Around sunrise (08:05am) it looked like today could be duller than yesterday, but I now think it will be about the same. If it were any duller it would be bedtime. Today may only see 11° C, but at least it should stay dry. Tomorrow may start with fog and mist, and end with mist. It will be another very grey day, but once again it should stay dry. Only 9° C is forecast, and so it is going to be a very unpleasant day.   Despite the horrible greyness, yesterday was not such a bad day, and I mostly managed to do all I set out to achieve - except for one thing because I was feeling a bit tired. After I finished writing, yesterday morning, I had my usual rest, and then had a shower.

  In had hoped that the few sunny spells we had in the first daylight hour of the morning might continue. Sometimes it seemed possible, and at other times impossible. I had a plan that really depended on some sunshine, but that was only needed if I wanted to enjoy myself, but the real reason for the plan was to get my high blood glucose level down, and ideally, lose a bit of weight. I went out for a walk, and that achieved both things.

  It would not have achieved much if I had stuck to what I suppose I could call my plan B. In view of the dull and miserable weather, my target would be to go as far as the cash machine by Catford station, and withdraw some beer vouchers for future use. I thought that I might also call in at the little supermarket on Catford Bridge. I had bought plenty of instant noodles on y last visit to Tesco, but a few flavours that Tesco do not stock might have been nice.

  As may be surmised with the details of my complete walk, it was a bit longer than just to Catford station. I tried to not walk too fast, and then I had a rest at Catford Bridge station to take a picture of a train that I didn't need. Then I went and got my money out the hole in the wall. I seemed to feel OK, and decided to take the shortest "long way home". That meant walking through the park, and doubling back over the "curly-wurly" bridge.
  I now have a picture of every class 707 train made, and so in one sense this pictures is superfluous, but the train was there, and I took this snap because I could !
  Once I had reached the southernmost tip of Ladywell Fields I had plenty to see, and quite a few photo opportunities - like this Robin doing a nice pose on a branch for me. I was using my Nikon D3200 camera with a Nikon 18 to 200mm lens on it. That is a useful zoom range, and I probably took this picture of the Robin from 20 to 30 ft away.
  I took a lot of pictures that I won't show. Quite a few just did not look good because the daylight was often very dim. It was very handy to stop and get my breath back while taking some pictures - so much so that I kept extending how far I might walk. Some times there were pictures that were easy to take like this Spaniel exploring the river bank on a very muddy, and probably very slippery path. I almost got a picture of a rat that was running from the dog, but I was too slow to get it (although one picture did show a sort brown blur on the very edge of the picture !).
  There was a man walking this dog from his bicycle. He seemed very quiet and shy, and I'm not sure if he spoke good English. I asked if it was OK to take a picture of his dog, and he just sort of smiled without saying yes or no, but I took the smile as a yes.
  What I didn't realise, until I turned around to thank him, was that he had two dogs. the other was this white and grey version of then other dog. I an unsure what breed they were, but the very shaggy coat suggests they were a very northern breed - in my imagination they were bread from Arctic wolves !

