i've been giving it a lot of thought and i think i made a mistake recommending my 2nd aunt to buy a new ipad. what she should've gotten instead was an android tablet. ipads are okay, but this exist inside of apple's walled garden, and as such, doesn't give you the sort of flexibility android can offer like manually installing your own apps. there are comparable samsung and google brand tablets that work just as well as the newest ipad.

i brought my set of dental picks. i got these a few years ago, figured i might need them one day, though at the time it seemed like a waste of money. but that day is today! i used one of the picks to pry inside the broken charge port on my 2nd aunt's old ipad. my intention was to maybe push in the prongs, or clear any obstructions, enough so that she can attach a cable to charge her ipad. i couldn't push in the prongs, but discovered i could pull them out. but the prongs seemed to be coming out, and i managed to extract them. that can't be good. but surprisingly, when i reinserted the apple lightning apple - i thought it'd be loose - it fit perfectly.

that made me super confused. how did that little piece of metal get inside the charge port anyway? it looked like a tiny staple. not sure who figured it out - either my father or mother - but one of them said the little metal piece was actually a part of the charging cable. i'd never seen this before, but a part of the cable actually fell off and got trapped inside the charge port, preventing a lightning cable to be inserted.

so the good news is we managed to fix my 2nd aunt's ipad. bad news is now she has no use for the new ipad that arrived last night, so we're returning it. i really wanted to try out the new 10th generation ipad! the one that's all screen (no home button) and now features a usb-c charging port. i went over to my sister's place close to noontime to retrieve the ipad that was sent to her house. esmei greeted me when i opened the door to the apartment, while my sister was still asleep.

my father - an avid tiktok user - made the switch to xiaohongshu ("little red book") after learning that tiktok will stop working in the US on sunday. he said it was just like tiktok. how long before xiaohongshu also get banned by the federal government?

it was a moderate level of busy today. i cooked 6 cups of rice, we used up most of it. it never got too crazy with customers, which is what we like. we made about as much as yesterday, and more than last thursday's profit. we're on course to match last january's earnings. bento boxes were the most popular item, minced pork the most popular of the choices.

there was a leftover chinese pastry (braided bread with bit of hot dog and scallions) from yesterday that i ate for lunch in the early afternoon. later my 2nd aunt showed up to retrieve her fixed ipad. she brought with her some subway sandwiches which she split with us. while eating, i saw news of david lynch's death. he's one of my favorite directors. kind of a polite weirdo, that was one of things i loved about him. dead at 78, an unrepentant smoker, it was emphysema that took his life, not a surprise. twin peaks, mulholland drive, dune, blue velvet, all my favorites. i have an original VHS recording of weekly twin peaks episodes when it first aired on ABC in the early 90's when i was still in high school.

my 2nd aunt brought her old lightning cable. that little piece of metal that was stuck inside the charging port fit the tip of her old cable perfectly. the case of the ipad that wouldn't accept any charging cable is officially solved. we ended up throwing away the old cable.

i saw esmei a few more times today: when my sister brought her to the cafe briefly. esmei demonstrated a new trick of alternating paw shakes before receiving a treat; i saw esmei again when she was in the back seat of the car after coming back from a walk. because i rarely give her any treats, she's learned to ignore me for the most part, focusing on my parents who constantly give her treats. i don't bribe dogs for their affection!

my father and i continued to think about the lighted clear acrylic glass display board. it could turn into something really cool. we first need to get some white led light strips. he already put out the smaller aliexpress acrylic board that i casually wrote some bento choices as a test. we also discovered that we can use a sliced up boba straw to either hold an led light strip in place or to use it as a shield to prevent light leaks from acrylic glass edges.

my 2nd stayed at the cafe to knit, before finally leaving around 5pm. our last customer came at 6pm, after he left, we started cleaning and getting ready to turn everything off.

i was in no hurry to eat dinner. i took a shower before finally moseying into the kitchen to make another chicken caesar salad. i mixed some pre-cooked shredded chicken in some olive, pepper, and salt, before pan-frying them so they were slightly brown. that made the chicken taste a bit better, but also made them tough like chicken jerky.

i woke up a bit before 8am to get ready for my 9am dental appointment in allston. it was another cold day but nothing like what it was last tuesday when i biked there. having survived that day, all other cold days seem warm by comparison. i still basically wore the same thing i did last time except i skipped the flannel pants and i wore my normal puffy black winter jacket instead of the columbia interchange. riding the bike, i warmed up underneath my clothes.

when i got there the language school adjoining their office had just opened as well. a collection of international students made their way inside. international kids always seem so cool. more stylish, more confident. i personally think language schools are kind of a scam, it's an excuse for them to party in the US on their student visa.

