even though i tried to sleep in late on the only day this week where i didn't have to wake up early, i still woke up at 8:30am. there was street cleaning this morning, on the opposite side of the street. it took me a while to figure out which side before i moved my motorcycle last night. there was one solitary car parked on the opposite side. instead of a ticket, the city road crew employed a leaf blower to blow all the leaves out from underneath the car since they had to clean around it. it's the second year that cambridge has stopped towing cars for street cleaning violations. i kind of wish they'd start again.

i went to market basket around 10:40am to collect a few more things for the cafe tomorrow. i wore a long-sleeved pullover but it was entirely unnecessary as it was already hot by mid-morning. in fact, we'd set a new record high temperature for this day at 85 degrees. it definitely felt like the last hurrah of warm temperature, and after this we'll be back to more seasonable cold weather.

after gathering my things from home, i stopped by the cafe to drop off the supplies. i moved out some food from the freezer to thaw in the fridge. i hung up the boston fern that my father lowered on saturday to water. i restocked the drink fridge.

i made it to belmont around noontime. i had a day of yard work planned, including moving and expanding raised bed zero. but first we needed to mow the lawn. we took down all the barricades i put up while i was growing new grass. while my father was doing that, i was emptying out the garage so we could clean it after discovering what looked to be rat droppings.

with most of the garage's content emptied out onto the driveway, it's amazing how much stuff we had in there. we filled several boxes with things we were going to throw out, and several boxes more with partially emptied old paint cans and motor oil containers that we'll drop off at the hazardous waste recycle day next month. we swept the perimeter of the garage (where most of rat droppings were located) before i vacuumed up the rest. i was going to change out the vacuum filters anyway, so it was okay that i was vacuuming up all sorts of gross stuff. we then put everything back into the garage. i need to spray expanding foam at the two corners by the garage door as there's enough of a gap for critters to get inside. once that's done, the garage should be rodent proof.

cleaning the garage took most of the day. we finally finished by 4pm. there was no time to build a new raised bed frame, but my father did mow the backyard. i didn't realize esmei was home and let her outside so she could get some exercise. i teased her with some milkweed fluff, she caught them in the air but regretted the decision immediately afterwards as the fluff wasn't much fun once caught. while my father mowed, i disassembled the sawhorse tables we were using for our outdoor houseplants. now that all the houseplants are back indoors, these tables were just taking up space.

my sister kept coming back to the house multiple times. i knew she was coming back because her dog was still in the house. one time she left to go see the doctor. another time to fix her car? and then a third time with my father to home depot to buy gravel.

i replaced the shark vacuum filters with some new ones i bought a few weeks ago. i then vacuumed parts of the house. it always amazed me how much dust gets vacuumed.

around 5pm i made the rounds watering our houseplants, starting with the basement grow room. i used Bti-infused water of course (to kill off any fungus gnats), but i also need to apply some general insecticide at some point as well, to treat for mealybugs and spider mites. it's better to get a head start eradicating those critters instead of waiting for an infestation to take place. even though i don't see any bugs now, they're there, and with no natural predators living indoors during the colder months, it's easily for their population to grow. after i finished with the basement plants, i watered the plants in the sunroom, with include the holiday cactuses and still more pileas.

my father came back from home depot around 5:30pm and starting grilling the lamb chops and asparagus. we kept asking my sister if she wanted any, but she said no. esmei didn't want to leave, and plopped down on the ground. she had to be coaxed with some lamb before she finally left.

the lamb and asparagus and the pico de gallo salad my mother made were all good. the lamb was probably cooked a little bit too long as they were medium done, but i actually prefer my grilled meats medium. while everyone else had 3 lamb chops, i ate 4. there were two left, and honestly i could've ate them as well, they were so good. it felt like summer foods on a day that was warm enough to be summertime.

after dinner i filled up a bucket with rain water and added some mosquito bits for watering next weekend. i also moved the plank table we built a few months ago into the basement grow room, replacing the folding table we'd been using for a few seasons. the plank table is slightly longer and gives a better natural aesthetic to the grow room.

