This morning has started at 16° C, and we have seen at least one short, and a bit watery, sunny spells. The forecast says there should be more to come. The grey sky says it is actually unlikely. I haven't really noticed them indoors, but there are supposed to be some very gusty winds to stir everything up, and blow more leaves off the trees. The last sunny spells, if we haven't already had it, may be at 1pm, and then the rest of the afternoon will be dull. From 6pm rain will return, and very late at night it could be quite heavy. Meanwhile from 7pm the temperature may drop to just 11° C by 1am tomorrow. Tomorrow could be bright and cheerful until 4pm, but from 5pm, after sunset so we won't see any sunshine, the sky should clear, and of course the temperature will start to drop. It may be done to 7° C at midnight.

  Another very late start to writing the electronic diary this morning. I had better try and keep today's writing brief, and that may be easier because yesterday was a really horrible day when not a lot happened except for some very bad insomnia last night, and the reason for being so late this morning.

  When I finished writing yesterday, I was saying how I was trying to psyche myself up to go out into the drizzle, and take a couple of trains to end up at Battersea Park station because the London Overground was on diversion, and although no route is shown to Battersea Park on the tube map, the track is all there, and there is a terminal platform that has no regular passenger trains booked to call there. I was getting quite excited about it as I consulted maps an train timetables. Then I looked up, and out the window.
 The view I saw was horrifying, and put me right off the idea of going out. When it just seemed like some thin drizzle I thought I could cope with it, but what I saw was sheets of rain being blown onto the window. It made it look three times as wet, and six times as cold. There was no way I was going out in that just out of curiosity. If I had a better reason to travel, it would not have been so bad.

  That was at about 11.30am, and from then on I did very little for the rest of the day - except for thinking I was eating too much. Maybe it was what I ate, or maybe the frequent times I ate were all of small amounts, but this morning was not the expected disaster. One thing I did do yesterday was to clear a small backlog of washing up in the kitchen, and also to clean some glasses that had candles in them.

  It does take a fair bit of effort to clean all the wax from those glasses, and it often needs petrol (lighter fluid) to get some of the labels off that probably use some kind of latex glue. It does seem a shame to throw out perfectly good glasses, usually of a size that is ideal for whisky and maybe a mixer. The only trouble is that I seem to be accumulating a silly amount of them. I am now starting to assess how much work it will take to clean them, and throw the worst in the recycling bin.

  I started the day with just a single, medium sized bowl of instant noodles - I didn't want to be too fell if I was going out. It is hard to remember all that I ate after that. I know that I must have had at least 4 small packets of crisps during the day, and I had three chocolate coated biscuits. I think I may have had some fruit at some point. I was already feeling guilty when it came to dinner, but I had a yearning to have a very naughty dinner.

  Not only did I have a very strong desire for what I had, but there was also the practical thing of it getting past it's use by date. It was the box of what turned out to be extra special oven chips, and a little pot of spicy gravy. I cooked the chips in the mini oven, as per the instructions, and then put them on a plate, sprinkled them with grated cheese, and then poured on the gravy before putting the plate in the microwave for just one minute. I am sort of glad it was such a small portion in the box because with my added cheese (and some chilli sauce) it was so delicious that I could easily had eaten 2 or even 3 times as much.

  There was hardly anything on TV last night, although I am almost forgetting I watched episodes of QI and Have I Got News For You (or am I thinking of the night before ?). Anyway, I also spent a lot of time reading from my book and also news and stuff on the internet. I think it was about 11pm when I tried to get to sleep. It was actually just before 3am when I did finally get to sleep. For a couple of hours I got up again to tire myself out reading more stuff on the internet - including many editions (episodes ?) of "What If ?" - answers based on real science to some very weird questions. Hint: each page is very interactive - hover the mouse over pictures for more info, and always click on the numbers in square brackets, like [2], for even more silly stuff (click again to clear it).

  Once I got to sleep it was like a normal night except for sleeping even later - well, the sun rises so late now, and I was expecting it to be cold wet and windy, and so there was nothing to entice me out of bed earlier - except that by 7.30am I was busting for a pee. Unfortunately I was not busting for a poo. One additional reason why I did not go out yesterday was that I didn't have a poo in the morning, and didn't want to be caught out short while out. In fact I never felt the need to poo for the whole day, and it was only around 11am today that I did have a poo.

  I fully expected my weight to have really risen this morning. I thought I ate terribly yesterday, and I should have had a backlog of poo. I was astonished to see my weight had actually dropped by 400gm when I got on the scales. If I had managed a poo before I had breakfast (two small packs of instant noodles) I reckon I might have seen a 500gm drop in weight.

  The next big thing to check was my blood glucose. Once again, thanks to the cranky Chinese "Exactive" blood glucose meter, I had a choice between very good, and very bad, and something fairly good in the middle. The Contour meter read 8.3mmol/l, and that is OK. The GlucoRX meter gave a very good reading of 7.9mmol/l. The Exactive meter gave a terrible reading of 9.4mmol/l. As I will probably say again, and every day until the start of December, "I can't wait for the month to end so I can permanently retire that Exactive meter" (or words to that effect).

  I've just checked my blood pressure, and thanks to not feeling like I need a poo, or a pee, so quite relaxed, my blood pressure was nice and low, and even a smidgen below my average. It was 104/40 - one of my lower readings, particularly the diastolic reading (40mmHg).

  If I had got to sleep early enough last night, and so got up nice and early, I might have gone out this morning. Maybe it would only be to the local shops, although possibly a bit further. This morning I do seem to have an idea I could walk a bit further, or faster before it started getting uncomfortable (although the reality would more likely be different). I think I will have a bit of lunch soon, and then see if I can have a long snooze before getting ready for a visit from Jodie for some more beer tasting.