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Diabetes, life and all that - personal diary

At the grounds of the nearby monastery, where I love to walk when time allows, there is a very beautiful water fountain backed by a mosaic depicting life on earth

Loosely translated the inscription on the mosaic in biblical Greek reads "Wondrous is all You have created in Your Wisdom"



I have to be honest that this has been playing on my mind.

It is not difficult to accept when one considers a beautiful flower, seemingly perfect in the elegance of its form



the delicacy of its design



Or the vibrancy of its colors



Nor is it difficult to accept when looking at the animal kingdom







But what of the rest?

What of plaques and illness and disasters?

What of war?

What of man!

 
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On the motorway, heading to Paphos airport to catch our flight to Manchester.



As I am not driving I take the opportunity to enjoy the scenery



Particularly some dramatic skies above



As well as a nice sunset




Trying to take photographs from a car speeding down the motorway is quite a frustrating experience.

If I had my way we would probably be stopping every five minutes to give me the chance to shoot yet another interesting vista.

But we have a plane to catch and neither the wife or my son look as if they would forgive me if I caused them to miss it.
 
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Trying to find something diabetes friendly to eat at the airport is impossible. It all seems to be high carb rubbish. There's some ready made salads but they look so sorry I can't bring myself to eat them.

Unfortunately with a five hour plane journey ahead and no dinner served on board ( thank you Easyjet) going without is not an option.

I can see that the next few days may well end up being a challenge diet wise.

I suppose I have my routine in place and this trip is about to disrupt it.
 
Might be a good excuse to snuggle up to the wife

But with our eleven year old sharing a room... even that may be out.

I am sure we will be fine as long as we don't let the weather affect us.
 
Actually I find that I have no problem ordering at "proper" restaurants, where they are quite happy to replace carbs for extra salad or veg.

The problem seems to be at self service, fast food places where everything is standardized and ready prepared.
 
From what I saw tomorrow will be reasonably dry but the weekend will be really wet.

The good thing Is that the forecast for Cyprus for this weekend is also rain.

We are prepared for the weather to be not very nice and hopefully we want let that spoil our time.

The son and I want to visit a couple of museums and the wife was talking to me about some huge indoor shopping arcade she wants to visit.
 
Just getting settled into our hotel.

Whoever designs passenger seats for Easyjet must be a real sadist. There is just no way to get comfortable on them. As for leg room .....

My son made me laugh as his first comment when we stepped out of the airport was " Dad what is this light in the sky?" I did not know what he was referring to at first. "Why is the sky not dark? Where are the stars?"

Say hallo to blanket cloud cover son!

At least it is not raining and it is nowhere near as cold as I feared it would be.

Pavlos
 
Sometimes I hate my biological clock.

Woke up at five a.m. this morning, less than four hours after going to bed. It's pitch black, everyone else is asleep and I have absolutely no business being awake.

Why am I awake?

Five a.m. UK time is seven a.m. Cyprus time, so a little letter than my usual waking up time.

At least my fasting glucose is a very good 5,1 mmol, despite going to bed at 6,7 mmol last night ( six whole hours after a toasted ham and cheese roll at the airport)

Pavlos
 

I'm gonna follow you thru this as I'm planning a LOT longer trip than you (US from OZ) and I need all the advice I can get re meals

Take care Pavlos
 
At six o'clock exactly, with the room still bathed in darkness, the silence was broken by a very cheerful "Good morning" from my son.

"Good morning. Now go back to sleep before you wake your mother up!" I respond.

He returns with " It's eight o clock in Cyprus, this is when I usually wake up. I can not go back to sleep!"

My first thought is " Yeap, that's my boy all right".

Followed by a more horrified " What do you mean you usually wake up at eight. You are at school at half past seven each morning?!"

My son burst out laughing.

Have a great day everyone

Pavlos
 
Finally light breaks and I look to see what is outside our window.

What last night looked like this


Is now revealed to be a rather modern looking pedestrian bridge over some small river or canal. Trinity Bridge by the famous architect Santiago Kalatrava apparently.



Still no sign of rain fortunately.

If that holds I expect we will be able to do a fair bit of walking around town. If the rain does arrive I still expect a fair bit of walking, only indoors this time; the museum of science and technology is our fall back solution in case of bad weather. A case of when rather than if, I suspect.

Nevertheless ,I decide to kickstart the day with a visit to the hotel gym.


At seven a.m. I was the first and only person there. I was pleased about that; made me feel really virtuous lol!



A nice 50 min 5km session on the treadmill, means that I can now enjoy a nice guilt free English breakfast.



Pavlos
 
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Weather more than behaved during our first day here, which gave us a chance to walk about the centre of Manchester; seems nice and compact with a lot of the museums and shops within walking distance of our hotel.

The Manchester Cathedral is definitely worth visiting; a building which manages to feel a lot larger on the inside than it looks on the outside



It has some very interesting colorful and distinctly abstract stained glass windows







The only sour note, the homeless person sleeping rough at the Cathedral's doors. Luckily this is not a sight we have grown used to in Cyprus and to be honest I still find it a bit shocking.



The Exchange theater has a remarkable architectural setting within the Royal Exchange building. Perhaps a place to catch a play tomorrow.



Just outside, a tribute to those lost at war



By this time the son started complaining that he could not walk anymore, while the wife was obviously tempted by the abundance of shops around us.

The solution to our problem was for my son and I to catch a film at the Odeon IMAX



giving the wife some free time.

Now back at the hotel resting a bid before we go to the Opera for a performance of La Traviata tonight.

Now how we will manage to get the son to sit through that, we shall wait and see.

So, so far so much more than just good!

Pavlos
 
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Up at four thirty a.m. this morning. At least I am reliably consistent.

You know what will happen. I will adjust to UK time only when I have to get back to Cyprus time.

La Traviata last night went surprisingly well. I love classical music but I was a bit apprehensive about sitting through a whole opera, from which I was only familiar with one aria previously to be honest, the famous drinking song


As for my son, I need not have worried, he behaved like an angel.

Well, slept like one anyway.



He slept from the middle of Act 2 until he was waken up be the audience's loud applause at the very end, just as the curtains were opening up for the cast to take their final bow.

"Wow", he said, " how did they manage to change the stage scenery so fast?"




Pavlos
 
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Glucose 5,2 this morning, to go with a 5,1 yesterday morning.

So far both my diet and my glucose levels are firmly under control, despite being on a short holiday break in the UK.

Wife wants us to go either for an Indian or a Chinese meal today so I expect this will be the biggest challenge to my self discipline.

The trick is knowing what to order or more accurately what not to order: rice, bread or sweet and sour sauce not being the best of choices for me.

Unfortunately, so is pasta. We walked right past San Carlo Italian restaurant yesterday, it is no more than a couple of hundred meters from our hotel.



I have seen this restaurant mentioned a number of times in the sports pages of newspapers, as being a particular favorite amongst the city's various football stars.

I would not mind dining like a star for a day.
 


Good news Pavlos

Let us all know what you eat insofar as variety is concerned

Take care

Mike
 
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