Monday, August 13

Itäväylä, 13:15

Yesterday evening, the sky clear and everything brightened up. Today, now we are back in Helsinki, the weather has turned hot and summery.

This morning, Irma went to work on the scooter, and I settled down to go through what I have written so far and make a determined effort to complete the first section of the thesis this week. I made some more notes about my current notes, then spent time gathering some books together and going for a ten-minute run. I also decided that today would be the first fasting day of my new Alternate Day Fasting regime.

I intend to keep this up for two months before deciding whether it is a viable lifestyle or a waste of time. I took some initial readings and my blood pressure two minutes ago was, depending on which online resource you decide to believe, on the borders of “high normal” and “mild hypertension”. According to Vaughn’s Summaries, my vaguely-believable site of choice, I will be in perfect shape when I have a reading of 120 over 80 with a heart beat of 40. However, apparently these change during the day so that “for normal people, the highest BP occurs about midday” – ie right now-ish – so I should take another reading as soon as I get up tomorrow.

I am now on a short walk, because all this reading, writing and ata gathering is making my eyes hurt. I am looking across Itäväylä at Plantagen, and the main road is almost empty. For the first time in over a week the sun is hot on my back.

Later Sunshine will return home with a dead rabbit about half its size. It will have no interest in it other than dropping it on the floor and making a noise to show us what it has brought. I iron a large pile of laundry and then will go for a long walk instead of a run, because the Achilles tendon on my right leg is aching and I don’t want an excuse to back out of the Midnight Run.