my father told me he fried the TYT 9800 because he powered it with reverse polarity. good news is it can be repaired cheaply, but bad news is it can only be done in taiwan, so he has to wait until the next time he goes back to get it fixed. this unit was actually our second unit, after the first unit was fried in the same exact way. that unit is back at my house, working after my father got it repaired in taiwan. we briefly looked online for a cheap substitute. my father didn't want another quad-band transceiver, but rather wanted an all band SDR transceiver/receiver that can be hooked up to an LCD screen to display a spectrum waterfall. we checked out radioberry pi and malachite SDR radio.

another thing that stopped working is our DIY LiFePO4 battery in the dining room. the battery charges via solar and the voltage is correct when we measure with a multimeter, but the onboard voltage meter, cigarette lighter and USB port don't work anymore. we connected to the BMS which showed everything was normal. my father also checked the wires to make sure none was loose. he finally figured it out: an inline safety fuse (10A 250V) was blown out. we replaced it with a 7A fuse and battery started working again.

i returned home after 8pm. i didn't bother looking for the comet tonight, but i did briefly glance into the night time sky when i was refilling the barrel with rain water.

i opened up the twin comforter tonight, stuffed it inside the twin duvet cover. i'm going to sleep in the guest bedroom to break in the new comforter. it seemed a little flat which may just be because it's been packed in a vacuum sealed bag. it may take a while for it to fluff up.

my alarm went off at 7am this morning but i couldn't wake up. i snoozed it for another 30 minutes before finally getting out of bed by 7:30am. bathroom, shower, i was out the door by 7:50am. temperature was in the 40's but would warm up. i left with some hot linden leaves tea. i wore my fleece hooded jacket layered with a vest. by the time i made it down to the river, the men's youth singles was already in progress. i went to my usual spot, removed my jacket, and got ready for the next event, the women's youth singles.

i didn't go to last year's head of the charles because it was too rainy. the last time i went was back in 2022. i came with my old 55-250mm lens but armed with new knowledge: shooting with my recently discovered action shot settings of manual f/8 aperture with 1600 sec. shutter speed, guaranteed sharp images. it was a bright sunny morning and the sun was casting a blinding glare on the surface of the river, shining directly at me whenever i faced due east. made me wish i had a hat to block the glare.

after the women's youth singles was the women's under-17 fours. i'm not sure what the difference is between youth and under-17. around that time a man showed up behind me. he was on the phone with his wife, saying he had a great viewing spot (my spot). after he hung up, we chatted a bit. james from chicago, watching his daughter compete in the women's youth eights. he wanted to shoot a video as his daughter's team (no.8) came up the river. i told him i'd move out of the way so he could have a clean pan. he wasn't here last year, but said he heard from other parents that the weather was miserable. he said the head of the charles was the most prestigious (and the last racing event of the season). they've been to other regional events in the northeast, though the final happens in florida in the spring. HOCR is a timed race, while in other places it's a head race where teams compete in separate lanes.

as the morning progressed, the glare started to diminish as the sun rose higher up in the sky. the next event was the women's youth coxed quads. finally the women's youth eights began. after i got photos of the first few boats, i let james take my place so he could film his daughter. i thought he was going to be quiet but as soon her boat came by, he was shouting words of encouragement. he thanked me for letting him film. before he left, he asked if i took any photos of his daughter's team, and asked if i could send them to him. we exchanged phone numbers as he raced off to the finish line.

i stayed and watched the rest of the youth eights. after that there was the women's youth doubles and fours, but i had enough rowing for one day. by then it was close to 10am. i walked back out to memorial drive where i parked my bicycle, then pedaled back home.

i got home by 10:15am. since we were planning on a baifu supply run, i quickly grabbed my things and left via motorcycle. my parents were still asleep when i got there by 10:30am. they didn't expect to see me so early after i told them i was going to go see the head of the charles. my mother didn't think we were getting supplies until tomorrow. since it was still early, we decided to do a supply run after all. my mother elected to stay home instead.

