Slept poorly. Couldn’t fall asleep for a long time; I saw that Tolya wasn’t sleeping either — he’d floated into the transfer compartment to watch the sunset and sunrise. When he came back (around 2 AM), I took the film camera, the photo camera, and also floated into the transfer compartment and started shooting the Earth’s horizon.

These days we’re entering a sunlit orbit — shadow is getting shorter and shorter. And today, getting the ballistic printout from “Delta,” we look and the shadow column is all zeros. White nights have begun in orbit. The Sun barely sets at all. Its edge slowly rolls behind the orange curtain of the horizon, as behind the curtain of a puppet theater.

During the day my head ached terribly. Tolya and I got into a tiff, and I couldn’t bear the pain for long. At 4 PM I went to sleep instead of exercising. Slept about two hours, and it got a bit easier.

I talked with Zhenya Kobzev on the comm. He said that according to all items on our coded table for private communication with the crew physician only, everything is fine, stable. We talked, and my soul felt lighter.

In the evening, over two sessions, we had a meeting with the wives. My dear Lyusek, what a sweetheart — she sets the tone, the mood. I talked with her and watched her with delight. She told me she’d spoken with Vitalik on the phone; he’s vacationing with friends in Grozny now. And he told her: “Mom, it’s probably bad that I left Papa and went away — maybe I should come back?” Well done, son. I told him to keep enjoying his vacation and then go to the “Orlyonok” pioneer camp.

A day off, but there’s lots of fuss and small tasks. During exercise, the strap on the leg-loading bungee tore off from the treadmill. Had to sew it back on. The thread behaves interestingly in weightlessness — it’s not easy to get it through a needle when it has no weight and gets tangled. So I held one end in my teeth and, pulling it taut, threaded the other through the needle. Managed it.

Then we drained water from the technical water container, prepared the toilet — basically getting ready to receive guests.

Now, before bed, we still want to watch the sun setting behind the horizon.