i had to get a new mold made of my upper teeth. the one made last week, doctor huang put in the wrong implant post, so that mold was no good. it went a lot smoother this time, mostly because he'd already loosened the crown on my last visit, so no hammers were necessary to remove it. he cast a new mold and even took an x-ray to confirm the type of post needed. i offered to pay for his time and extra material cost, but he said what i paid last time was already enough (he hadn't cashed the check yet). there were no other customers so we chatted a bit more. they told me about a patient of theirs that biked all he way from lexington to allston. he was a man in his 60's and used an electric bike. it probably wasn't a good experience because the next time he came he drove. i also told them about seeing them last year during the boston marathon. they said they live right next to heartbreak hill, so the marathon basically runs by their front steps.

i was out by 9:40am. i went to yi soon bakery to get a few things for my parents and 2nd aunt. coming back, i stopped at the brighton trader joe's to get some stuff for the cafe (like baby cucumbers and garlic). crossing the charles river, i noticed for the very first time that the river was partially frozen. even though they were far away, i spotted a few hooded mergansers with their unmistakeable plumage patterns. i wish i had my telephoto lens so i could take better photos.

cutting through harvard square, i made a detour to harvard vanguard to pick up a few prescriptions for my mother. apparently they also offer free prescription mail delivery, but when you order on the phone using their automated system, you need to speak with a live pharmacist afterwards to request this service each and every time. seems like a very inefficient way of requesting this convenience.

i made my way to the cafe around 11am. my 2nd aunt hadn't even shown up yet. a few orders came in and i started working just to help out even though technically it was my day off. my father and i tested the plastic divider shielding the cashier area from customers. was it acrylic or polycarbonate? we happened to have a short led strip which was thin enough to fit the edge of the plastic. the fact that it was able to light up the entire glass meant it was acrylic, which is what we wanted. the led strip was RGB only so it couldn't properly reproduce white light. the closest it got was blue, but it was proof that we could create a light board if we wanted, maybe use it to write our menu.

my 2nd aunt eventually showed up. she brought her 6th generation ipad, said her cord was broken, wouldn't charge anymore. we found her a replacement cable but when we tried to plug it in, it wouldn't fit inside the charging port. turns out the problem wasn't the cable but the port itself. the port's been so abused, the prongs inside that hold the charge cable in place have been mashed to smithereens, preventing the cable from inserting. it's a fix beyond our DIY expertise, as it requires desoldering. we told my 2nd aunt she could try taking her ipad to chinatown to find a repair place. my father suggested he could take it with them to taiwan to fix but that's not until the end of next month. after we checked online on the price of a new ipad ($299, 10th generation, circa 2022), my 2nd aunt decided to buy a new one. i ordered it for her on amazon, it's actually going to arrive later tonight.

i got back around noontime, ate a pork floss pastry for lunch. afterwards i biked to market basket to get some groceries. there was a sale on romaine lettuce so i decided to make chicken caesar salad for dinner the rest of the week. i had some shredded chicken in the freezer which i defrosted (from my spicy mexican chicken soup recipe a few months back). i'm overdue for some light meals, seems like every morning i'm getting heavier and heavier.

i spent the rest of the afternoon rewatching jett. it's a crime that this show only got one season, but what a glorious 9-episode season it was. jett is one of the coolest character to ever appear on the small screen. did carla gugino ever win any awards or receive any nominations for her performance? maybe one reason the show didn't get as much recognition is it premiered on the eve of the global pandemic. people had more pressing concerns.

i made my chicken caesar salad for dinner. i reheated some shredded chicken in the microwave. the hardest part of the recipe was chopping up the lettuce. added to that was the readymade caesar salad dressing, some shredded parmesan cheese, and croutons. the chicken itself was kind of bland, i might try to grill it in a pan next time for a bit more flavor. while eating my salad i realized my mistake: never have something cold to eat on a cold day. fortunately i had some hot tea to keep me warm.

celtics played the raptors tonight. boston's kind of in freefall right now, losing more games than they've won, to teams they should beat (on paper at least). seems like everyone brings their A game when they play the defending champions, and the celtics are not up to the task of defending that title. of course the raptors were highly motivated, having lost to boston in a 50+ points beatdown 2 weeks ago. this was their redemption game at home.

last night i started reading the ministry of time by kaliane bradley. it's received awards for being one of the best books of 2024. that there was a scifi premise - and time traveling to boot - intrigued me enough to find a copy. it's surprisingly funny. can't wait to go to bed tonight so i can read a few more chapters.

my father was busy all day preparing all the meats we got yesterday: cutting and seasoning the boneless chicken thighs; cutting the pork butts and marinating them for charsiu; cooking the ground pork for making both minced pork sauce and zhajiang noodle sauce. he also made a new batch of beef noodle soup with the beef shank he cut up into cubes last week. the pork butts we got from the chelsea market basket was one of the better cuts we've ever bought, with amazing marbling that makes them seem like more expensive cuts of meat. of all the market baskets, chelsea has the best meats, followed by waltham. somerville is last, but because it's the closest, sometimes we have no choice but to buy from there.