driving to baifu took us onto storrow drive, back to where i was earlier this morning. there were even more people now crowding the bridges. crossing the eliot bridge took some time as they reduced the lanes to control traffic, but after that it was smooth sailing. we watched as crowds of people lined the charles river watching the boats go by. we got off at kenmore square and went down mass avenue to baifu. traffic was surprisingly light, both in cars and pedestrians.

we got to baifu by 11:15am. we finished shopping in about half an hour, heading back to cambridge. once more we traveled on storrow drive, crossing back over eliot bridge. we made it to the cafe around 12:30pm, unpacked the supplies, then returned to cambridge.

my mother was gone. i assumed she took off with my sister to walk esmei in the woods. my father made wonton soup for lunch. i felt a little light-headed, thought maybe i was too hungry, but i think i might've gotten carsick.

after lunch we left for chip-in farm in bedford to buy some chicken manure. when i called them on friday they said they still had them in stock. we left by 1:40pm and it took 30 minutes to drive there. we would've been pretty lost without the help of google maps.

things didn't look good when we arrived, as the manure truck was empty. we went inside the shop to ask the clerk if they had anymore chicken manure, he said they were all sold out. i asked when they'd have them available again, he said in a few more weeks. so we drove all the way out for nothing. at least we got to see some goats in the petting zoo, and one of the goats licked my hand. another goat had the same fur colorations as esmei, like a goat version of her. there was also a child's birthday party happening (which explained all the cars in the parking lot).

we got back home by 2:45pm. my mother had already came back.

i downloaded the photos pertaining to james' daughter's rowing team and sent them to him. there was too many to attach in a text message, so i created a google photos album. i sent him the link, he thanked me afterwards.

my father was trying to figure out how to use the 12v wifi-enabled power switch i got last year to remotely control our transfer pump. we'd already disconnected it but the attached wires were confusing, as there seemed to be more than necessary. that's when we figured out that power had to both go into the switch to power it as well as the load circuitry in order to power that as well in addition to turning it on and off.

prior to sunset, i climbed the roof to mount my gopro on the solar panel frame to take a night lapse of the sky, in hopes of capturing the comet.

for dinner my mother made a stirfry of tofu with chinese celery, along with a garlic chive omelette. unlike yesterday when i was the first to finish the risotto, tonight i was the last to finish my dinner.

i got up this morning at 8am to go to haymarket. the thermostat had turned on the heat by then, so it wasn't as cold as usual. i tried to leave early but didn't set out until 8:45am. temperature was in the 40's but will be in the 70's by the afternoon. the sky was clear and sunny. i went to haymarket via cambridge street and lechmere. there was barely any bike traffic this early on a saturday morning. i got there in 20 minutes.

i was happy to see the fishmongers were back. i looked to see if any of them were selling softshell clams but no luck. i wanted some hachiya persimmons but could only find the flat fuyu variety. my haul: 8 fuyu persimmons ($5), 2 scallions ($2), 1 cilantro ($1), 1 lbs. of red anaheim hot peppers ($1), 1 swiss chard ($1), 2 lbs. of tomatoes ($1).

i left haymarket by 9:30am. after crossing the longfellow bridge, i took a detour to ride along the shores of the charles river back to harvard square. i wanted to see the start of the head of the charles, which i'd never seen before. it wasn't easy riding, as there were many saturday morning joggers. the race starts from the BU boat house but there's no good place to see the launches from there so i kept riding. it wasn't until western avenue didn' they finally close memorial drive and i could ride in the empty road. i made it as far as ash street before i detoured and returned home.

i got back by 10:15am, but left immediately afterwards, this time to market basket to get some ingredients for making risotto tonight. back at home again, i grabbed my things and took the motorcycle to the cafe, getting there about 15 minutes before we opened.

on saturdays the action at the cafe begins as soon as we open. it was busy - probably more so with the nice weather - but the good thing is we close early, so after a few hours of work, we can call it a day. we used up all the tea eggs in the slow cooker, but instead of heating up the backup batch of tea eggs (which we couldn't possibly all use up today), we just fished out 10 eggs and put them in the slow cooker. for lunch i baked some mini pizzas in the oven. it was good, but my 2nd aunt the recent nutritional buzzkill was looking at the ingredients listing and said there was too much salt.

