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What was your fasting blood glucose? (full on chat)

@ianpspurs. Thanks for that. It is not necessary to have a chosen religion in order to practice stoicism. In the case of Monday’s Serenity Prayer - I take it as a sort of mantra or meditative verse and ignore the word ‘prayer’. I suppose you could say contemplate although some would argue that contemplation is praying. But, it’s just a word.
The mind the gap audio I took to be a mental exercise in choice. In physical terms, I got on the wrong tram in Bordeaux a couple of visits ago, realized my mistake, got off two stops down and waited quietly for the one I wanted to turn up. I didn’t get angry or upset by it. People board the wrong train all the time; the person who goes out on the lash, intending to stay with the group and then decides to wander off - and gets mugged or worse. The person coaxed into a bit of light shop lifting and ending up in court. Pinocchio boarding the wrong train, so to speak and going to Pleasure Island. For myself I think about the chimp inside my head (the primitive bit, all excited about jumping in) - and the mind the gap bit as (shoving it back in it’s box and having a think about it). I suppose that the mind the gap explanation could have made more emphasis on the choices that we make in different situations when the chimp inside our heads jumps up and down - ‘the car in front is not going fast enough and I can’t overtake on this winding road - grrrh!’ - or, ‘well it’s a nice day, enjoy the view’.
Not sure that’s of any help.
Thank you for taking the time to respond and clarify your lived experience of Stoicism. As for the mind the gap issue, I've read/heard many a sermon/homily which also should have been better thought through. I can see many commonalities between Christian tradition and Stocism, especially St Paul but he has some critics over those influences. I can't actually reconcile it to the gospels but there's a great deal of Christian tradition and supposedly foundational beliefs with zero gospel basis. One thing that stands out as remarkably similar is the use of Examen prayers - almost identical to imagining then reviewing the day. My big stumbling block is meditation as prayer. If there is no one on the end of the phone so to speak what exactly is the point? Obviously I could be praying to absolutely no one or nothing but at the very worst there is a 50/50 chance - far better odds. Once again thanks both for this and the link to the whole week.
 
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Forgot to add:
@dunelm coffee in a tea mug, sacrelige and also when it happens vise versa. Somehow drinks in the wrong mug are not so enjoyable. Strange but true.
@Krystyna23040 sad to read that you will be housebound again with ankle trouble, just as you had recovered enough to enjoy going out and about again. Hope the support from MrK and the elasticated monstrosity helps.
 
31.10
8.35am FBG 5.7.
So grateful that son2 chose to arrive a few days early, instead of his due date, which was today. I could not have coped with a lifetime of Halloween birthdays. Having sent years of my life trying to ignore it.
In the busyness of the last few days I have forgotten to post.
Update on house sale.
After advice from a French friend, at the second viewing I resolutely ignored the roof repair, which they apparently did not notice, also a small damp patch In a window reveal. The important thing is to tell them about the things they cannot see for themselves. So mentioned the dripping tap, and demonstrated how to almost stop it. (now MrSlim will not need to fix or replace it) Told them which window won't open and that another is difficult to clean. Mentioned the occasional woodworm in the bedroom. Which they peered at. They had already been told about the underfloor heating, and accepted that only half of it works in the kitchen.
I told them we are not taking the huge heavy armoire in the salon, it's too heavy to move, or the four poster bed in the master bedroom. We had to cut the frame in half to get it up the stairs and then weld it back together. Also showed them which plants we intend to remove from the garden, apparently very important to agree on that.
Then electronic signing of the preliminary agreement. Which due to my technical and computer incompetence took a lot longer than it should have done.
Now we wait.
They have ten days to withdraw.
I am packing. Started with sumner clothes, seemed a logical first step. Moved on to the armoire in our bedroom. Which has already been tidied, except for the bottom shelf, a mess of shoes, their boxes, bags and other things thrown in to be out of sight.
Sorted shoes, placed sandals into their boxes, decided not to keep a pair of fancy patterned boots, pretty, but not comfortable, so rarely worn.
During the sorting process there was stuff everywhere, it didn't help that Kiki was rearranging some of it and later brought inside a huge spider to play with!
Mess resolves into one packed suitcase with all our summer clothes, pile of rubbish, big bag for charity shop and remaining tidily stacked shoes and bags back in the armoire. However those pretty boots in their box are nowhere to be found. I must have spent an hour looking for them. Still missing this morning.
Do other people have things perform this vanishing act. Happens to me fairly frequently. Now having to go through everything again.

