It's another day starting with mist and fog. The mist lasted a bit longer than forecast. The last seemed to go just after 10am.  Today's high will be 9° C again, but much of today will only feature sunny spells, and full sunshine not starting until 4pm - according to the forecast. As I write this the sky looks very clear, and the sun has been shining non stop since it first burned through the last of the mist. After a very cold night, tomorrow is going to be a slightly improved version of today. That improvement may just be several or more hours of sunny spells today will be replaced by full sunshine....maybe.

  It's a very late start to today for reasons too diverse to fully explain. I didn't get up that late today, but lots of silly things have pre-occupied me - including another failed attempt at getting the zipper back on a zip ! To save time I had probably better just write today as a précis of what happened yesterday.

  After the usual writing and resting yesterday morning, I had a shower, and then put the last of the laundry in the laundry bag in to soak. I then walked to Aldi. It was one of those curious times when after walking little more than 10ft it seemed like I barely had the energy to walk all the way to Aldi, and yet when I got there I didn't feel any worse.

  Walking back was, as usual. a bit harder because I was carrying a fair bit of heavy shopping - the very heaviest in my rucksack. After putting four 2l bottles of Diet Coke, and 4 cans of beer (440ml - I think) in the rucksack I did the zip up with such a flourish that the zipper came off the end of the zip. One end of it was a bit frayed, and no longer attached to the main part of the rucksack (although the sides still were except for the last inch).

  When I got home I was hot and bothered, and my attempts to get the zipper back on so I could get my bottles and cans out came to nothing except for more sweat and frustration. I had to rip the zip open to get my stuff out. Once I had put my shopping away I had a luxurious lunch of (alleged) chicken tikka filled samosas. I had never noticed these in Aldi before, and I reget that because they were really delicious just eaten cold direct from the packet. They are probably unhealthy on many levels, but if I see them again I will definitely be buying another couple.....maybe even four !

  I had a rest after eating, and I think it included a snooze. I seemed to have to force myself to open my eyes, but maybe 10 minutes later I was finishing the laundry I had left in soak after my shower. It was one pair of lounge pants, one t-shirt, one pair of underpants, and one pair of base layer pants (I think they are called). They are like Lycra long Johns. I used to use wear them under my jeans when going to work in icy weather. recently I experimented with wearing as pyjama bottoms on cold night. They were briefly useful walking the 10 second walk to the toilet in the middle of the freezing night, but then had to be pulled down before going to the toilet, and so I still shivered !

  I had one afternoon snack of rice crackers and cheese, but spoiled it by adding sweet pickle (Aldi's own brand version of Branston pickle). Without the pickle it is an almost zero sugar snack. With pickle it is probably still better than a Mars Bar, but..... The main course of my dinner was debatable... It was a small portion of fries with a medium portion of German meat balls. Even now I can't decide if, taste wise, it was a tasty dinner or not. I think the sugar content was possible fairly low.
  What did boost the sugar content was my dessert of a lot of fruit. It included a couple of very ripe soft fruits that did seem very sweet. Overall it did seem like I had gone over the top. It was only an hour or so after eating the last of the fruit that I decided to scare myself and check my blood glucose levels. They were indeed dangerously high, but to some extent probably not unprecedented so short a time after eating sweet stuff. Both readings were taken with my "spare" blood glucose meters that I don't use day to day because they always seem to over read. As can be seen, they don't even agree with each other here ! In a moment of madness I tested these two meters again this morning, and the results were interesting.

  On the whole I had a good sleep, and I feel sure I got my full eight hours sleep. I think it was around midnight that I got up to go for a pee, and I felt very chilled after getting back from the freezing cold bathroom. It gave me some brief trouble that was possibly more cold angina than heartburn, but I treated for both. I seemed to recover from it very quickly, and I was soon back in bed, and sleeping.

  I had several dreams that seemed to be about staying near the seaside with friends. One dream was about what happened when I was asked if I could fix a locking mechanism for a car. The best option I could come up with involved a lot of super glue, and I seemed to get it everywhere, but I think I fixed the thing. One curious thing I noticed about the car was that quite a few jack sockets had been added to it. This was so the band could just drive up to where they would be playing, plug in, and play with no setting up.

  The other dream shared the same people and setting, but was set in a pub. We went into a pub, and it was a very plain public bar. I ordered what looked to be a nice ale. The landlady said I would have to wait 5 minutes because she was still pulling through the pipes (using water to flush out any sediments etc). I said OK, and that I was just going to nip down the road to a shop. When I came back the landlady noticed me out the front, and beckoned me into the much better equipped, although rather full, lounge bar - apparently that is where I should drink my premium beer. It did seem rather nice.

  I woke at just after 6am, and after a pee I decided to have another 5 minutes in bed. That turned into nearly 90 minutes. After getting up I went to the toilet, and had a quite reasonable pee, and a slightly small poo. I felt like I had eaten quite a lot yesterday (a bit more than I have described), and so I was pleased to see my weight was exactly the same as yesterday. That seem a good start to the day.
  It was a case of pure madness, or maybe it was in the spirit of experimenting, but this morning I used all 5 of my blood glucose meters. The two on the left came via the nurse at the group practice. That make me think that they are known to be accurate. The other three are cheap Chinese meters, and I doubt their accuracy. It is possible that there are patents the Chinese have to work around that make them less accurate.

  The meter on the far left was replaced by the nurse for no obvious reason - or at least a reason I was not aware of until very recently - the internal calendar only goes up to 2020 ! For me that makes no difference, but the hospital diabetes clinic can plug in and download the memory, and so an accurate date is wanted.  Those two on the left, whose readings I believe to be accurate, almost agree with each other, and 8.1mmol/l, and 8.7mmol/l., are good enough readings.

  It is curious that the three Chinese meters are are in close agreement. In the wrong order, 9.1mmol/, 9.2mmol/l and 9.3mmol/l are all rather higher than is desirable, but not terribly so.  I'll have to wait until it happens again, but I am sure that when the two meters on the left read a bit lower, the three Chinese meters seem to switch to agreeing with them. It is as if there is a non linear relation between them. It may be because at least the VivaChek meter on the right can also measure ketone levels - apparently using the same test strips somehow.

  A couple of things will be happening today. At some time "before 9pm" I am expecting another delivery from Amazon. This one included a few things I was saving up to make sure of meeting what now seems to be a £35 minimum order for free delivery. It includes more glucose test strips for two of my meters, and a couple of spare batteries for my waterproof cameras. This afternoon Jodie will be over to enjoy a few more cans of exotic (maybe) beers.