after work i left for my parents' place. they haven't turned on the heat yet so it was freezing inside the house. i opened a few windows to let the hotter outside air into the house. my parents returned a short time later.

around 5pm i started making my risotto. the last time i made it was june 2023, so we're long overdue. my father helped me chop the onion and garlic, i was tasked with putting it all together, but mainly to stir the risotto non-stop for 20 minutes. i realized why this risotto is so delicious: the sauce is essentially the same sauce we make for our steamed mussels - a combination of butter, garlic, and white wine. my mother came out of her room around 6pm, eager to eat some risotto. it's a great winter recipe because you really start to warm up afterwards.

after dinner i went out into the backyard to look for tsuchinshan-atlas. i managed to spot it using a pair of binoculars, and used my camera phone to confirm. i went back inside to grab my telephoto camera and a tripod. my father came out and spotted the comet as well with the binoculars. he said without it, he would never be able to see the comet, and he was surprised by how faint it was now. supposedly it has a magnitude of 6.8, too faint to be resolved with the naked eye from the suburb. my mother came out as well to finally see the comet with the binoculars before going back inside to watch her shows. i remained outside to photograph the comet before it disappeared behind the maple tree.

before i left i helped my mother buy a heated mattress pad for the twin bed. originally we were going to buy a sunbeam pad because my parents have used that brand before and it had over 17k ratings, but ended up going an unknown brand because it can arrive by tomorrow. i'm not a fan of the heated mattress pad. i much rather prefer a heavyweight winter comforter. yes it's cold at first, but your own body heat quickly warmed up the comforter.

going to sleep early tonight, need to wake up tomorrow at 7am to catch some head of the charles action.

i woke up at 8am this morning, hoping to leave the house by 8:30am for a quick chinatown supply run. i didn't leave until 8:50am. it was a little chilly this morning, had my gloves on, but i started to warm up and started unzipping all my layers the closer i got to boston.

i got to chinatown by 9:20am. first stop was c-mart, to check out their prices. they had sales on napa cabbage and baby bokchoi, so i decided to get them here (as well as garlic chives), betting that these prices were better than at ming's market.

i then went to ming's market to get the rest of my stuff. so i bet wrong, because everything at ming's was cheaper across the board. some by only 10¢/lbs. but other by $1 or more. i bought so many things it took me a while to repack my rear bike baskets and messenger bag to fit it all. this of course meant i wouldn't be able to visit haymarket as i was already loaded to capacity.

instead i headed back to cambridge, about 10am. instead of going home, i went straight to the cafe, which was a distance of 5.6 miles and took over half an hour to get there. i arrived by 10:30am.

i noticed the temperature in the cafe was pleasant today. i thought it was maybe because it wasn't as cold today (60 degrees outside), until my mother told me my father already turned on the heat, after i rewired the nest thermostat yesterday.

we were busy during the lunch time stretch, and a steady stream of customers the rest of the day. beef noodle soup was a popular item, there were a period when we had 3 consecutive orders that were multiple all beef noodle soups. i keep thinking maybe somebody wrote about it online, because it seems too much of a coincidence to suddenly have so much demand. how customers even know about it is a mystery, since we've never advertised.

kathy's daughter showed up at the cafe to order a bento for one of her sons. i thought it was strange at first that an unknown woman just walked towards the kitchen like she owned the place. then she did a dick move: she unplugged my gopro which i was charging so she could charge her own phone while she waited for the order. when she left, she didn't bother to plug my gopro back in. inconsiderate people like her are my least favorite type of people.

my father had a urologist appointment in burlington at 4pm. he left by 2:45pm. my sister was supposed to help out while he was gone, but my mother asked my 2nd aunt to come in for a few hours, since we couldn't rely on my sister. sure enough, she left to shop at costco with her korean friend.

my other aunt showed up in the late afternoon. we gave her the baseus noise cancelling earphones she ordered. she ate a few things and left when we started getting busy again.

