This morning's version of The BBC's weather forecast looks about right, although only time will tell how close it comes to reality. This morning the sky is blue, and the temperature was low enough for what was probably frost on some shed roofs I can see. No frost on anyy cars though. The sun is shining brightly, and inside my bedroom the rays feel nice and warm. The sun should continue to shine until 5pm when we may only get sunny spells. The afternoon temperature should reach 12° C. A cloudy night means tomorrow won't start so cold, and although sunshine will be at a premium, if indeed there is any, the temperature could rise to 14° C. The main problem is that the middle of the day is probably going to be wet.

   Yesterday was mostly a good day, but it ended badly. I'll explain the bad ending further down the page. The good was actually a bit sparse in some ways.....on the other hand it did involve beer ! With a drinking session with Jodie, and Michael in the afternoon, my first real action of the day was to have a shower, and once again it was a bit cool, but fortunately not so cool as to be uncomfortable.

  I seemed to write a lot yesterday, and I got off to a late start to do it. It meant it was not far off midday before I could put my feet up for a while before having a slightly cool shower. After that I needed no time to cool off, and I got dressed ready to go out. I wanted to get some stuff from the little supermarket on Catford Bridge. It is slightly unusual to go out just to do that. More often I get stuff from there on the way back from the station.

  Top of my shopping list was some apples. They have some Spanish (I think) apples that they describe as golden, but as far as I can recall, they don't look like French "Golden Delicious" apples, and they certainly have a nicer, more apple-y taste. I bought three of those, and three big juicy oranges. The fruit from that shop always seems nicer than that from Tesco. Tesco fruit is usually underipe, or has been force ripened.

  I had hoped that the little supermarket would have some sugar free biscuits, but sadly all I could see was gluten free biscuits - which I didn't want, or buy.  What they always seem to have is a wide selection of instant noodles. I find I am not so keen on the Korean noodles, although when prepared a bit closer to the instructions, they are not so bad. The trouble with that is that it means boiling them for a few minutes, and then draining the water off before adding the dried vegetables, plus the concentrated, syrup like, flavouring.

  That is a lot of messing around for "instant noodles" and I didn't buy any of those yesterday. I did buy some Polish, Vifon branded instant noodles that were, according to then packet, "Chinski flavour". In the small print it says in English that is Chinese style chicken flavour. That is debatable. I had two packs, that are small, maybe 60gm, in one bowl this morning, and they seemed OK, but I didn't notice anything I would describe as Chinese or Chicken flavours.

   It seemed a fair walk to the mini supermarket and back. It is approximately the same distance as Catford Bridge station, but of course there is no footbridge to cross at the end of the walk. That footbridge is the real killer, but otherwise the distance is just at my limit of walking with no chest pains.  After I got home I made myself a (hopefully) very safe, probably healthy, lunch of a chunk of cheese plus an apple and an orange.

  It didn't seem long, although I guess it could have been as much as two hours before Jodie arrived carrying more beers. It is funny how she can remember what beers she had drunk, but could remember there were tow small fridges full of beers, and among them were quite a few she had been looking forward to. We actually started with a couple of small cans of IPA style beer, and they weren't that bad. Then she opened one of the dreaded fruit sour style beers, and it was disgusting !

  Prior to Jodie arriving she had sent me a text message to let me know she was on her way (I think she thought she might be late, but if anything she was very slightly early). Once I was sure she was coming I sent a text message to Michael to say we were drinking in the afternoon, and he joined us a little bit earlier than recently - at about 4.45pm (normally it is after 5pm). He was full of "joy", or in other words he was pretty miserable about the situation with his serious dementia suffering wife.

  We, or I, seemed to get through quite a few beers yesterday afternoon, although it has to be remembered that I was usually splitting even a 330ml can with Jodie so we could both have a taste of it. Sometime that is not a great idea because some beers you need to glug down a full pint to get the flavour of it. Of course the downside of that is that with Jodie's taste for awful beers it would mean her having to drink the whole lot, or giving my share to the sink to drink !

  At the end I sort of assumed I must have been fairly drunk, but it seems I still had some self control. I had been lusting after a very expensive takeaway of Singapore Fried Noodles, but I seem to find the common sense to substitute instant noodles at something like a tenth of the price. I had two bowlfuls, and one, particularly with the addition of some hot chilli sauce, was extremely spicy, and in a couple of hours I would be paying the price for that.

  I had got that dinner ready just in time to see all but the first few minutes of Star Trek: Voyager. I don't know why I rushed because it was not a great episode. In fact I would almost go as far as to say it was rubbish ! When it ended at 8pm I didn't do my usual of going to read in bed. Instead I spent a bit of time looking at railway services and maps of the railways. It all started when I thought that I might go out to do some semi random travel on my Freedom Pass.