  I took the last two pictures at the base of the curly wurly bridge (it has a long slow spiral that allows easier use by [dismounted] cyclists and wheelchair and pram users). My earlier plan was to cross the railway here, and then turn right towards home. I didn't, I headed for Ladywell.
  As I approached the top of the bridge I overheard a man tell his son that the train had just left Ladywell station, and although he would have to see it from the side, I was able to get to the top of the bridge, and using a lot of zoom, take a snap of the train before it had fully left Ladywell station. You cans see the end of the "Up" platform on the left of the picture.
  There are many, probably hundreds of pigeons in the park, and mostly they are not worth photographing, but this one was different. I don't think it was, but it seemed to be guarding this hole in the tree. I frequently see this with Ring necked Parakeets (parrots) who do use such holes for their nests.
  I have not got a complete set of photos of all class 465 train, although I am close to it. This train was not one I needed, but the picture was taken also to prove to me, or anyone, that I had walked all the way to Ladywell station. I was starting to feel a bit tired, but the only thing I could do was to walk home again, although I could have cheated and got the train back to Catford Bridge, but it would mean a 15 minute wait for the next one.
  I'm glad I decided to walk home because if I hadn't I would not have got this picture. This is one of those pictures that would look better in 3D. I took the picture standing on the footbridge that links the park with the back of Lewisham Hospital. It shows a whole section of river bank that has collapses and washed away recently. All the rain we have had recently eant the river was running fast and deep, and it must have undercut the bank. The chainlink fence, seen in the middle of the picture, should be guarding the edge of the bank. It's not exactly headline news, but I thought it interesting to come across it.
  Back nearer to Ladywell, and the bridge that crosses the river at the back of St Mary's Church, I saw a woman feeding ducks. I should have taken a picture of her if only to show the fluorescent pink wellington boots she was wearing !  We spoke for a few minutes, and I mentioned that I had only seen one Mandarin duck recently. She said she had seen a couple not so long ago. Two bridges nearer to home and I looked down and saw several Mandarin ducks. This one presented the best picture.
  What might have been a short walk became a lot longer. There were a few reasons for this. The first was that my slow walking speed (although some short bits of it I probably walked a lot faster), and frequent stops to take photos, or sometimes just to consider taking one, but not bothering, meant that I suffered no angina pains. A secondary factor was that although not initially intended, the route I took had plenty of possibilities for turning back early.

  I was aware that wherever I went, I had to get home again, but I just sort of kept pushing on because I could. It was pure luck that I didn't push just a bit further. The last quarter or half mile was very hard. I still had no angina pains, but my feet and legs were getting extremely tired. It was all due to lack of practice. I wish we had some nice weather, because now I have learned a strategy to stop the onset of Angina I would like to get back into practice.

  It almost felt like I should have done the last 100 yards to my front door on hands and knees. I was feeling like I was on my last legs. I recovered quite quickly once I was at home, but I was still fighting some overall tiredness. One thing I resisted was having any lunch. Perhaps completing the walk, which was actually longer than those when I started building up to very long walks back in 2022, felt so positive that I could resist the call of food.

  That did help me get complete control-ish of my blood glucose and also weight, but it would take until this morning to see the full result of that. In the meantime I gritted my teeth, and copied all the pictures to my computer where I selected what I would use, and edit them to show here.

  I took a fair time, maybe as much as an hour, although that does seem excessive, to finish all the photo editing, but I did manage in time to have a lie down for as much as an hour. I spent some of it reading, and some of it snoozing.

   Overjoyed would be far too strong a word to describe the fair pleasure that there were episodes of Star Trek on yesterday evening. I was expecting the usual weekday TV shows to be tossed out the window, and replaced with some terrible Xmas themed stuff, but luckily not. I was able to eat my dinner while watching one of more Star Trek series/episodes.

  I had deliberately wanted to keep my dinner to a minimum, and I only part succeeded. I started off with a can of Tesco's own brand, very low sugar and calories cream of chicken soup. I added the remains of a pack of "ready to eat" spicy sliced chicken breast to the soup, plus a splash of hot pepper sauce. My only worry was that the chicken had been open several days, and there was a sort of hint that it might have been starting to turn.

  In my ideal fantasy world I might have eaten no more than that for the rest of the day, but I did follow it with two small packets of crisps, an apple and Persimmon, and finally one of those alleged low calorie nougat bars that seem anything but. I regret buying those bars now, but they have to be used up somehow. The evidence this morning is that it was a fairly safe and healthy sort of meal.

  I thought I would have a nice early night last night, but it turned out to be not as early as hoped for. I did go to bed early, soon after 8pm, but I read for some time before I tried to sleep. The next bit is very vague. In think I might have slept for half an hour, maybe even an hour, but woke up again. I don't think it was for a pee, although I did have one anyway - a fairly small one.