i tried out the illuminated clear dry erase board. when it's lit up it looks pretty cool. we used to have one for our sushi menu back when we used to sell sushi before we stopped because obtaining the necessary permit to sell any kind of raw food was too much of a hassle. anyway, the technology for that clear dry erase board was old, it probably used something like fluorescent bulbs to light up the glass. nowadays, with led light strips, it'd be easy to build our own.

my mother reheated yesterday's leftover beef stew for lunch. i had some with rice.

today was busy during lunch and not much after that. it gave my father time to do all his meat prep work. most of our online orders were old customers, there was only one or two names i didn't recognize. it's funny, i recognize all the names, and i remember their orders, but because i work in the back kitchen, i have no idea what these customers look like when they come and pick up their orders.

in bank info update news, grubhub finally updated our bank info. my sister told me last week. when i checked the payment info today, i noticed it was now the new bank account. ubereats takes the longest, they finally sent my sister a form essentially resubmitting all our financial credentials including tax id. why can't they more like square, where i just go to bank info in the app and easily update the bank routing and account number myself, no need to jump through all these hoops? but it looks like we may finally be able to consolidate all these delivery service payments into one bank account.

end of the day we were packaging: chicken and marinated pork into boxes to be frozen until we need them; zhajiang noodle sauce into pots to be frozen as well; and the beef noodle soup portioned into single serving containers, making sure each one has enough beef chunks and soup, then frozen until ready to serve. before we knew it, it was almost closing time. every time we make a new batch of beef noodle soup, i get to take home some leftovers.

i didn't have dinner until 8pm. i cooked some noodles and reheated the beef noodle soup. there was chunks of beef, plus an assortment of tendon and sinews and fatty bits, the parts we can't serve to customers, but the tastiest bits in my opinion. once again, it seemed like i had a huge bowl of beef with a little bit of noodles, given how much meat i had.

my father said he'd be here at 10:15am so of course he showed up 10 minutes early. we were making an everett-chelsea supply run today, my mother decided to stay home instead.

the everett restaurant depot was the first stop. the final few days of boneless chicken thighs on sale. we also tried looking for beef shanks but they've never once carried it at the everett location. out of curiosity i went to check out their egg prices. they were completely out of eggs again. there was another customer there equally confused by the lack of eggs.

next we went to the chelsea market basket just next door. we got some pork butts, got some grounded for making zhajiang and minced pork sauces. market basket seems to have better suppliers because unlike star market, they did have eggs, though a 6 carton limit. we also got some mussels on sale.

we came back on a straight shot through davis square. i caught a glimpse of the new h-mart as we drove by. we stopped at the cafe by noontime to unload the supplies before continuing to belmont.

my father cooked up the mussels for lunch. compared to clams, mussels are much better. cheaper, more plentiful, and no sand. plus they're pretty easy to prepare, the way we steam them with a garlic-butter-white wine sauce.

after lunch i ran some errands. i refilled the birdfeeder. i cleaned the chain on my motorcycle with a rag before spraying some chain wax chain lube.

finally i was in the basement watering the plants. the smallest potted orchid has opened up a blossom. i pruned off most of the new tendrils from the jasmines, leaving a few that i saw had flower buds. technically all the new growth should have flower buds, but many of them are just growing then long with no flowers.

my final batch of aliexpress purchases finally arrived in the early evening. it included a stove fan that automatically runs when placed on top of anything hot. we tried it on our actual kitchen stove top (though we plan on using it eventually on our outdoor tent stove). it didn't seem to do anything at first, but once i manually turned the fan, that seemed to start it up and it keep on running, even after we turned off the stove. there was also a nano hexbug knockoff with rubber feet. it mimics a live bug that can run around on the floor and change direction when it hits an obstacle. these have been around for more than a decade but i'm only discovering them now. finally we tried the acrylic erase board that lights up anything written/drawn on it.

for dinner we had some beef stew that'd been simmering on the stovetop for hours. it was so fragrant, i could smell it when i was outside and working in the basement.

i got a ride home after dinner. after a shower i watched the vikings-rams game. was it supposed to be on during the weekend and postponed due to the LA fires? they played in los angeles but there seemed to be more minnesota fans in the stadium. i was kind of rooting for the vikings because sam darnold's resurgence is a feel good story, but minnesota ended up losing 9-27.

i thought my father and i were going on a everett-chelsea supply run this morning but i called him he postponed the trip to tomorrow. he still came to give me a ride around 10:30am. first thing i did when i got to belmont was climb the ladder to clear the snow off of the solar panels. it was supposed to be a quick job but i got distracted by the clogged gutters and ended up spending more time cleaning those instead.

