Today started very damp after rain during the night. It seemed like the rain had stopped for a while, but I can now see that the rain is very fine rain, and difficult to see. That may be the case for most of the day. It is the sort of rain that gets you saturated without you realising it is happening until it has happened. The temperature will slowly climb from just 7° C to 15° C by the end of this soggy day. It could almost feel nice if you wanted to stand in the rain at midnight. One important thing about today's weather is very strong winds, and they will continue tomorrow. Tomorrow was, if I recall correctly, going to be another very wet day, but the latest update shows the day being dull, but dry until rain resumes in the early evening. The temperature could rise to 16° C, and if it was dry and bright that could be t-shirt weather !

  Yesterday was a rather good day, and it was mostly because I did what I didn't think I would do. I mean that more literally than it reads because what I did was a bit different to even my optimistic predictions. With no more than a quick flick with a damp flannel, and a squirt of deodorant, I went out into the big wild world !

  Having just re-read what I wrote yesterday, when I initially said there might be three options for things I might do, I see that I did add a fourth possibility, and although not actually planned that way, that is what I did. I had made earlier preparations for going out, but mostly just checking my Canon 300D camera to make sure the time and date were correct, and too make sure that the battery was showing as full. Sadly the battery indicator says full for three quarters of it's life, and can then go down fast !

  Having found the correct desire, and something like courage, I decided that I would start off just going to the station to get a copy of The Metro, and that is what I did. While at the station I would take pictures of any trains I saw. I don't think I have ever tried using that very old Canon 300D (also known as The Rebel) for taking train pictures. It was really just an impulse buy when I saw it going for a song in a second hand shop.
  When I got to the station I found it would be at least a 10 minute wait until the next train, and so I went outside the station to take the picture above. This is a very contrasty picture taken from the top of Catford Bridge looking towards the east, and the old Town Hall, and Lawrence House. The sun was off to the right of the picture, and was very low in the sky , as can be seen by the very long, very dark shadows to the left of everything.
  I went to the London bound platform to take this picture of a train heading to Hayes (Kent). Only the front of the train is in full light that is coming from between two blocks of flats on the left of the station. Apart from an excellent demonstration of how not to take a good picture, it seems sort of OK. At least it shows the camera could focus on a moving train, and take a sharp picture.
  I took this picture mainly as a reminder for Jodie who likes to have a look at this once a month food market, but maybe also for myself. I did do a fairly fast wander through the market when it was in Catford Broadway, but have never seen it in it's new place, for the last year or two, between the two stations.

  Having made it to Catford Bridge station I could effectively rest, and reset the first hints of angina. It was by no means complete rest, but by not walking to far I was fine. With another long-ish wait for another train at Catford Bridge, I decided I would visit Catford station. Now there are lifts there, which seem to be mostly reliable, it is only a short walk from one station to the other, and then up in the lift.

  Unfortunately I got up to platform 2, the country bound platform before checking the times of the trains. It is only a half hourly service outside of the core rush hour times, and it happened that I had just missed a train by about 5 minutes. I didn't fancy waiting around on the platform - it is very windy up there ! So it was back to Catford Bridge because that was the direction of home.
   My timing was terrible yesterday. I got back to Catford Bridge station just as the next Charing Cross train was arriving. It was too late to get a snap of the front of the train, but I though I could get a snap of the back. I pressed the shutter button and nothing happened. It too a moment to realise the battery had gone flat. I had three spare batteries with my, but by the time I had swapped to a fresh battery that train was gone. A few minutes wait and the next Hayes (Kent) train arrived, and once again I took an extremely contrasty picture of it.  The sun was even lower in the sky, and even the far platform was disappearing in shadows.
  One slightly more useful picture I took while still at the station is shown above. It seem that tomorrow there will be no trains to Waterloo East and Charing Cross because they will be diverted into Canon Street. If I had time tomorrow I might be tempted to get a train to Canon Street, and then come straight home again - just because I could.

  "Just because I could" was my feelings about going home from the station. It would not make my walk home a lot longer if I diverted into the shopping centre, and went into Poundstretcher. I had even taken a bag with me "just in case...". Actually it would increase the distance walked enough to get uncomfortable before I got home, but a slow wander around Poundstretcher would be sufficient rest.

  There were a few things I bought in Poundstretcher. One item was a string of 50 battery powered LED lights. I think I thought that a string of 50 was more than I had seen before, but on reflection I am sure it wasn't. Much of what I bought was food, They didn't have any zero sugar biscuits, and not really any low sugar biscuits that I fancied. I did buy a few high sugar chocolate biscuits, but I think I can eat them very sparsely.

  When I finished in Poundstretcher I came out the shop feeling sort of rested, and decided I would push the entire length of my walk a bit more. I guess it was as much curiosity as much as masochism. I thought I would take a look at the London & Rye pub, to see if it's new owners had done anything to it. I found it exactly as I last saw it. I have no idea what the new owners are doing because superficially it looks ready for use.

