This morning has started very cold and dry again. Also again it seemed to be a degree l0wer than forecast, or just a few tenths of a degree above zero. Today the forecast of sunshine turns out to be true. The sky is 100% blue, but whether it continues until sunset is anyone's guess. The last three hours before sunset should see the temperature climb to a still bloody cold 3° C. The clear skies will continue, and the temperature will drop to 0° C by 11pm. Tomorrow could start at -2° C (yes minus 2), and the morning may feature mist. There may be a few sunny spells later, and the temperature will rise to a brass monkey's 1° C !

    Yesterday was another day that started good, but started to go wrong mid afternoon. There was one great annoyance in the morning. I had a shower and it seems my patch over the crack in the bath has started to leak. This time it was real, and not just a tide mark on the mat.

  I had my shower, but once again I didn't wash my hair. The reason the day before was that the water seemed to be a bit too cool. Having fixed that, the water seemed a bit too warm to spray on my head, although I must confess that my body seemed to acclimatise to it very quickly once I started shower. It actually felt good to have a hot shower, and get myself that little bit cleaner.

  I didn't hear anything from Kevin before going out, and so I didn't lug his Xmas present to the pub, but I did take a Xmas present to be shared between Stella the dog, and Ayse the barmaid. It was a box of dog treats I saw in Aldi before Xmas, and yesterday was the first time I needed to take them. I say that they were shared between Ayse and Stella, but it was actually that I gave custody of them to Ayse. If I kept them I may have over fed the dog.

  To go to the pub I put on my thick, blue, hooded winter coat, and even though it was as dry as a bone, I put the hood up, and it worked well to keep my ears going numb in the very cold air. It would also have kept me dry if the forecast rain/drizzle had started hours earlier than forecast (it seemed to be a few hours late instead). It is hard to describe how I felt as I walked to Catford Bridge station.

  I didn't have any real angina pains, but I was a bit short of breath. More significant was that I could feel my heart working hard....at least I think that is what I remember. I definitely was glad to get there early enough to wait on the down platform for a minute or two before going over the footbridge to the up platform. Even before this current angina problem, going over the footbridge would often seem like hard work after a brisk walk to the station.
  As usual I took pictures of all the trains I saw, but none were of any interest. What was more interesting was seeing not one, but two ducks perched on a tree branch sticking out over the river. It is quite unusual to see a duck perched in a tree, and I can't recall ever seeing two of them, and two of them so close together that I have a feeling the male Mandarin duck may have been trying to mount the other duck.
  This was definitely a time when I wished I had taken one of my big DSLR camera with a big flash gun. The big camera would have produced a clearer picture than the pocket sized Canon SX210 camera I used, and I could have used far more zoom for a closer picture (both pictures above are crops of the original snaps to make it seem like they were bigger). The light under the trees was very dim, and my big flash gun would have probably produced some really crisp pictures that might have given a better idea of what those ducks were up to. Incidentally, the duck in the foreground is far too dark to be a female Mandarin duck. They are a fairly light tan colour. Someone speculated that it might be a juvenile.

  It was good to get to the Jolly Farmers, and get a nice warm welcome from Ayse. I thought she had been on holiday the Wednesday of last week, but it turned out that she was actually off sick with a sort of cross between a cold and 'flu that is currently doing the rounds.  The Metro was published yesterday (and probably they resumed publishing from Monday), and Ayse thanked me for picking up a spare copy for her. It is the main reason why I get the train to Ladywell, although train spotting and just being lazy (sort of enforced by my current health) are other very valid reasons.

  I sat down with my lovely fresh Guinness, and started flicking through the paper. Usually I would turn straight to the crosswords. Maybe I had had a premonition that it was not going to be an easy Quick Crossword, and indeed there were quite a few clues that I found baffling. I did skim read a few articles before starting to tackle the crossword. I had only managed to solve 5 or 6 clues before Shawn and Stella came in.

  Ayse handed back the box of dog treats to me so I could have first go at them. At that point I have never even opened the box to see what was inside. It turned out to be 4 packets with 4 different types of treats. The first I selected was like a bone, and was very crunchy, and apparently it was very enjoyable. A bit later I opened another packet and it had thin sticks of a meat like substance. That barely lasted 2 seconds once Stella took it.

  When I got to the pub there were only two other people in it, but people started trickling in. Once Shawn and Stella got there then place started getting quite lively, and I was often distracted from the crossword. That was a good thing because I was not really enjoying trying to solve some of the clues that seemed like they might be more at home in the cryptic crossword (which I never did get around to looking at).

  After two pints of Guinness I might have had a third, but I felt a sort of urge to head for home. For one thing it seemed darker outside, and it seemed like the forecast sleet could start falling at any moment. I had forgotten my main reason for wanting to go, and I was also distracted by another idea of what I would do. I had originally intended to walk home via the Pharmacy to pick up my repeat prescription.

  It must be an impending sign of brain fade to have forgotten that, but maybe I was too distracted by another idea that was buzzing around inside my mind. It was to go home via the little supermarket on Catford bridge where I wanted to get some nice assorted, mainly Polish, instant noodles, plus some other stuff. That is exactly what I did, and I am happy to say they had the beetroot flavour instant noodles that are a Polish favourite at this time of year (although admittedly more as a beetroot based soup rather than instant noodles).

  I ended up with half a bag full of instant noodles, including a 5 pack of some Japanese instant noodles of some unrecognisable flavour. I also got one of the extra strong garlic sausages that Michael loves, and a fairly expensive pack of smoked spare ribs. If they should be as nice as Chinese style spare ribs, then maybe they were not that expensive - there maybe enough for 2 or 3 portions of Chinese spare ribs at the same price each of the price I paid for the whole pack.