i went inside briefly to have some homemade scallion pancakes for lunch before going back outside to clean the gutters and the solar panels. the gutters on the eastern southern side of the house were the worse, i don't think we even cleaned them last season. there was about a centimeter of dirt. the gutter along the sunroom also had a layer of dirt but the clog wasn't as bad. western southern side was mostly clear. gutters on the northern face of the house were frozen solid with about a centimeter of frozen water. nothing we can do for now except wait for the ice to melt naturally.

my sister brought esmei to the house today. everyone cheered when she went outside and both peed and pooped. she came back inside and while nobody was ate a pat of butter from the stovetop. my sister took her home a bit later.

three NFL games today: broncos-bills (1pm), packers-eagles (4:30pm), and commanders-buccaneers (8pm). buffalo trailed initially, which probably gave bill fans a heart attack. eventually they started scoring like everyone thought they would, won the game 7-31. i didn't pay much attention to the packers-eagles game. it seemed to have existed just so the producers can play nazareth's "love hurts" (1976) (quarterbacks jordan love and jalen hurts). eagles won 10-22.

saw a bunch of birds at the feeders. the usual: downy woodpecker, goldfinch, juncos, chickadees, house finches, possibly a song sparrow. at least one of the juncos has learned to perch on the feeder and eat directly instead of scratching for scraps like the other juncos underneath.

mike vrabel was officially announced as the new head coach of the new england patriots. wasn't a big surprise, he was the favorite going into the weeklong interview process. now everyone's asking if josh mcdaniel will come back as offensive coordinator.

we had garlic chive egg omelettes and a stirfry of ham & wood ear mushrooms & hot peppers for dinner. my father gave me a ride home soon afterwards. i wanted to get home early to make up for getting home so late yesterday.

i caught the end of the pelicans-celtics game. i was expecting it to be a blowout but new orleans played boston tough. there was a total of 21 lead changes. celtics won because the pelicans missed a final seconds layup. celtics next game is against the raptors in toronto on wednesday.

craving some ice cream, i took a quick trip to star market before they closed. just for kicks i checked out their egg selection, which was mostly empty. i got two pints of häagen-dazs caramel cone ice cream ($2.99/each) and a 5 lbs. bag of russet potatoes on sale ($2).

i watched the commanders-buccaneers game. i was rooting for tampa bay. not much to say, the two teams were equally matched, wasn't decided until the final seconds with a field goal kick. washington won 23-20.

i got an e-mail from my upstairs neighbors early this morning with a bill for $1200. the handyman they hired to caulk their leaking window, well, they think i should pay a portion of that bill ($480) because it pertains to the overall exterior area of the house. it's all bullshit but i agreed, with the stipulation that we never hire that handyman again (he did work for us before, shoddy craftsmanship, no attention to detail, i had to fix some of the stuff myself afterwards) since he probably ripped us off.

i knew it was going to snow this morning but i figured a dusting at most. i wasn't expecting to see the landscape blanketed in snow. this meant i wouldn't be able to ride the bike to the cafe today. i was prepared for that possibility, so budgeted extra time to get ready so i could leave by 10am and still get to work before 10:30am. besides, i didn't mind walking in the fresh snow. there was about an inch of accumulation, but it was supposed to snow throughout the day until the evening, so the snow wasn't done yet. along the way i picked up a blackburn rear bike rack i found a free bin. i was trying to remember how i mounted the last rack i installed, until i saw a bike parked on the street that had a similar looking rack. what was missing was the two rack stays (struts) that attaches to the seat post and some nuts and screws. cost of replacement stays is $10, while the price for a new rear bike rack (with stays) on aliexpress is only $20.

my father went to go pick up my 2nd aunt at 11am. she reported on her adventure at the davis square h-mart grand opening and how she got a free thermos mug for showing her h-mart membership card and an h-mart branded bag.

not a lot of customers today, but we had a few sizable online orders and enough people came to eat in person to make it profitable. i was busy all day in the kitchen, cooking fresh batches of black soy noodles, dumplings, boba pearls, and tea eggs.

a week ago my sister asked me to babysit esmei today for 2 hours. she never said when, and i just assumed it was during business hours. but she told me she wanted me to babysit in the evening. i said she could bring esmei to belmont where we could watch her but she said i had to stay at her place to watch her dog, which didn't make sense. plus my sister never keeps her word, if she says 2 hours, it could just as well be 4-5 hours. she decided she'd only be gone for an hour and would leave esmei at home along during that time. but then when we were about to close she called and said she changed her mind and wanted us to bring esmei back with us to belmont.

my father gave my 2nd aunt a ride home a quarter before we closed at 4pm. however a customer phoned in an order and someone else came in and bought a boba drink, so my mother and i were still busy done to the final minutes. afterwards when my father came back we went to get esmei and bring her to my parents' house. my sister packed a bag with enough things to take care of her dog for a few days, not just a few hours.

