Once again the weather forecast for yesterday was almost pure fantasy. There was rain, but most of it was after dark. The afternoon did bring a few light showers, and not a single hint of any thunderstorms close enough to be heard. Most sunshine was in the early morning, but there were a few sunny spells in the afternoon, and that seemed enough to push the temperature past the forecast 17° C to more like 20° C, and I thought I saw 21° C at one point in the late afternoon° C.
       

  Today's weather forecast from The BBC looks pretty grim, but I am not sure I should believe it after the last couple of days of forecasts that did not match reality. The latest revision has changed a few things. 10am is now shown as drizzle, and 4pm is now shown as heavy rain, The most welcome, but actually irrelevant change is that 11pm and midnight is now shown as dry. It looks like there is a zero chance of seeing any sun today....but that doesn't mean it won't happen ! The maximum temperature today may be just 18° C, and it is already that now. By 7pm it may have dropped to 17° C. The Met Office forecast shows less rain, but similar temperatures, and also a complete lack of sunshine. Tomorrow may feature a lot less rain, and there could be some sunshine late in the day. It should be warmer with 21° C forecast.
 
   Yesterday seemed to be an OK sort of day. It was not exciting, although maybe there were a few individual excitements. I think the best thing about yesterday was that it was not nearly as bad as the weather forecast predicted. As well as being considerably drier, it was also warmer. In fact when being very active it did feel quite warm.

  It did not feel warm when quietly reading, and after laying on my bed reading I decided I just had to turn the heater on low to warm the room a bit before I came back to it after washing my hair and having a shower. I guess I had that 1kw heater on for nearly 2 hours, but maybe that didn't matter too much. Yesterday morning my latest energy bills arrived. My gas had loads and loads of credit. I probably should reduce my standing order for my gas bill . For the first time this year my electricity bill has gone into credit, but not by much. If it does not snow soon, and maybe not until October (as it feels like it could in my blackest thoughts) I might even build up enough credit to pay for the whole of Octobers electricity bill, and than slowly sink into debt over winter.

  I was not optimistic that it would stay dry for a long enough period of time to pop out to the shops, but I was being too pessimistic. It was a more dry than wet in the end, and I did go out to the shops. I was not brave enough to not put a coat on, but in fact I didn't need one, and perhaps because of the humidity I was feeling rather too warm as I walked back from the shops with a lot more shopping than I had expected to buy.

  My first port of call was to Savers. I particularly wanted to see if they stocked more than one kind of soluble aspirin. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I found a packet in the back of my food cupboard of completely soluble aspirin under the Aspro brand. That packet was 20 years passed it's use by date. Each tablets seems to be very well sealed in individual foil pockets, and it seems like it shouldn't deteriorate. I have tried a couple with no apparent ill effect. The thing I like about them is they are not just soluble, but effervescent, and  dissolve into a clear liquid.

  Savers only had the one soluble aspirin, and I bought another packet of that. I noted they had some effervescent paracetamol tablets. I bought a pack, but they have two things wrong with them. One is that they are more than ten times more expensive than ordinary paracetamol. The second thing is that the slightly powdery liquid does not taste nice at all. The only good thing is that they may work a bit faster when taken.

  Other stuff bought from Savers was a couple of bottles of bleach, and a bottle of Surf laundry detergent. I also bought a bag of lavender scented big tea candles. They are weird. They have a very nice lavender small until they are lit, and then don't seem to smell of anything ! Also in my shopping basket was a bottle of shower gel that I have yet to try, a spare can of deodorant to replace one that is almost finished, and a packet of cheese flavoured rice crackers.

  I would normally cross the way to go into Poundstretcher after Savers, but like last time (I think) I went into Iceland. There were a few things I definitely wanted, and a few things I hoped to find in there. I was specifically after sugar free, or at least low sugar stuff. I found some sugar free biscuits I had tried before, and I bought them along with another two packets I had not seen or tried before.