@dogslife if a photo is too large, screenshot it and try again with the screenshot. Thanks to whoever it was who gave me this tip, has saved a lot of time.
All sounds rather promising so hopefully they will go ahead.
 
Good morning everyone on a bright and sunny start to Diwali here in the dark and dangerous north - or Halloween if you will but don’t mention the shop loads of tat. The bins have been emptied - only another two garden bin days until Christmas! Well, April really. We are going to take advantage of this splendid sunshine and go foraging for vitamin D. Mrs Miggins, with her all to Scottish Heritage freckle skin will have all she needs before reaching the end of the drive - and it’s not a long one. I will probably need about 20 minutes while Mrs Miggins goes all crispy and fries in the pale sunshine - like a badly informed vampire. Art bit - a boat - well nearly a boat. I hope you all have a good day and @gennepher I hope your day makes up for the awful experiences of yesterday. Already had my koffy, and in the correct mug - phew!
 

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Good morning everyone on a bright and sunny start to Diwali here in the dark and dangerous north - or Halloween if you will but don’t mention the shop loads of tat. The bins have been emptied - only another two garden bin days until Christmas! Well, April really. We are going to take advantage of this splendid sunshine and go foraging for vitamin D. Mrs Miggins, with her all to Scottish Heritage freckle skin will have all she needs before reaching the end of the drive - and it’s not a long one. I will probably need about 20 minutes while Mrs Miggins goes all crispy and fries in the pale sunshine - like a badly informed vampire. Art bit - a boat - well nearly a boat. I hope you all have a good day and @gennepher I hope your day makes up for the awful experiences of yesterday. Already had my koffy, and in the correct mug - phew!
Enjoy the walk in the sun, we have one of Will's fen sucked fogs (more of an anaemic mist) here which is fitting as we are off to Ely later. I forgot to wish anyone celebrating a happy Diwali despite Moonpig reminding me several times - too early for Hanukah wishes. Thank you for sharing your art once again and well done on selecting Muggy McMugface over other imposters. Other syndromes are available should anyone feel the need to be even more fashionable but for goodness sake don't tell Kemi.
 
Morning all - can't say good since I've read of sprained ankles, conflict over how to balance carbs with the need for extra protein, a horrendous experience in Lidl and distress from TV licensing. Hugs to @gennepher @Krystyna23040 and @JohnEGreen. @dogslife the walking sounds as though it has helped you in so many ways and @jjraak's useful guide could be the gateway to you adding images. No grandchildren here today just a trip for a CT scan then a month wait for the feedback - unless ..... Meanwhile it is time for more tea, peanut butter (the downsized spoon isn't Rachel's doing) and Jarlsberg to mask the after taste of steroids. Y'all enjoy Fursday - it is garbage day./week. General Waste Bin looks resplendent medals, epaulettes n'all.
that reminds me back in February I had a scan to determine the extent of the PAD in my right leg this is when they by chance found the leak in my AAA stent which lead to immediate hospitalization but your mention of your scan has just brought it to my mind that I have had no notification about what the scan was originally for so I'm going to have to chase that up.
 
Thank you for taking the time to respond and clarify your lived experience of Stoicism. As for the mind the gap issue, I've read/heard many a sermon/homily which also should have been better thought through. I can see many commonalities between Christian tradition and Stocism, especially St Paul but he has some critics over those influences. I can't actually reconcile it to the gospels but there's a great deal of Christian tradition and supposedly foundational beliefs with zero gospel basis. One thing that stands out as remarkably similar is the use of Examen prayers - almost identical to imagining then reviewing the day. My big stumbling block is meditation as prayer. If there is no one on the end of the phone so to speak what exactly is the point? Obviously I could be praying to absolutely no one or nothing but at the very worst there is a 50/50 chance - far better odds. Once again thanks both for this and the link to the whole week.
Interesting, the examen. I’m with you on meditation as prayer - I meditate, it’s not prayer.
 