i took esmei out for a walk in the backyard when we got to belmont. after she peed she came right back inside. i took her outside again after dinner at 6pm, where she peed again. later in the evening she suddenly woke up after being asleep. sensing she might want to use the bathroom again, i took her outside one last time where she pooped.

my mother never seems to want to cook on saturdays, and made us order out again. tonight it was thai chicken and rice. we got the usual, but also got the fried chicken tendons, which sounded intriguing. my father and i went to go pick up the order at 6pm, getting some gas on the way back.

i'm here to tell you don't waste your money, fried chicken tendons is a scam (and costs more money than fried chicken bones, which is a much better deal). maybe it's a delicacy in thailand, but it's nothing more than the cartilage from chicken bones, things we normally throw away when we process a chicken. otherwise everything else was very good as usual. i finished all of my roasted chicken and rice while both my parents had leftovers.

my plan was to wait for my sister to return from her party to pick up esmei so i could get a ride back to cambridge. at 6:40pm she texted me that they were having dessert, which i took to mean she was almost done. so i waited and waited, until it was after 9pm and she still wasn't back. i texted her but no reply. she must've gotten into a car accident because the other possibility is that she simply decided to stay longer after she originally said just 2 hours and that would make her a terrible person. my father decided to give me a ride home instead. my sister didn't show up to pick up esmei until 11:30pm.

after a shower i made some hot chocolate. drinking something so sweet and hot was on the top of my list, but i still have some milk that i need to finish before it spoils. this weekend marks the beginning of the NFL playoffs. football is getting more obnoxious, like selling exclusive broadcast rights to paid streaming platforms (amazon, netflix) and branching into potential other markets like kid-friendly versions of games on nickelodeon. anyway, texans beat the chargers (12-32), and the steelers were no match for the ravens (14-28). three games tomorrow: broncos-bills at 1pm, packers-eagles 4:3opm, and commanders-buccaneers at 8pm. as much as i hate the NFL, i'm still going to watch two of those games.

i started watching american primeval on netflix last night. all these influx of western themed shows seems to be a reaction to the country turning more conservative. this show reminds me of the language of deadwood mixed with the action from the revenant. i never knew mormons could be such badasses. i like the few things i've seen betty gilpin's been in (glow, the hunt). taylor kitsch's character in the series seems like a real asshole, but since he's one of the male leads, i'm sure he'll show his heroic bent sooner or later.

i got a call from doctor huang's office right before i left for the cafe this morning. his wife told me i needed to come in again because doctor huang wasn't happy with the dental mold he made tuesday morning and wants to redo it. she asked if i could come in late tuesday morning but i had to work, so we made an appointment for wednesday morning on my day off.

even though today was 16 degrees warmer than yesterday, i still dressed like it was zero degrees wind chill. better safe than sorry i say. i noticed the city had sprayed the roads with brine in preparation for a little bit of snow tomorrow. i got to the cafe before my parents did, cooked 5 cups of rice before i even had time to take off my jacket.

my parents showed up with a bunch more things from my 2nd aliexpress delivery which came yesterday: h-back aprons, chair leg silicone feet protector pads, 2025 chinese tear-off calendar, anker soundcore motion+ speaker case, food fortunes card deck. the calendar was much smaller than i thought, even though i checked the measurements before i got it. at this point i've basically given up, i am not going to spend anymore money looking for a medium-sized tear-off calendar. this tiny calendar smelled strongly of ink (to the point where i worry about it's toxicity level). it does have all the days (unlike the larger calendar, which combines the weekend days to save off), but it's very much a mainland chinese calendar, with obscure chinese communist holidays like police officer day. the aprons fit okay, but they're kind of small. it's also just a single fabric; the one i were daily is two layer, with a water resistant top layer. my mother said she'll get me more when she goes back to taiwan. a glass teapot had also arrived but they didn't bring it; my mother told me it too was on the small side.

while vacuuming the cafe today, i decided to open up the front panel of the drink refrigerator and clean the condenser fins. they were covered in dust. i used the brush attachment to clean the fins. hopefully the refrigerator runs more efficiently after that. i did the same to the food fridge we have in the kitchen. its condenser fins were also covered in dust. unfortunately the fins were hard to get to, and i could only reach so far with a manual brush, collecting the clumps of dust afterwards by hand. the space was so tight, i might've accidentally bent some of the fins so i finally stopped.

i made smoked white fish salad bagel sandwiches for my parents and myself. i managed to use up all the white fish, all the bagels, and all the dill.

a customer informed us that our charsiu bento was out of stock on the ordering website. when i checked the item inventory, it was marked as in stock. when the customer called later to order by phone because she couldn't order online, i went to the online page and checked for myself. sure enough, it showed out of stock despite what the inventory said. this must've happened for a while, because my mother had been noticing we were selling as much charsiu, which used to be our most popular bento. i finally fixed it by marking the item in the inventory as out of stock, wait for it to update, then mark it again as in stock. that finally solved the problem.