my father didn't get back until after 5pm. the doctor prescribed him some methylprednisolone, which has a weird 6-day dosage course that involves taking half a dozen tablets on the first day over breakfast/lunch/dinner/before bed, then reduced dosage over the days. he wasn't sure how much it'd cost, so when the pharmacist told him, "298" he thought he meant $298, but actually just $2.98.

we didn't need my 2nd aunt anymore so she went home. i turned on the playoff game between dodgers and mets which began at 5pm. new york scored 3 runs in the first inning and 5 more in the third. that was all they needed to win, the final score 6-12. i'm glad to see the mets making it interesting. now they go back to los angeles for game 6 on sunday. if mets win again to tie the series, then things can get really interesting after that.

right when we were about to close, an asian family walked in. they ordered 3 noodles, and my mother let them stay and eat even though it meant keeping the cafe opened for another half an hour. i think she thought they were taiwanese, but they turned out to be chinese. i had a suspicious they were chinese from the start because taiwanese wouldn't be so rude and not see that we were closing and order takeout instead.

i left around 6:45pm. my parents said it was okay for them to wait, since they were eating dinner at the cafe anyway. my mother packed me some leftover bento. tonight was a clear night and i was already taking snapshots of the western sky with my camera phone to see if i could spot the comet again. i rode to the summit of observatory hill and took a few photos, managed to see the comet, but faintly.

i decided to ride down to the radcliffe quadrangle, and get some photos there. since the elevation was lower, it took me a while to find the comet. not sure what the magnitude was, but it was pretty faint. plus the full moon was causing a glare in the night sky, making it even harder to see.

i finally got home by 7:20pm. normally i take a shower after getting back from work, but because it's been so cold, i dive straight in to dinner, showering later right before bed. i also watched the tail end of the dodgers-mets game.

i couldn't take it anymore: i finally turned on the heat tonight around 9pm. the room temperature was 58 degrees. it's been like that for the past few days. yes i know it's going to warm up next week, but the cold was starting to get unbearable. i have a space heater, but i don't think it's efficient as my forced air gas furnace, which heats up the whole house, not just (barely) a single room.

and like every autumn, i held my breath until the heat actually kicked in, never knowing if one day it'll just stop working. i don't do any maintenance on it other than replacing the furnace filter every few months when it's in use. the first heating there's always a slightly burnt smell, like singed hair in a blowdryer. but the smell either goes away on its own after the first day or i just get used to it.

the commercial space next to the cafe continues its renovation work. apparently there was so much banging yesterday, plaster from the basement ceiling was falling down. it was more of the same today, after i just swept all the debris. hopefully there isn't too much more of it. the new tenant came by and gave us some sample donuts: an apple cider and a korean gochujang. the gochujang donut kind of makes sense, just the right amount of spicy, yet still a sweet donut.

the beef noodle girl spilled her soup all over the rug on tuesday. my father moved it outside but hadn't had time to wash it yet. i gave it a wash today using the DIY powerwash spray and the garden hose. the carpet is designed to be easily cleaned, and after a few hours outside it was already dried.

i rewired the cafe's nest thermostat for heating. we haven't turned the heat on yet, but we'll be ready to do so when the time comes. we even tested it and the furnace turned on without any issues.

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a while back cambridge gave the cafe a grant to upgrade our front door to make it ADA complaint. that meant having a button that you can press to automatically open the door. that worked for a while, but the button outside started acting weird, and it finally stopped working months ago. my father wanted to fix it so we took apart the buttons, both inside and outside, to figure out what was wrong. the inside button works fine. we measured the voltage across the switch and it was 10V. i never understood how it worked, but there seems to be a remote switch inside the housing. sure enough, if you press the button on the remote, it will open the door, just like if you pressed the "push to open" button. we checked the outside button. there was a remote switch inside, but nothing happened when we clicked on it. the voltage across the button switch was only 5-6V. so it looked like the remote switch needed to be replaced, but it seemed firmly attached inside the housing and we couldn't remove it.