  I felt fine walking as far as the pub, but from then on, the rest of the walk home was rather taxing. It may have been a little over the halfway point when I had to stop to consult my phone (to appear to be doing something) and have a 20 second rest. Even with that I was feeling quite uncomfortable when I arrived home. I had walked a total of 1.333 miles, and that should be a fairly accurate figure because I remembered to pause the tracker while I was in Poundstretcher, and a few times when doing nothing at the railways stations.

  One bit of discomfort was the need for a pee. I had a medium size pee just before I went out, but the cold air meant I was getting hints I needed another pee by the time I first arrived at the station. After bottling it all up while out I had a rather large pee when I got home. The other discomfort was that I was definitely getting strong angina pains, and I could feel them heading up my chest, over my shoulders, and almost into my arms - a very undesirable state to be in.

  Although the official time of my walk was just 47 minutes and 40 seconds, that didn't include the time I was in Poundstretcher, and some periods when I had paused the tracker while at the stations and not really moving. I think the total was really almost 2 hours, and it was well past lunch time when I got home. I expected I would have hot soup, but my thick winter coat had kept me warm enough to not need a hot meal.

  After having my pee, and getting changed into indoor clothes, I went down into the freezing kitchen, and made myself two well filled wholemeal baps. Each had a different cheese, and both had sliced gherkins, sliced read jalapeño chillies, and sliced tomato. They were pretty tasty, although being so well filled, they were messy to eat.

  Once I had eaten I felt very tired, but I forced myself to transfer all the pictures taken to my PC, and to put the camera batteries on charge. I then went through the photos and selected which ones I would use. I was generally happy with the pictures that old camera took, but I suspect that my mobile phone might have made them less contrasty. Had I managed to get a snap or two of trains at Catford station I think I would have seen better pictures because the light up on the platforms there would probably have been better.

  After I had finished editing and saving the pictures I wanted, I laid down on my bed to read. I think I managed half a page before my eyes closed, and I slept through to dinner time, although that was probably for less than an hour. For dinner I did opt for hot soup, but I only had one can of pea and ham soup (with added chilli sauce). I then had a dessert of one large orange, one of the nice ones from the small supermarket and not the nasty ones from Tesco, plus a Persimmon fruit and a small kiwi fruit.

  It was probably a mistake to stay up to watch both QI and Have I Got News For You before going to bed. I think staying awake that long made me pass the peak tiredness, and I was waking up again. It was gone midnight before I managed to fall asleep. Once asleep I seemed to sleep OK, or perhaps "typically" is closer to how I slept. I think I had a dream about working in a telephone exchange, but I can't remember enough to describe any of it.

  I managed to sleep through to just after 7am again. By then I was well ready to go for a pee, but alas I didn't poo. I state, with little to no evidence, that that was the reason why it seemed I put on 200gm since yesterday morning. I didn't think I had eaten enough to put weight on, and at worst I thought I may have broken even, If I had had the poo I thought I deserved, maybe I would have weight the same as yesterday, and maybe a tiny bit less. The good thing (I hope) is that apart from these small ups and downs, the average is still looking like I am less heavy now than I was at the start of the year.

  My blood glucose was the now typical good and bad. Both the Contour and GlucoRX meters read the same with a reading of 8.0mmol/l - not perfect, but still fairly good. Once again the Exactive meter gave a silly, by comparison, reading of 9.1mmol/l - just in the one stop until the danger zone area. At the end of the month that meter definitely goes into retirement ! I'll probably go back to using the Sinocare meter as the third meter, but I might give the Vivachek meter another go, but I think that was possibly worse than the Exactive meter.

  My blood pressure is slightly up again this morning, but 115/49 is still shown as in the optimum area on the meter.  I do seem to be generally hovering between good and bad this morning. I sort of feel sort of OK in a very hesitant way, and I have a few mild aches. I have felt better, and I have felt worse. Maybe it is about as good as it can get on a cold drizzly day.

  It is possible I am going out later. I hope I manage to find the right mood to go out because a rare opportunity has arisen. It is because of engineering works today that the London Overground service from Dalston Junction to Clapham Junction is being diverted into Battersea Park station. There are two through platforms there, one completely disused platform, and one terminal platform. Once up on a time there used to be a service, possibly peak hours only, from Battersea Park that went as far as Peckham Rye station, and then maybe to Beckenham Junction.

  That terminal platform at Battersea Park station is very rarely used now, and it is not often that an opportunity arises to use it. The connection from Wandsworth Road station, the previous station, to Battersea Park station is not even shown on the London Underground/London Overground map.  I really need to psyche myself to go out on the cold drizzly day to not miss this opportunity for a bit of novelty. The possibility may not arise again for month, or even years !