a busy day, but nothing crazy. we had a pretty good handle on all the incoming orders, whether in person, via phone, online order, or delivery. cathy even called to make an order for her grandkids. she wanted all sorts of substitution and half-and-half selection before my mother finally told her we don't usually do combos. she came by to pick up her order and left. later she called, asking if my spare bedroom was available to rent for the daughter of a family friend who was attending lesley university but didn't like living in her dorm. she needed a place for a year, and needed it right away. that was not going to happen.

we were busy around lunchtime, and busy again in the evening after 5pm. once again that chinese family showed up late - we were about to close - made an order, and stayed to eat. they didn't leave until 6:45pm, well after we were already supposed to be closed. as rude as they were, we couldn't just throw them out. i think one time they came right when we were about to close, and my father told them they could get stuff for takeout, but they said no they'd come back another time.

my aunt showed up in the afternoon. "you guys don't look very busy today," she said, right after we have a very busy stretch. she had the charsiu bento for lunch and got a chance to see esmei when my sister came back from an errand.

i didn't bring anything home, but found some leftover rice in my fridge that i used to make chinese rice porridge for dinner. it didn't look like a lot of rice, but after simmering it in water in a pot on the stove for over half an hour, it grew in volume. i had an assortment of side dishes, the same as last time: braised eel, pickled cucumbers, gluten, pickled spicy sichuan vegetables. to the rice porridge i added some chopped scallions and spicy pickled radish.

i got a chance to check out the food fortune tarot cards. maureen introduced them to me a few years ago. when i saw them i knew i had to have a set of my own. so it was kind of funny when i saw the aliexpress was selling them, and for cheap too ($4/deck). i figured they were knockoffs, but i was impressed with the print quality and the card stock. the only way you could tell it wasn't the genuine deck was it didn't include a booklet explaining the various foods. there was a QR code on the back that directed you to a dead link that supposedly had a pdf of the booklet (i didn't eventually find a copy online through search engine).

i ate dinner while watching the kings-celtics game. sacramento hasn't beaten boston at home (or maybe at all?) for a few years now. kings led by single digits in the first quarter, while the celtics led by single digits in the second and third. single digit leads are dangerous in the modern NBA, given how quickly teams can go on a run. that's what happened in the fourth quarter, kings went on a run and the celtics couldn't recover. seems like sacramento couldn't miss in that quarter, while boston was struggling to find some offense. kings win, 114-97.

i made some white fish salad bagel sandwiches for breakfast this morning. my father didn't want one so it was just my mother and me. it had all the fixings: cucumber slices, onion slices, dill, capers.

i also proofed some expired yeast from 2022. to 1/4 cup of warm water i added a teaspoon of sugar followed by two teaspoons of the yeast in question. after 10 minutes, it had doubled in size and formed a foamy dome that exceded the 1/2 cup mark.

i worked with my sister to update the bank info for grubhub and ubereats. grubhub seemed to have finally updated it, though the bank routing number shown in its app was still wrong. it seems impossible to update bank info with ubereats however. apparently it's something you can do with an admin account, but when i logged in with my sister's credentials, all the banking fields are still greyed out. when she tried get some help through an agent, they ended up reseting the ordering password and ubereats went dark for about 10-15 minutes. also for some reason you can't seem to speak to a live agent, or at least anyone above a call center level of clearance.

jimmy carter's funeral was today. it was fun seeing all the former US presidents assemble together. the death of another president is just amount the only reason you'd ever see them all together. it was weird seeing trump, who has denigrated every single former president at one time or another. even weirder was seeing pence shake hands with the hand who indirectly ordered his mob to kill pence and did nothing about it when it was happening. one notable missing person was michelle obama. i read she had a scheduling issue. maybe her issue was she didn't want to be seen with trump.

in the afternoon around 3pm i went to trader joe's to get a few things (cucumbers, scallions, cilantro, bananas). it was cold, but i found the fleece neck warmer with attached head covering plus a hat is very effective in keeping me warm.

my sister brought esmei to the cafe close to evening time, when the sun was about to set. the sky was aglow like flames. esmei was occasionally out of it but perked up with promises of treats.

today was moderately busy around lunchtime, then it stayed mostly quiet. after 5pm there was zero customers, i wonder if the frigi weather is keeping people away. with 30 minutes before closing, an old customer phoned in an order and we managed to make a little more before the day drew to a close.

i went home with a frozen trader joe's meal i bought last week, spicy farfalle pasta with italian chicken sausage. after a shower, i threw it in the oven for 35 minutes. it wasn't bad, definitely spicy. i just wished the portions were a little bigger, i'm so used to large dinnertime meals. afterwards i ate a jumbo korean pear which was a meal in itself. it was so big, i actually regurgitated a bit of chewed up pear when i burped.