in the meantime, we went online in search of replacement remote switch. using google lens, i was able to find an exact match immediately: linear multi-code MCS307010 300Mhz transmitter that sells for around $20. i always thought the switch was somehow hardwired, but further digging showed photos indicating it uses a 12V 23A battery. we tried to pry off the cover of the transmitter to get to the battery compartment, but it was stuck on firmly, until on a whim i put a few fingers underneath (not knowing if the thing was electrified) and just pulled out the transmitter. it wasn't hardwired at all, and was wedged in tightly through friction alone, nothing more.

once the transmitter was off it was easy to troubleshoot. so these door buttons work entirely by remote, powered by a single battery. the reason why it wasn't working was because one of the battery leads had corroded. my father cleaned it with some sand paper and i used alcohol to clean the rest. we also put in a new battery, one from our light switch remote, which happens to use a 12V 23A battery. once it got a new battery, we clicked on the button and the front door opened like magic. we installed the front switch back in its assembly. as for the old battery, it still worked, but we put it in the light switch remote. my father asked me to go online a find a cheap door switch remote, so he can open the door remotely for customers.

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my mother finally finished knitting the second patriotic pussy hat, this time in a smaller size. i put it on a mannequin head and put it facing outside so people could see it. i'm surprised we haven't gotten any comments about the hats. i think it's because it wasn't very visible. now that i put it front facing, maybe we'll get some prospective buyers.

my sister was at the doctor so around 4pm i went to her place to check up on esmei. she was sleeping like a pig inside her tent. she stretched then headed to the backyard. not to pee, but just to walk around a bit, explore the territory. i coaxed her back inside before giving her a few treats. that's when my sister got back. she took esmei to the cafe a short time later to try out the muskox/horned cow costume she got her. esmei wasn't the least bit happy to wear a costume (tried to pry it off with her paws), but when she realized she was getting some treats, she ignored the costume for the time being.

it was busy around lunch time, then between 3-5pm we had zero customers. but close to closing time we got busy again, to the point where we started geting worried that we wouldn't have enough rice or noodles. overall it was a good day business-wise, but nothing like last thursday, when we set some kind of single day record. still, if we keep going at this rate through the last 10 business days of october, it'll be one of the most profitable months.

we had a beautiful sunset, the kind of colors you'd only see in a maxfield parrish painting. but the clouds made me worry, since i was ready to do some comet spotting after work.

after we closed, i rode down concord avenue to get to cambridge common. in my mind i had this great photo of the comet behind the sheraton commander sign. but i just couldn't find the comet, made more difficult by all the headlight glares of cars. i kept using my phone camera to see the comet, but it wasn't working. it wasn't until after 7pm before i finally saw the comet. it wasn't behind the sheraton, but rather the first church next door. i kept moving around, trying to see if i could get the comet behind the sheraton sign, but it wasn't going to work. i would have to be behind the sign in order to photograph the comet in the background.

i finally left by 7:30pm and returned home. i put the 3 leftover pizza from last night into the oven and made some tea to warm up. i ran the space heater for a little bit, just enough to raise the room temperature by a few degrees. i watched the dodgers-mets game, saw los angeles win, putting them 3-1 in the series. they could close it out tomorrow, game 5 starts at 5pm.

i didn't wake up this morning until 10:30am. i thought about going out for a run, but it seemed too cold (upper 40's), but most importantly, it was too windy. i figured maybe i'd wait until the afternoon when it got a bit warmer and decide again.

instead i just relaxed at home, or as much as i can relax when the indoor temperature was 58 degrees. i put the space heater on a barstool and blasted it on oscillation mode in the living room to warm up the house. i drank hot tea. i put on some socks. i cooked a chicken cordon bleu in the oven for lunch. anything to warm up. eventually the living room did get as high as 61 degrees.

it's been over a month since i last did laundry, and i had a lot of dirty clothes. i ended up having to do two loads, and will probably need to wash again soon as i still have bedsheets that need laundering.

in the afternoon i went to UPS to return a macy purchased jacket for my mother, before swinging by market basket to get some groceries. an obnoxious cyclist with a trailer had locked his bike to the stand, taking up more than half the spaces. i was tempted trap his bike with my lock so he couldn't leave. i got some baby cucumbers, bean sprouts, and corn starch for the cafe, and some snacks for myself. nothing for dinner, since i figured i'd throw something frozen in the oven, warming up the house in the process from the residual heat.