  Once upon a time Iceland used to do special slimmers meals. They don't seem to sell them any more, and I wouldn't be surprised it was because across the range only one or two types was nice, and even those were not that healthy. Their replacement range goes under the brand name of "My Protein". That name sounds like something weightlifters would use to build their muscles, but I don't think they have lots of protein in them, but maybe the ratio is a bit higher because they do seem to be low in sugar and calories.

  I bought two "My Protein" items, and some stuff that was not specifically low anything. It included two six packs of crisps because they were two for £5 (or something like that), and three items from their 3 for a £5 shelf. I noted that there was a bigger selection of stuff there than I had noticed the last time I was in there. I also bought 2 tubes of each flavour Primula squeezy cheese. I suspect they are desperately unhealthy, but they are so handy, and delicious when squeezed onto rice crackers.

  When I walked from home to Savers I noticed I was getting close to some angina pains starting, but I didn't notice any walking home again. By then I was carrying quite a bit of shopping, and probably walking slower, but then again, the extra load would mean I was worker harder to walk home. It is one of the unpredictable things about angina. It was still good to get home, and put away all my shopping - except for a few things I intended to use straight away.

  One such thing was a packet of two small mature cheese flavour quiches. Each one was only about three inches across, and so eating two for lunch was not as greedy as might first seem. They were part of the three for £5 range, and so rather cheaper than Tesco's own brand of 6 inch quiches. Being cheaper might suggest they were inferior, but they had a much cheesier taste, and I think I would choose them every time over Tesco's offerings.
  I knew if I didn't add the time of day to the above photo I would forget when I took it. As can be seen it was taken at 12:58, and it shows just how gruesome the sky looked. Despite those glowering dark clouds it still remained dry, and made a nonsense of both the BBC and Met Office forecasts. It was, if I recall correctly, between 5 and 6pm before the first rain fell, and it was no more than between light and medium heavy rain.

  There was one thing I had to do, but I delayed that until I had had a lie down, and read some of my current book. I also delayed things until I had found, and ripped to mp3 files, a CD I knew I had, but couldn't find. The reason I couldn't find it before was I had misremembered what the CD looked like. Yesterday afternoon I had a sudden inspiration of what I should be looking for, and found it very quickly.
  I could not remember everything that was on the double CD set, but I knew what the good stuff was. A bit later in the afternoon I listened to almost the whole thing. The good stuff was still good, and some of the less good stuff was pretty awful ! I am sure that once upon a time I had a 12" LP vinyl version of this, but if I remember correctly it was a 3, and maybe 4 disk version with more stuff on it. It was another thing I regret giving away. I think that maybe today I might see if I can find a downloadable copy of it in the murky depths of the internet.

  The thing I put off doing was to do finish doing some laundry. It was only two t-shirts and four pairs of underpants, but it seemed almost like hard work. I think the murky weather didn't enthuse me, and I wanted to start listening to the Woodstock CDs. I persevered, and got that laundry finished, and hung up to dry on the big clothes horse with a desk fan blowing at it.

  With the washing done I could relax, and listen to the Woodstock double CD. Just like at Petts Wood Calling last year, there was stuff I didn't care to listen to, and although I guess it would have been impossible if I had been there, I would have nipped around the corner to enjoy a pint in the pub - which is exactly what I did at Petts Wood Calling last year, and will again this year. In fact there seems to be quite a few bands on at this years Petts Wood calling where I will take a quick selection of pictures before racing to the pub until the next, hopefully better band, is on.

  I never did finish the whole of the Woodstock double CD because it was time for the first Star Trek, and almost time to prepare my dinner. I watched all three Star Treks last night, Enterprise, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager. To my great surprise, all were pretty good episodes - even Voyager was one of the better episodes, although Captain Janeway was still like a simpering infant school teacher. I prefer a strong personality like Captain Picard (from The Next Generation).