feeling kind of tired tonight, going to make it an early evening. get to bed by 10pm, do some reading, go to sleep.

on wednesdays - my one day off - i run errands. today was a mountain load of laundry: shirts underwears socks, pants, and finally bedsheets. it was a good day to run the dryer, indirectly heat the house in the process. while laundry was in progress, i also did some vacuuming. i made a matcha latte which fueled me for the rest of the morning. i also finally took down my christmas lights. one of them had already fallen, which was almost a sign. not sure what i'm going to do next year. i sort of want to upgrade my lights. these ones i got are almost 20 years old, i got them when led christmas lights were just coming out.

the bedsheets presented a challenge. a few years ago i decided to get all white sheets because i figured they'd be easier to clean even though stains now show up more prominently. and by stains i mean blood. during the winter it's so dry inside the house that my arms and legs get really itchy. i scratch them while i'm in bed, occasionally to the point where they bleed, leaving little blood spots on my sheets. i've tried various methods to get rid of blood stains. hydrogen peroxide works for light stains though they don't completely remove older deeper stains. stain sticks work as well as hydrogen peroxide, but you need to wash the stains afterwards. i also have oxiclean powder and bleach.

i pretreated the few blood stains i found using a small dish and letting the stain soak in hydrogen peroxide for a minute. the stains would bubble. light stains disappeared completely, while deep stains faded but still lightly visible. i decided to presoak with bleach before washing. in the past i've presoaked light loads in the bathtub, but it's a messy affair transferring all the wet washings into the washer. plus i didn't want to get bleach everywhere.

so i decided to presoak in the washer. unfortunately my washer doesn't have a presoak option. so i just ran a regular wash, and once there was enough water in the tub, i added 1-1/4 cups of bleach, then added in the sheets. once the tub was filled, i kept the lid open, which prevents the washer from washing, allowing me to do a manual presoak. i left everything soaking in the bleach for 15 minutes before finally closing the lid and letting the machine wash. i also added some liquid detergent.

in the early afternoon i finally had lunch. i made two gyros with the remaining leftover ingredients. i used ready made gyro meat from costco. when i was there this weekend i couldn't find them anymore. it might be better to make my own next time though, if i can get my hands on some boneless cuts of lamb.

when the sheets finally finished washing, i transferred them to the dryer. they had that bleached fabric smell which reminds me of hotel stays (smells clean). when i inspected the duvet cover however, i noticed the blood stains were still there. one stain i didn't pretreat still looked dark, like the bleach had no effect on it. instead of putting everything into the dryer (the heat would set the blood stains), i tried a few more stain removal tricks. to that one dark stain, i first treated with hydrogen peroxide. it bubbled and faded, but didn't disappear. next i tried the stain stick. stain faded some more but still visible. finally i soaked it in some oxiclean solution. that seemed to do the trick. the stain was almost gone. so i decided to presoak all my white sheets (and some white towels) in oxiclean. i added 2 scoops (up to the 3 line) and waited for the tub to fill a little bit, swishing the powder to dissolve it. i then added the sheets and left the washer to fill up. i opened the lid before it started to actually wash, leaving it to presoak. the direction said to presoak for 6 hours.

i ran out to run some outdoor errands. i would've done it earlier, but the pharmacy was closed between 1:30-2pm for lunch. i wore my brown cashmere trenchcoat with a hooded sweatshirt underneath. it's my extreme cold weather classy look. i headed out with the bicycle. today wasn't as cold as yesterday. the temperature was in the lower 30's but still very windy.

first stop was the dollar store, where i got a daily planner booklet (something my mother wanted) and some 70% isopropyl alcohol (we use it for cleaning at the cafe). there was only one checkout lane open and the woman ahead of me had something like 80 things in her cart. i took another spin through the store but when i came back the cashier was still ringing her up. she ended up spending $100, never seen anyone buy so much at the dollar store.

second stop was walgreens to pick up my statin prescription. there were two people ahead of me in line, i didn't see them because they formed a line in one of the aisles instead of where the sign said to line up. third and final stop was market basket. i decided to get some more white fish salad and bagels.

i got back home a little after 3:30pm, with just an hour left of daylight.

after about 6 hours of oxiclean presoak, i finally ran the washer. when i finally took out the duvet cover, it looked very clean. however, when i put it on my bed and did a thorough inspection, i did notice a few very faint blood stains. however, that one dark stain that i pretreated with hydrogen peroxide + stain stick + oxiclean i couldn't find anymore. so the secret to removing old blood stains seems to be a thorough pretreatment regimen of hydrogen peroxide + stain stick + oxiclean. i'll try that technique on some of the faint stains next time. the ones on the duvet are barely noticeable. there should also be some stains on the bedsheet but i couldn't find any. can't wait to go to bed tonight, it'll be like sleeping on brand new sheets.