  It was good to get home, and out of the cold. It was not really warm indoors, but after just an few degrees outside, it initially felt quite warm. The first thing I did after taking my coat off was to go into the cold kitchen, and put the contents of a pack of Aldi's salt and chilli pork belly strips into the mini oven to cook. I had a cunning plan, and it worked quite well. I also made up a single wholemeal bap with a sliced beef, mixed salad leaves and horseradish sauce filling.

  I then went up to my bedroom. I should have realised that turning off all the heating before I went out for a few hours would leave my bedroom feeling quite chilly, and it was so cold outside that the heater struggled until the middle of the night trying to get the room comfortable. First of all I ate my bap, and the heater was just about starting to take the worst of the chill off the air, although my computer desk felt unpleasantly cold to touch for hours.

  By the time I had eaten my bap, and gone through the pictures I had taken, and fished out just the two shown here, it was almost time for the first Star Trek of the day at 4pm. It was maybe 4.30pm when I went and got the salt and pepper flavoured pork belly strips from the oven. I have to say that the salt and chilli flavour was almost hard to detect, but they were, as expected, very nice.

  I thought it was probably a mistake to buy those pork belly strips because I would have them for dinner, and being very rich, it would probably give me terrible heartburn if I ate them too late. I thought I would eat them very early in the evening, and then probably hav a can or two of soup as my "official" dinner. In the end I didn't seem to feel the need of any hot soup, and I am not sure why because I was still feeling a bit cold through most of the evening.

  I checked my temperature several times and it was low rather than high. So it was not a fever, but the result of the room not being that warm. Hot soup would have been the sensible idea, but I just had three small packets of crisps as a sort of finale of the day's eating. After watching, or part watching the four Star Trek episodes, and two The Simpsons episodes on offer, I decided it would be more comfortable to get under the duvet and try for sleep. Just to help things on a bit, I had a few large whiskies before going to bed.

  I did seem to feel very tired by 9pm, and I expected to go out like a light, but I also felt very uncomfortable. It wasn't my guts this time, but things like my right elbow, plus other bits of me aching. The right elbow is an old wound and often aches when it gets cold. Other aches seem to be the site of where I had my covid injections, and they too can be sensitive to cold. They ache like overworked muscles, or even the aches you get when having a heart attack. Fortunately experience showed those aches were nothing dangerous, but just annoying, and maybe an early sign of something 'flu like.

  I eventually fell asleep, and slept for maybe a couple of hours. I would usually wake after a couple of hours to go for a pee. I assumed it would be the same last night, but I went to the toilet, but nothing happened. It seemed quite odd, and possibly worrying that I peed very little last night. There later turned out to be a probable reason for it, but I am not completely convinced.

  I think it was around 3am when I woke up, and by that time the heater did seem to be keeping out the cold. It was also the time when the body temperature sinks to it's lowest, and that can make it feel warmer. One of the troubles was that it was now feeling a bit too warm under the duvet, but there were assorted aches and plus the off phenomena of my bed suddenly gaining lumps and bumps that weren't there half an hour ago, and......I just could not relax and get back to sleep.

  I got up and started reading stuff on my PC. I should also add that another discomfort was that I was in the middle of a hangover from the several (or more) large whiskies I had drunk earlier in the night. I think it was around 5am before I managed to sleep again, and that didn't last long before I got up again to have my first semi big pee of the night. Getting back to sleep again seemed easier, and with one more visit to the toilet I managed to sleep until well gone 8am.

  When I finally got up I went to the toilet, farted instead of having a poo, but did do a very big pee. It seemed like I had just not peed enough, and water being a heavy substance, meant that when I weighed myself I seemed to have put on 800gm. That was a lot for a 24 hour period, and there were reasons to think it was not from eating too much this time.

  One of the desired side effects of my early, and very simple, dinner last night was that my blood glucose was nice and low this morning. The Contour meter read an excellent 7.6mmol/l. The GlucoRX meter was even better at just 7.5mmol/l - the target I have been trying to reach for ages. Even the Sinocare meter gave a very good reading of 7.8mmol/l. I have doubts I will achieve similar good results tomorrow.

  The odd thing is that just these lower readings were good enough to almost stop me peeing until quite late in the early hours of this morning. As I sit here writing this I think I will soon be having another big pee. Once again, it seems possible, if not indeed probable, that some of the odd peaks in my weight are nothing but water retention. It is possible it is a side effect of one of my blood pressure drugs.

  Talking of blood pressure....Before I just went to the toilet, and then allowed a bit of time to settle down, my blood pressure was unusually high - for me at this time. I saw 125/52, although the blood pressure meter still calls that "Normal", but I prefer the kudos of "Optimal", and that is what I got just now, 108/52. It is slightly suspicious that the diastolic pressure remained unchanged at 52mmHg, but maybe it is this possible illness having a negative reaction.

  At last I finally feel warm, and thanks to the bright sunshine now streaming through my bedroom windows, I have at last been able to turn the heater down. It is a shame that it is still under 3° C outside. While I feel warm I seem to feel fairly OK, albeit a bit tired after my lost sleep. Sooner or later I have to go outside when I go and collect the repeat prescription I should have got yesterday.

  I think I choose to still treat myself as being off colour, and so I think I will forego a shower, and washing my hair, and just have a quick spray of deodorant before rushing out to get my prescription, and heading home again. I think my big blue coat will keep any bad smells in as well as the cold out. then once I am home I hope to luxuriate in the sunshine inside my bedroom. I expect I will read and snooze until I feel no need to read and snooze. The only fly in the ointment is that Lee has suddenly surfaced again, and wants to ask me some technical questions that I may well feel hard to answer after so many years of not doing the sort of pirate radio technology that I am sure is what Lee wants to ask about. It is about time he started remembering some of this stuff himself.

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