Morning all - can't say good since I've read of sprained ankles, conflict over how to balance carbs with the need for extra protein, a horrendous experience in Lidl and distress from TV licensing. Hugs to @gennepher @Krystyna23040 and @JohnEGreen. @dogslife the walking sounds as though it has helped you in so many ways and @jjraak's useful guide could be the gateway to you adding images. No grandchildren here today just a trip for a CT scan then a month wait for the feedback - unless ..... Meanwhile it is time for more tea, peanut butter (the downsized spoon isn't Rachel's doing) and Jarlsberg to mask the after taste of steroids. Y'all enjoy Fursday - it is garbage day./week. General Waste-Bin looks resplendent medals, epaulettes n'all.
Thanks Ian...
 
Horrendous experience & something that would clearly scar anyone.

Horrible how life's little bumps in the road, the kind of things that others might tut but move past swiftly like your TV letter , can cause a much more intense reaction because others have a more deep rooted hyper vigilance going on for whatever reason.

I like your 'post & forget' attitude.

And hope you manage to allay any fears & your yoga helps get you back to a more gentle state of mind.

Best wishes for the day.
Thanks @jjraak

I am back home now. I thought the morning out would do me good, but I honestly prefer my own company, so now a cup of tea and a nap and I will start the day again. There are a couple of things I want to achieve before darkness falls...

Yes, we all have a personal history that affects our individual reactions/responses to certain events.
 
Thanks Ian...
You are welcome. This has been doing the rounds as a story with comments this week. As a male I will never properly understand her point, your toilet experience or full horror of the stalking but well done Saoirse. Marina Hyde's piece was in my opinion brilliant.
Would have been better if I had spotted that made should have been male
 
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Yes mate I do agree the shakes were prescribed without consulting me out of the blue as it were, but I am in a bit of a quandary as a med I am on for pulmonary fibrosis plays havoc with your appetite and makes everything taste yuck so am having trouble eating so the shakes may help but I think I will ask Keiran to recommend some shakes and self fund them the meds slow down the progress of PF but do not stop it and the hospital keeps phoning up to check on me to make sure that I’m not losing to much weight this is a separate issue to the doctors reason the wound I have on my back is around the area of the coccyx and I don’t have much padding there so a bit of a conundrum swings and roundabouts don’t you know.
as with a lot of things, finding the right balance for you.
there is a huge variety of protein shakes, and as always some (Not many) are ok.
but it's not something I could recommend.
there must be a way, to increase muscle, having food related protein as with meat or such.
I increase my meat portions to help if I am off colour.
 
Agree @SlimLizzy .

But also liked your retraining programme.

I was going to ask why on earth they didn't knock first, but then realised they may have done so.

Only in gennifers case she might not have heard them?

Which then takes me to ....

If loo lock NOT working AND workmen are assigned to fix it, why was there NO sign saying "Loo out of order"...?
I absolutely love @SlimLizzy 's retraining program. I am going to incorporate aspects of it in my complaint letter @jjraak

I would not have heard them knock. I was wearing my Cochlear sound processor. I was reaching around away from the door searching for some toilet paper, and so I did not see nor did I hear that huge black guy coming in. He was intent on the door handle. I said my piece. He did not look at me. But my memory of this is that he carried on fiddling with the door handle and did not immediately leave. I was also aware of other shoppers looking around him looking at me on the toilet as though there was something interesting to view here. My mind could not quite compute... then the fact that the second guy came in, a white guy this time fiddling with the door handle as I'm trying to finish off my business on the toilet. No privacy whatsoever, and the stupid shopper woman with the trolley with the toddler in the seat is still interestedly trying to look round to see what is going on, because I am now shouting for a second time.