there was an NBA game between two teams with 10+ games winning streak: the thunders (15 games winning steak) and the cavaliers (10 games winning streak). the entire game was like a heavyweight fight between two equally matched opponents. there were 30 lead changes and nothing more than single digits. the game could've swung in either direction. first half thunders played better, second half it was the cavaliers. cleveland ended up winning 122-129, breaking OKC's winning streak.

i made a bowl of luxury ramen for dinner using a packet of nongshim shin ramen. i threw in some leftover pickle slices and half a tin of leftover braised eel.

who wakes up early in the morning on one of the coldest days of the year to go to the dentist? that's the question i asked myself when i woke up this morning at 7am to get ready. the temperature outside was 16 degrees, with single digit wind chill. i brought out all my warmest gear (mostly wool): my janus wool long johns underneath my flannel-lined pants, quick dry t-shirt underneath 100% merino wool sweater, wool socks, wool mittens, and my columbia interchange jacket that i only bring out on the coldest days. i still wasn't sure if i wanted to take the 66 bus out of harvard square or simply bicycle to allston, but decided on biking. i could also bail out if it was too cold, just lock the bike in harvard square and grab the bus.

i left the house at 7:40am for the 8:30am allston dental associates appointment. i wore a fleece neck warmer with a helmet lining underneath my bike helmet. riding the bike wasn't so bad but i felt really bulky and didn't have good peripheral vision (had to turn my whole body to see behind me). the only part of my body that was cold was the bit of my face that was exposed, and the space between my thumbs and the rest of my fingers. otherwise i felt pretty warm, and would continue to warm up as i biked.

i arrived by 8:10am. doctor huang's wife was happy that i arrived early. i think she originally wanted me to come at 8am, but was afraid it might be too early so said 8:30am instead. we chatted, caught up. i don't remember the last time i saw them, must've been 2 years ago when i had that toothache that almost resulted in me pulling a molar and replace it with an implant but the toothache suddenly was gone and i decided to leave everything as-is for now.

doctor huang was surprised when i showed him the original teeth mold that he made 10 years ago when i first had the crown done. "you still kept it, all this time?" his wife said. doctor huang first tried to smooth out the crack. i could save some money if i didn't have to replace it. there was a lot of scraping and grinding sounds, i even smelled the familiar odor of burnt enamel. it wasn't working so he ended up removing the crown. that involved some pounding with a small hammer to unseat the crown. it seemed a little violent but the weird thing was i didn't feel anything. that molar was long gone; in its place a titanium post fused to my upper jawbone. that's the great thing about implants: do any work you like on the crown (the tooth), i don't feel a thing. if i had the money, i'd pull out all my teeth and just have a full set of implants.

doctor huang showed me the extracted tooth. it was smaller than i thought, about the size of a pea. inside your own mouth, when you're tonguing your teeth, they feel much larger. after examining the crown, doctor huang gave me the bad news: the crown would need to be replaced. the chip was fairly extension (about a quarter of the tooth), and food particles could easily be trapped, damaging the adjoining tooth. the good news is because i brought my old dental mold, he could reuse the bottom half, and just need to redo the top portion only.

doctor huang put the crown back inside my mouth. he screwed it down to the titanium post, then patched up the hole. he said it was only a temporary fix until i get my new crown in about 3 weeks. if the tooth becomes loose, i'd need to come back so he could secure it tighter. he showed me how much i paid last time: i had the crown made back in 2015, i paid in two installments of $700, so a total of $1400. doctor huang ended up charging me just half, so only $700. since i had a check on me, i paid the amount right away.

i didn't leave until 9:40am. for some reason it felt colder heading back. maybe i was going up against some head wind. i called my mother to ask if she needed anything at trader joe's, she said no, but i went there anyway. i was in search of panettone and ice wine, neither of which i found. i got snacks instead and left.

i cut through harvard square to get to the cafe, getting there by 10:30am. i took off my merino wool sweater because i didn't want it to get soaked with cooking smell, and replaced it with a generic pullover. i made a new batch of tzatziki as we'd already used up the one i made over the weekend. i used a fresh english cucumber this time, it was light green after i shredded it.

we had a busy noontime stretch. today marked the first full week of cafe work. a few bento sales, followed by beef noodle soup, a very typical day. we even had to cook more rice after we ran. starting from 4pm we didn't have a single customer. given how cold it was today, we were happy with the business we had. originally we thought it'd be a quiet day given the weather. in the afternoon my mother fixed me some rice with leftover ground beef for lunch.

i returned home with some ingredients for making gyros. i didn't have dinner until late though, almost 10pm, because i wanted to wait for the celtics-nuggets game. celtics was without derrick white tonight (illness), while the nuggets were missing nikola jokic. celtics led for much of the game, though most of the time only by single digits, with the nuggets persistently making inroads. there was 10 lead changes and 8 times tied. celtics held on to win it in the end, 118-106.