  I may have woken up from noises heard outside. I was aware that a neighbour, 5 of 6 houses up the road, had problems with a sewer blockage. They were hoping not to get Thames Water involved, but it seems they had to. It must have been around 10pm, maybe a bit earlier, that I definitely heard noises from the road. I looked out the window, up the road, and there was one of Thames Waters huge lorries with water tank, and something like a transit van with rodding and CCTV inspection stuff. It was all lit up like a Xmas tree.

  I went back to bed, but I could not get to sleep while I was imagining what was happening up the road. A similar event happened back while I was still in work, and so I pretty much knew what was going on, but with one difference. On that occasion it was convenient for Thames Water to get access to the middle of the sewer through the manhole in my garden. It is about the midway point.

  On that occasion they used CCTV to find that the sewer had a lot of grit in it, and was also jammed with wet wipes in the direction where the problem probably was last night. I believe that Thames water did some corrective action to a break in the sewer where all the gravel was getting in 5 to 10 years ago. This time I expect the main problem was a build up of wet wipes, and also nappies because someone up the line doesn't believe that they can't be flushed away. My biggest distraction was that I would get a knock at the door asking if they could access the sewer through the manhole in my back garden.

  That didn't happen, and at some unknown time I drifted off to sleep. The only slightly unusual thing about last night was that I can barely remember even that I was dreaming, and I certainly have no memory of any dreams. I still had to get up to pee a few times in the night, but otherwise it was a very uneventful sleep. Maybe it was good sleep because I didn't seem to have any qualms about getting up soon after 6am.

  I did have a crazy idea that I might have gone for a walk this morning, and started out before it was even light. It might have meant seeing the sunrise from one bit of the Linear Park that has a relatively clear view to the east. It is something I did a few years ago, and I fancied doing it again. I am glad I didn't because thick clouds meant it was still almost dark long after the official sun rise time.

  I thought I would have a poo when I had my first pee after getting up. It felt like it should happen, but it was just wind...but several hours later it may be a real thing soon. After getting on the scales I was delighted that I seemed to be a whole 500gm lighter this morning. That is within a couple of hundred grams of the lightest I have been all this month, and the previous 2 months. Of course it is not the multiples of kilograms that I would like to lose, but it could be a start (as I've said multiple times in the last year !).

  With my weight down I wondered if, as seems to happen a lot for some weird reason, my blood glucose had gone in the opposite direction. Fortunately not, and although my readings were not great (in a negative direction) they were not bad. The Contour meter read 8.7mmol/l - or slightly above my old target. The GlucoRX meter read 8.1mmol/l and that is almost very good. The Sinocare meter read 8.3mmol/l, and at least that is under my old target (8.5mmol/l). The average of all three is actually among the lowest I have seen this month.

  I think it is a timing thing, particularly with regard to eating, but my blood pressure is up a tiny bit this morning. It is 109/56. That is still in the "optimum" area, and well with the usual small ups and downs I get every morning. I guess that means it is good !

  There is one thing I have to do today before anything else (except for a short rest after I finish this writing) and it is to finish washing the sheet and pillowcases I left in soak yesterday. It was probably silly to think I would find the energy or enthusiasm to finish the job after my walk. It is just about, by a very slender chance that I may go for a walk today once that laundry is hanging up to dry. On the plus side it would be a good distraction from food, and on the minus side, it is just as murky as yesterday. That is less of a problem using one of my big Nikon DSLR cameras,, although the pictures would look flat with no "punch", but it would still make a walk a lot less pleasurable.

  I guess the thing I will be doing most of today is trying to stop myself having any lunch. Later on it will be trying to restrict what I have for dinner. It would be quite an achievement to start a new year with the scales showing a lower weight. Of course the tricky thing would be to keep it that way for the rest of next year ! My Xmas dinner will be little more than a Scotch Egg, because if Covid has taught us anything, a Scotch Egg is a "substantial meal" if certain of our now (hopefully) deposed members of parliament are to be believed. I will probably have two of them, plus all the trimmings (aka hot pepper sauce).