  I noted that the tube/railway map shows that Kenton station, on the Bakerloo line, and Northwick Park on the Metropolitan line, are shown as in walking distance. I decided to check, and it seems that they are about 600 metres apart, of 3/8th of a mile. That should be easy walking distance for me in my difficult state. It is my intention of taking the Bakerloo line as far as it goes, and than change to London Overgound services the rest of the way to Watford Junction. That is well out the normal travel zones, but the journey is still valid on my Freedom Pass - provided it is on a London Overground/TFL service.

  It was probably about 9pm before I headed for bed, and it felt too late to read. I tried to go to sleep, and I think I did despite feeling a bit uncomfortable. It was possibly 11pm when I woke again. I was mostly needing a pee, but I was also starting to suffer from heartburn, but it could have actually been angina. I was also feeling like my guts were playing up. I went to the toilet for a pee, and also did a poo - quite a fair sized amount.

  As I walked back to my bedroom what had seemed like heartburn, became more like angina pains, and I could feel that pain move up to my neck. It even gave me toothache. That was almost going in to heart attack territory. Once back in my bedroom, and sitting in front of my PC, I checked my blood pressure. It was dangerously high with a systolic pressure of 168mmHg. Over the next 30 to 60 minutes it gradually dropped.

  I had taken a swig of antacid suspension, and that seemed to have settled the heartburn, and made burping no loner acid tasting. It did that quite quickly, but it took a lot of time until my blood pressure returned to my normal (I think I got the systolic pressure down to just 109mmHg). The chest pain had gone, but my guts still felt a bit sore. I went to bed, and after a while I managed to fall asleep. After that I seemed to sleep well, or at least typically.

  I can remember at least a précis of a dream I had last night. It was influenced by the time I worked on an industrial estate in my last job, but I wasn't at work in the dream. I'm not sure exactly what I was doing, or where I was. It seemed to be like being at home, but "home" seemed to be an old pub. It no longer had a bar, but it was very spacey, and the windows and doors seemed to be typical of an old pub.

  One thing that made it seem like home was a cat. It was asking to go out, even though it seemed to be raining. I opened the door and stepped out, and immediately soaked the socks I was wearing as the only cover on my feet. The cat, who didn't seem to have a name, rushed out, and almost got run over before dashing into a big warehouse on the other side of the road.

  I was a bit worried about it going into the warehouse, but it seemed like it might have been a favourite destination for several other cats and dogs. I think some time had passed when I checked to see if the cat wanted to come back in. I couldn't see it at first, but then suddenly several cats and dogs ran out from the warehouse after being shooed out by someone who worked in there. I tried to call the cat, but as I mention a bit earlier, it didn't seem to have a name, and that made it difficult. I think I woke up trying to think of what I could call the cat.

  I seemed to wake up at what seemed a reasonable time to get up. I think it was around 6.20am. As usual I went straight to the toilet after getting up, and I had a decent pee, and I also had a good poo..well I say good, but ten minutes later I would be back on the toilet doing a lot more. Even after all that it seemed like I had put weight on again - a massive 700gm. I still occasionally feel like I could go to the toilet again, but I have eaten now, and so even if I could lighten myself by excreting poo and or pee, it is now too late.

  Fortunately, once again, despite putting on weight, my blood glucose readings were good again, although not so great as the day before. The Contour meter read 7.9mmol/l, or just inside the light green zone on my spreadsheet. The GlucoRX meter read an even lower 7.4mmol/l. The Sinocare meter went back to it's old habit of reading much higher than the other two. It read 8.4mmol/l, and that is sort of neutral - neither good or bad.

  This morning I am happy to say that my blood pressure is perfectly normal (for me). It was 106/44. I do wonder sometimes if that is not a bit too low, but my doctors and the cardiologist seem to think it is "well controlled" (by the prescription drugs I take).

  Ideally I would like to go to a gig tonight, but it is going to be cold and dark, and I doubt I would be able to raise the enthusiasm to go out. What might be more possible, if it seems my guts won't give me any trouble, would be to go out using my Freedom Pass to visit Watford Junction, and maybe try the walk between Kenton station, on the Bakerloo line, and Northwick Park on the Metropolitan line. Had it been summer, when there is much more daylight, and it would be a lot warmer, I might have even paid for a return ticket, with Senior railcard discount, between Watford Junction and St Albans Abbey station. It is a possibly cute branch line that might be interesting to visit. Maybe that will be a treat reserved for next summer.