill, and it went down quite a long way ! My walk to the park entrance was still a lot less than if I had walked from Ladywell, but it was still very arduous, and I had to stop twice to get my breath back/let the angina pains subside. I felt very uncomfortable once I was in the park, but the path to where the stage was seemed to be no more than the very gentlest of slopes.

  I found the stage was an inflatable structure, and a little smaller than would have been ideal for some of the bigger bands. I guess it was ideal for the smaller bands, or the solo singer/guitarist I saw. Unfortunately the band who were on when In got there were definitely not to my taste - a sort of soul band of the worst shouty kind. Oh well, they were useful to practise my camera work on, and get the feeling for the light.

  It did not take long to realise there were a few people I knew there. One person was Ravi Sharman, once guitar technician to Eric Clapton, and at Hilly Fields I think he had loaned/hired out some of his own gear for the stage. The other man was the man in charge of the stage, but not the sound. I keep forgetting his name, but he was also doing the announcements between bands. I have seen him at many outdoor gigs, and he remembered me as being a trusted photographer, and suggested I could go backstage to take some photos.
  Once the horrible band had finished, the next set was from Anita Raj - pictured above. She played electro-acoustic guitar and sang. I can't be sure, but I think she may have sung a few songs she had written herself. I would guess that she was not used to playing to such a big crowd, and had a slightly nervous start. One she got warmed up she was fine, although it wasn't until her final song, something well known, which I can't remember the name of, or who it was originally by, She sounded quite enthusiastic while she played and sung that,
  In the middle of Anita's set Carrie and Steve turned on - which was handy because they were next on ! Once they had sorted themselves out I got them to pose under a tree for a few possible publicity photos. With hindsight they were great photos for a family album, but maybe not for publicity. I did send them via messenger, and said they could use them in any way they felt like.

  If there had been more time I might have tried to find a better place for the snaps I took of them. I started off using my fish eye lens, and I hoped that the centre would be in the right proportions, and then try some effects on the stretched views around them. Unfortunately, my Nikon D610 is a "full plate" camera with a much bigger imaging area, and the resulting picture was surrounded by a black pattern where the image from the lens didn't cover most of the sensor. It would have been fine on my Nikon D80 camera, and possibly on my Nikon D310.

  Unfortunately, as I write this, I haven't had time to select any more pictures, and prepare them to show here. I hope I have some great pictures of Caz And Steve Duo on stage, but I do know not all pictures were even slightly usuable. One problem through the whole time I was there was the sun alternating with some dark clouds. Some pictures were under exposed, which can be compensated for, and some were badly over exposed, which can't be compensated for.

  The band I was dreading, and was inspiring me to think of ways of getting out of earshot of them, failed to turn up. There were two consequences of this. The first was that the raffle seemed to be extended until it passed from boring to ultra boring, and the headline band, Guns 2 Roses, and Guns And Roses tribute band, coming on early, and doing a longer set than they had planned for. While the interminable raffle was going on, I got them to pose for me.

  I'm in two minds about Guns 2 Roses. I caught hints that some of them did not know the songs well enough, and occasionally the two guitarists would seem to play different tunes for a few seconds. On the other hand, they did manage to look like the originals. Their Axl Rose did look like a complete dick head, and I believe that was very true of the original towards the end of their first brief stardom. Curiously enough, despite originally coming from America, he had lived very locally to Hilly Fields for the last 20 years. The keyboard player (I was not previously aware that Guns And Roses had a keyboard player) was introduced as the only member who was English, and had to correct to say that he was Polish !

  For the three hours I was there (approx) I didn't drink a thing, and that was mostly because there were often long queues for just two portaloos (although I think the nearby cafe does have public toilets). I didn't fancy having to use those portaloos. Generally I felt OK, but I did get one brief hint of sciatica, and my left ankle seemed to ache a bit. Going back to the non drinking, it was my plan to head to The Jolly Farmers pub for a pint of Guinness on my way home.

  I hoped that with the way back to Ladywell village being all downhill, it might be a comfortable walk, and it was. Of course walking down a very steep hill means partly keeping the brakes on, and that takes a bit of energy. As I walked down the hill I checked on train times from Ladywell, and saw that I was in with a chance to get the next train back to Catford Bridge. Going over the footbridge to get to the Down platform (towards Catford Bridge) just took me over the top, and the walk down the platform was quite uncomfortable.

