Recently, I had a nice Birthday. I’d booked a ‘day’ off work, and a Sunday roast was planned, and successfully executed. I made half a coffee cake which was sandwiched with coffee butter icing and cherry jam. It was good! My friend in Wales, surprisingly, sent me a Birthday text on the day, and even more surprisingly, flowers and truffles were delivered the next day from him. Nice! It was kind of him to remember, and a week on, I still have most of them; yellow roses, yellow freesias – my favourite, white antirrhinums, and some foliage. The tiny white daisies didn’t last so well, though they were pretty. As for the truffles… oh my. They were Belgium chocolate, small drop-like shapes, and salted caramel. He knows what I like lol. Only 2 remain, though they look lonely so won’t last much longer lol.

Work has been good. No bolshy customers from my point of view, and no overtime sought which was fine by me. Over the month since the last pay date, I managed to only do 5 hours overtime as I wanted to see what my new basic pay would be like. I’m still not earning enough to pay back the student loan and that’s fine with me. With my reduced pension payment, the salary is just enough to make our lives more comfortable. We’ll never be rich, but I can live with ‘comfortable.’ If it starts to get too much for me, I’ll simply ask to transfer to the tills, though I have heard that my area is known as ‘no escape dot.com’ by other staff. Funny…

I finally ordered and received work trousers; mine are looking a tad ‘tired’ so I thought it would be a good idea. It wasn’t. They’re so rough, stiff, and heavy. I washed them including plenty of fabric softener, hemmed them, washed them again finishing them off in the tumble dryer. I wore them for a week (not the same pair) and they rubbed my knees raw, presumably rubbing my knees whilst I walked. They have a high percentage of polyester in them and I suspect this is the problem; I wear mostly 100% cotton clothes. They’ve aggravated my back too, and front, from the waistband. I could wear a small T-shirt to avoid them rubbing my back, though that won’t help my knees, so they’ve been consigned to the bottom of a drawer. I’ve noticed lots of staff don’t wear the ‘regulation’ trousers, so I’ll just carry on wearing my own; I have 2 pairs of smart trousers, so it’ll be fine.

The title: when I first moved here, I had an ‘MOT’ and they discovered my blood sugar level was raised and I was told I was pre-diabetic which came as a shock to me. I was careful, and less than a year later, my blood sugar had dropped to almost normal. I’ve continued to be careful, and a recent blood test has shown that my blood sugar is now ‘normal, no further action required.’ What a relief! I really have been careful with sugary products and losing the weight has most likely helped too. My legs are looking seriously toned lol, I’ve lost over an inch from my waist so far and my trousers are all a tad too loose, so I need to wear a belt with them. I need to lose more weight before I can drop a size, but it’ll come, I’m sure.

Christmas is less than 10 weeks away now I think, and I’ve noticed all the lovely Lebkuchen (gingerbread) in the shops. Oh, they take me back to growing up in Germany (army brat) and I love them though I’ll make sure I don’t eat too many of them.

Oh, don’t forget: In the UK the clocks change this coming weekend. In the past, it’s never been an issue as I’ve rarely worked weekends. Now, I work every weekend though at least I’ll get an extra hour in bed this weekend.

Have a good week.