December has started grey and damp. It seems to be like last nights fine drizzle at the moment - enough to slowly get the ground damp, but not enough to feel much like rain when walking through it. Maybe it will get a little heavier later, or maybe it will stop now and then. In the seemingly highly unlikely even that the forecast is right, we may get a sunny spell at 3pm. The Met Office forecast reckons there will be sunny spells from 1pm, and they will last until sunset. The afternoon temperature should be 13° C, and that is the same as yesterday, and didn't feel too bad. Tomorrow may start dry, and with a possible single sunny spell, but the afternoon will probably feature rain, mostly just drizzle. It may start at 10° C, but the temperature will slowly drop to 9° C by 9am, and then 8° C by 3pm. The day may end with the temperature down to 6° C.

  Yesterday was a rather tiring day, but it was still a good day. It was good to get out with my best camera and lens for quite a few hours. The only really negative thing was that the train I wanted to get to Petts Wood station was cancelled, but the next one ran on time 30 minutes later.

  It was still handy that the day before yesterday I had had a shave, and washed my hair. It saved time yesterday morning, and all I had to do was to have a quick shower. In fact, as mentioned above, with the train I intended to get to Petts Wood being cancelled (a fact that I happily learned before I went out) meant I had an extra half hour to spare. In fact I had loads of time to spare because apart from writing this electronic blog, I hardly did anything before going out.

  As I mentioned yesterday morning, I was heading to the Petts Wood Xmas Carnival, although my interest was only the live music stage. I had intended to get there at 2pm when the first "band", or in this case singer with a guitarist to accompany her, was to start. All bands were due on, on the hour, and finish 45 minutes later to allow a bit of time for change over. It meant I only got to see the last quarter of an hour of Lilise's set.
  Lilise was dressed in a very flamenco looking dress, and I would have thought her guitarist would be playing a less forced, more mellow style. It was actually like his electro-acoustic guitar was going through an effects pedal turned up to maximum treble, and it sounded a bit like breaking glass. I don't think I knew any of the songs she sang, and it is possible they were all original from her. She did finish with a Xmas song, and that may have been an original as well because I thought I new and hated most Xmas carols.
  Next up was Vince Lightning and his latest Thunderboltz. I can imagine his big ego said yes when he was offered the gig, and before he even knew he had any one to play with. Vince is second left in the picture, holding the beer glass. The other three were friends he called on, and he alleges that the whole thing was done with no rehearsals. I must admit it still sounded OK, and so he chose right.

  Vince was the first to really rub the Xmas bit in. I know that the whole day was about turning on the Xmas lights in Petts Wood, but it was still November, but I, a fully signed up member of the Grinch club, thought it was much too early for Xmas songs (by the bucketful !!). I was absolutely not in any sort of Xmas spirit.
  The third band on were Granite. I had no idea who they were, but they were pretty good. On the left of my group photo is Pauline (the only name I can remember), and I suspect she was the wife of one of the others. I don't rate her as a good singer. I can only describe it as being like a mum up on a Karaoke stage - full of good intention and spirit, but not quite hitting it.
  The last band were The Four Hoarsemen. I had never seen them before, but I had heard some good reports about them, and they did seem to live up to those good reports. I must admit that I wasn't always paying too much attention to their music. Some of my attention was on the time because I wanted to get the 5.45pm train back to Catford.

  Quite a lot of my attention was one driving my camera. It was fully dark when this last band were on, and while the stage was colourfully lit, all the light wasn't always in the right places. There were now footlights on the stage, but there were head lights. It meant that often the bands faces were brightly lit while from about the waist down they were in sometimes deep shadow.

  Had I stayed until they finished I might have got them in a line up, and probably used my flash gun to zap them with a more even light. I think that it is going to take a long time picking out the best dozen or so photos of them for a photo album, and making loads of corrections when I edit the pictures. The good thing is that I know the Petts Wood Xmas Carnival committee have seen these 4 pictures, and "liked" them. They should appear on their Facebook page.

  One other good thing about yesterday is that my newest, and best fitting leather jacket seemed very comfortable to work in, and it seemed warm without being too warm in the 12 or 13° C. I wore with the zip on the front done up on the way to Petts Wood, but unzipped it when I got there. I didn't feel the need to zip it up on the way home, and that was good because by the time I had walked to first the wrong platform, and then to almost the far end of the right platform, I did feel slightly too warm when I got on the train.