  I made it to the station with at least 6 minutes to spare - a lot quicker than I imagined. That was useful because it allowed me to rest until the angina pains had almost disappeared. At Catford Bridge I was feeling good enough to not need to slow down at the start of my walk home, but I had barely gone halfway before I had to stop for a minute, and then walk a lot slower. It was great to get home for a rest, and to take my shoes off. They were a very rarely used, and almost like new, pair of Converse trainers, and they felt very stiff. My feet and ankles were very sore at the end.
  Pictured above is what was the core of my dinner. I added a sprinkle of balsamic dressing, and also some ready cooked, sliced, BBQ flavoured chicken. With hindsight, the chicken did not really do anything to improve it, and maybe have actually been detrimental to my blood glucose levels. I got home at approximately 6.45pm, and I wanted to transfer the pictures from my camera to my PC before I ate. I probably had dinner later than 7.30pm - a bit later than usual.

  I felt dreadfully tired last night. In guess my stamina for outdoor life is at an all time low at the moment. I was still determined to get a few pictures selected and edited before going to bed. I ended up with five pictures of Caz and Steve under the tree, and (I think) five pictures of Anita Raj before I gave up. I could possibly have done some pictures of the first band I saw, but I didn't care for them, and they are my lowest priority.

  I know it was gone 9pm when I went to bed. I laid down on the bed with the idea I would read for a while, but I felt so tired I just closed my eyes, and seemed to be instantly asleep. I think it was between 1 and 2am when I woke up feeling cold, and very creaky.  I turned the heater on low, went for a pee, and made sure I partly pulled the duvet over me before falling asleep again very quickly.

  Only about an hour passed before i woke up again, and I am not sure why. I went for another pee, but there seemed to be no urgency about it. When I went back to bed I think it was almost two hours before I managed to fall asleep again. I don't really know why it took so long to get back to sleep, but it was probably because I was feeling uncomfortable in many little small ways. Some of it was balancing between too hot under the full duvet, and too cold without some of the duvet, but it was also various little aches from my ankles, knees, and other assorted bits of me.

  Once I got to sleep I seemed to have some good, but dreamless sleep. Maybe it was the bright morning seeping around the curtains, but I woke up again at about 5.30am. I clnched my eyes shut, and managed to get back to sleep until a more reasonable 6.30am. One thing I did before almost anything else was to get on the scales. A very light diet and some exercise showed as a nice low weight. Since the 1st January I seem to have lost 3kg, or approximately half a stone - which is not that much, but better than nothing.

  While me weight was good news, my blood glucose measurements were not good news. I had fantasies that the readings might be extra low this morning, but it seems what was in my dinner, and possibly how late I ate it, did not leave me as depleted of glucose as much as I hoped. I had hoped for "three cherries" - all readings in the dark green (under 7mmool/l). The Contour meter read 7.6mmol/l - light green. The GlucoRX meter read 7.7mmol/l. The Sinocare mater read 8.1mmol/l.  These readings are still good, but not excellent as hoped.  Maybe to make up for it, my blood pressure is rather good this morning, just 109/48.

  There are several things that could happen today, but probably won't. There are no trains to/from Catford Bridge today because of engineering work. That means it is very unlikely I'll see Jodie today for a beer tasting session. If she should decide to get the bus I hope she lets me know before the morning is over. Assuming she is not coming it would leave me free to go all the way, by two bus rides, to Ye Olde Whyte Lyon pub where Simon Whitestar is doing an afternoon semi acoustic gig.

  I would otherwise been tempted to go to that gig, but I think my priority today is to get back to yesterday's photography, and get at least the Caz And Steve Duo, and if possible, the Guns 2 Roses photo albums done. I took a hell of a lot of pictures of Guns 2 Roses trying to get the perfect pose of most band members and the whole band. It seems ridiculous, but I took 288 pictures of them, and I know that I will only end up with maybe 20 decent pictures out of that lot.

  As a final P.S. I followed the advice I mentioned yesterday, and left my Sony HiDefinition camcorder conected to the charger for a full 24 hours (and it is still connected now). It seems it has revived the internal battery that keeps the internal clock going, and saves any options set in previous use while changing the main battery. I think that in future I will leave a battery in the camcorder while it is not in use - even if it does self discharge a lot over the months, I now have a spare battery that I can use while the other is charging in my external charger. All I have to do now is to use that camcorder instead of letting it collect dust.


 





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