  My dinner, or at least the main course of my dinner, was one of the "My Protein" range from Iceland. The description and pictures hooked me, and consulting the nutritional information (pictured on the left) convinced me it could be a good thing, and it seems it was. 9.1mg of sugar may not be that low, but it is not bad compared to much stuff I eat. It was also fairly tasty - even when it turned out the meatballs were made from chicken meat rather than something tastier like beef. If there was one thing wrong with it, it was that it came in quite a bog plastic bowl, but the bowl was barely half full. It was not a big dinner, but it was not too bad.


   I could have finished eating after that main course, but I was feeling daring, or maybe the dull weather had just give me a "Devil may care" attitude, but I decided I was going to have a dessert, and that dessert was going to be a "My Protein" tub of chocolate swirl ice cream. That really was low sugar compared to most ice cream. Unfortunately it was not all that nice. It was far from horrible, but maybe it had more ordinary water in than many ice creams, and was far from creamy.

  It certainly was not booze, because I didn't have any at all yesterday, maybe it was tiredness, but I can't seem to recall whether I watched QIXL at 9pm last night. Maybe I just read the description in the Electronic Programme Guide, and recognised it as an episode I could remember, and that is all I remember, because I also seemed to think I went to bed at 9pm instead. What I definitely remember is no indigestion, or other causes of any chest pains, and being able to sniggle down and getting to sleep quite quickly.

  On the whole it was another night where I slept mostly soundly - with the added benefit of being able to get to sleep the first time I tried for it. I think it was maybe just after midnight, and probably three hours of sleep, that I had a slight hiccup. It seemed to feel too hot under the duvet, but it was definitely too cold without it. It seems I probably got back to sleep fairly quickly, but I can't remember how I decided to keep warm in the end.

  The only bit of dream I can remember seemed to be about going to work on an old slam door train. For some reason my fried Kevin was on the same train, and apparently also going to work as well. I was doing the crossword in a newspaper - possibly a broadsheet instead of the Metro. I seemed to be doing quite well, but decided to look out the train window for a while to rest my brain. When I looked up I saw the man sitting in the opposite seat had got hold of my paper and had filled in a clue that was really puzzling me. I can't remember the clue, but his answer was "decooched" which doesn't sound like a real word to me, or if it is, perhaps from some slang dictionary, it is a rude word !

  I seemed to be ready to get up just after 6am this morning. Like a few recent mornings, I had some lower back pain, but a few hours later and I am not really noticing anything now. One bit of mild discomfort was the usual need for a pee. One bit of almost, but not quite zero discomfort was the need for a poo. I am surprised the clue to needing it was so low key because I released a pan full of it. After that I weighed myself. I have lost a little more, and I am within just 200gm of my lowest recorded reading so far this year. If I can be careful, which on such a cold grey days seems unlikely, I could be on my way to reaching a new low (weight, not of depression).

  I was not sure what to think about my blood glucose this morning. I hoped that what I ate yesterday was mostly safe, and it seems it was, or nearly was. This morning the Contour meter read a magnificent 6.5mmol/l in the dark green area. This was my new imaginary target hit fair and square. The GlucoRX meter read 7.6mmol/l in the light green area. That is just slightly over my current imaginary target, and so not that good, but still better than the Sinocare meter. That read a boring, but under the old target, 8.0mmol/l. That is still good, but only just. The other reading this morning was my blood pressure. Once again it is in the "Optimum" (better than "normal") area of 106/42.

  At the moment it is very grey outside, and it is damp from some light showers and drizzle. It still seems that this is the patern for almost the whole day. I have no desire to go out in it, and I don't seem to have any desire apart from occasionally giving in, and putting on some heating now and then. If it were not that I have several things inn the fridge that can't be left too much longer, I would be having hot soup for lunch and dinner, but I think lunch may be a pie or two, eaten cold, and dinner will be beef burgers and cook in the bag rice.