By the time I get out, the black guy is nowhere in the shop to be seen. But the white man is still there and I have a verbal go at him. There was a second white man with the same uniform/overalls, who is now fiddling with the disabled toilet lock...

The lock on a disabled toilet often does not work. But if you need the toilet, you have to go in... unfortunately the disabled toilet door often opens both ways so if it does that, I cannot barricade it with my walker.
 
6.9 this day of so many different issues with our lives.
Maybe for once a lot of sympathy goes to the rest of you lot instead of Mrs L and myself.
Having a quiet day.

#1 grandkid birthday today. 24.
Triple wow!
No cake as his girlfriend has taken him away for a long weekend.

Happy Halloween, Diwali and bonny collection time.

Weather is a bit weird, all the fore casters are saying it is mild teens temps, dry, a bit cloudy etc.
It's not here.
It feels cold, seems we are stuck in a cloud. Damp and spitting.
A mate of mine phoned me saying he had a round of gelf, in bright sunshine, twenty degrees in Newcastle area!!!!!!
I tell you the locals are walking around in Eskimo clothes or is that the fashion now?

Hope you lot get sorted.

Just remembered, friend of mine got took to magistrates a good few years back.
Cos of licensing, he pleaded not guilty.
Cos he had paid it.
The magistrate dismissed the case, with costs and apologies in writing from the beeb.
His was a the third case in a row, that was dismissed by the court.

Typical broken britain.

My bestest wishes to you lot as always.
 
Thank you @SlimLizzy
I very much like your suggestion...
I will be incorporating some of that into my letter to Lidl when I get back home...thanks!
Breakfast has arrived so....
Will tell you the sleep yoga when I get home, it is a breathing yoga....
It is a breathing exercise. @SlimLizzy
I have been doing it about five weeks now and it has worked every time.
You start counting the number 30 (in your mind).
You breathe in, and then you make the out breath last as long as possible.
You then count the number 29 (in your mind).
You breathe in, and again you make the out breath last as long as possible....
Usually by number 26, I am sound asleep.

If I wake up for the bathroom, I sort that and then I just start the whole process again and by number 26 I am fast asleep again. If your mind wonders and starts thinking thoughts you have to start at number 30 all over again. But my mind never does that..

However, last night I was wound up tighter than a coiled spring. And I got down to number 10 and I still haven't fallen asleep. My mind said some words to myself, and I thought oh no, I've got to start at number 30 again. But I went out like a light...... so it did work!!!!

I'm surprised it works.... maybe someone else knows a bit more about breathing to aid going to sleep...
 
Good morning everyone on a bright and sunny start to Diwali here in the dark and dangerous north - or Halloween if you will but don’t mention the shop loads of tat. The bins have been emptied - only another two garden bin days until Christmas! Well, April really. We are going to take advantage of this splendid sunshine and go foraging for vitamin D. Mrs Miggins, with her all to Scottish Heritage freckle skin will have all she needs before reaching the end of the drive - and it’s not a long one. I will probably need about 20 minutes while Mrs Miggins goes all crispy and fries in the pale sunshine - like a badly informed vampire. Art bit - a boat - well nearly a boat. I hope you all have a good day and @gennepher I hope your day makes up for the awful experiences of yesterday. Already had my koffy, and in the correct mug - phew!
I am very liking this particular series of Art bits @dunelm
I find a peace in them....

Thank you, I am taking it slowly today....until my mind clears of the murkiness of yesterday, which it has nearly done, and I am ready to start something new....
 
7.5 this morning.
The saying 'it never rains but it pours' is so true.
I quite badly sprained my ankle yesterday when walking with my sister after we had done the afternoon admin.

Mr K is going out to get an ankle support as soon as our local pharmacy opens.
Oh dear...extra hugs for you @Krystyna23040
 
"Common "sense did not prevail. Surely on opening the door to repair handle and finding toilet occupied, even if they did knock, the correct and only proper response is an apology and immediate withdrawal?
How is it that these workmen were so very insensitive. I simply cannot understand their attitude.
I totally agree @SlimLizzy
I cannot understand why they did not withdraw until I came out...
 
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