  The train ride back to Catford station was uneventful, but then I had the long (feeling) walk home. I guess the walk between Catford and Catford bridge stations is only a few hundred feet, but with Catford Bridge station being about the limit now for comfortable walking (and that is from the platform nearest to home) it was a bit of a slog. I managed to do it almost non stop (I had one 15 second rest), but I was definitely getting to angina pains when I finally reached home.

  I could have rushed straight upstairs to have a pee, but I didn't seem desperate for one. Instead I had a little rest by going into the kitchen, and making up two ham, mustard and tomato wholemeal rolls. Then I went up to my bedroom, turned the heater up full, and changed clothes. I then went and had a pee, and it was as expected, rather a big one ! I then looked at some stuff on my PC while I chomped on my rolls. They were so nice, no doubt after not eating since breakfast, that I went back to the kitchen and used the last two wholemeal rolls, and filled them with cheese and pickled, and sliced red jalapeños.

  With some food inside me, and hands washed of leaking mayonnaise and tomato juices, I got my camera out, and put the battery on charge while transferring all the photos to my PC. As well as the bands, I also had a few train photos, but they will have to wait until I have finished with the band photos. In the case of the first three bands I knew I had taken the group photos, and it did not take long to edit them, but I had to go through a lot of the great many photos of the last band to find the best picture of all band member in one frame. It may not have been the best one, but seemed good enough for now.

  Once I had the four photos done I could relax a bit. I started to watch a special Eric Clapton concert on Sky Arts (on Freeview). It was good in places, but also a bit tedious in places. I took a few minutes out from it to go down to the kitchen again to grab a single small packet of crisps, a small alleged low something chocolate mini slab that must have been oozing sugar and calories by my reckoning, a bottle of Diet Coke, and finally to turn out the lights and close the doors downstairs.

  After a bit more Clapton and friends, and the naughty snack I now regret having, I went to bed. I read for a while, but I think it must have been 9pm when I turned the lights out and tried to sleep. I seemed to feel very tired after all the fresh air, and being out of the house all afternoon, but I could not seem to relax enough for sleep. One problem is that I was having the old trouble of too warm under the duvet, and too cold without it. In the end I turned up the heater, and then I managed to get to sleep.

  Maybe I did not sleep well, even if it feel like I did, because I couldn't seem to find the enthusiasm to get up before just gone 8am. I had woken at about 6.30am, but turned over for just a "few minutes more !!". I remember turning the heater up and down a few times in the night, and each time was when I had woken to have a pee. I didn't seem to wake more frequently for a pee, but each one did seem to be of quite a big quantity.

  It is possible that I was slightly dehydrated when I got up. I must have peed an awful lot because the scales said i had lost 1.1kgm, and that is an awful lot for just 24 hours, but a great start to a new month - although it will be almost impossible to stay that low, and ideally get even lighter, but I will try to do so - right up to the time I get drunk again, and that could be this afternoon. Incidently, I only had one single pint of Guinness yesterday, and that was bought for me by Jo.

  I had hoped that maybe my blood glucose readings could be good this morning, but in reality I knew that I was probably a bit dehydrated, and that make my blood glucose seem higher, and the wholemeal rolls, and the naughty little chocolate thing would probably ruin everything. Actually the readings weren't too bad. The Contour meter read 8.9mmol/l - not very good, but good enough. The GlucoRX meter read slightly better at 8.6mmol/l. For this month I have retired the Exactive meter and gone back to the Sinocare meter. It read 9.6mmol/l. That is probably less than the Exactive meter would have read, but was not all that unexpected. If nothing else, it was below the rad danger line at 10.0mmol/l.

  My blood pressure has got off to a fair start on this morning of a new month. It was 107/51, and that was the first and only reading I took. That seemed quite good considering I am think that it is going to be a hectic day.  The first thing I have to do, and do it very soon, is quickly put together a new page for December on this website. The silly thing is that I got bored a few days back and I have already made a page for January 2025 (and set up the server for 2025).

  Once I have finished everything for today's electronic diary I can have a rest, but not really a long one. I need a shower before going out shopping at Tesco. There are several things it would be very handy to have, and I think it is going to include more of those nice wholemeal rolls. Maybe I might get some wholemeal baps as well...or maybe instead of the small rolls. This afternoon the trains are running, and Jodie should be over for a few hours of beer tasting. If I get any free time I will possibly try to make am start on selecting and editing some pictures for photo albums of the four bands I saw yesterday.