it actually felt warm when i was running my afternoon errands, that i got home and started getting changed so i could go out for a run. but i just as quickly lost interest, started rationalizing my way out of it. it was already kind of late. it was only warm in the sun, otherwise it's still very cold because of the winds. i slept on my side wrong and the area of my heart hurts from the front to the back. and just like that, i ended up not running. i heard it's going to be warm this weekend, so maybe i might go running saturday morning before work. or maybe not, because it's the head of the charles this weekend, and the river will be crowded.

whenever i had some spare time, i'd watch a little more of alien: romulus. i don't much care for the slasher thriller component, but there were some interesting scifi elements i'd never seen before. like space ships crashing into the rings of a planet. or the loss and gain of gravity as a plot element. it's pretty good, would definitely recommend for scifi fans. it also looks amazing, can't believe a big budget movie (with an original story though part of a larger franchise) like this is still being made this day and age.

my father sent me a photo after work. he went out to the park and managed to get a photo of the comet. i was originally going to go and and do some more comet photography in the early evening (maybe even venture into boston for a more dramatic foreground), but got lazy and didn't want to go back outside. maybe tomorrow i might feel differently, i'll bring my tripod and drone just in case.

for dinner i heated a frozen sausage and pepperoni pizza in the oven. it was a thick crust variety, i only managed to eat half because i got so full from the bread crust alone. i ate while watching the dodgers-mets game. los angeles spanked new york in flushing, winning with a score of 8-0, shutting out the mets.

i woke up in the middle of the night to pee. it was freezing in the bathroom. however when i woke up this morning to get ready for work, the bathroom was a relatively warm 63 degrees. that's because sheri from upstairs must've turned on her heat. her hot water heating pipes go through my bathroom wall, so i get some residual heat in the process. elsewhere in the house it was 58 degrees. every autumn i play a game to see how long i can go before i turn on the heat. last year i turned on it october 17th. will i be able to last longer than that?

we didn't get slammed today at the cafe, but we had a steady stream of customers, so made some good profit by day's end. normally it's uncomfortably hot in the kitchen while it's refreshingly cool in the dining area. today was the total reverse, where it felt nice and toasty in the kitchen while it was downright freezing in dining area. by the afternoon the temperature difference was starting to equalize.

during a lull in the afternoon i made some clam fettuccine. i was basically following this recipe i found online. although we had plenty of linguine noodles, i had an old box of barilla fettuccine from home that i wanted to use. how old? it expired march 2015. i smelled the dry noodles and they seemed fine. in hindsight, using linguine would've been the better choice, as fettuccine was just too thick. i've made clam linguine in the past, but always with canned chopped clams, which barely have any clam flavors. since we got a large bag of littleneck clams from restaurant depot on sunday, this was the perfect recipe to try and use up some surplus clams.

so besides using the wrong noodles, i also didn't cook the clams properly. i was supposed to wait until they opened before tossing in the noodles, but after 6 minutes i added the noodles, totally forgetting about the clams opening part. so i ended up with a lot of clams that were only partially opened and had to be pried apart with a knife. the clams were cooked and quite delicious, their briny juices still intact. unfortunately those juices never got a chance to infuse with the rest of the sauce, so the whole dish was on the bland side. what i should've done is follow our recipe for steamed mussels that we sometimes serve during thanksgiving. that sauce is delicious, all garlic and wine and butter.

my adventure with clams wasn't quiet done. my clam knife arrived in the mail, and i had a chance to use it. i couldn't get the blade to go through the split in the clamshell. i was also very worried that i might have another knife accident and slice open my hand. i watched a few youtube videos to stoke my confidence, until i finally grabbed a clam in a towel and managed to drive the clam knife into the clam. i've shucked my very first clam! neither of my parents wanted to try eating a raw clam, so i did the honor with some tabasco sauce. it was briny, and fishy, and chewy, i think if i added some different sauce it might've tasted better. now i'm thinking about buying an oyster knife so i can learn how to shuck oysters as well.

the future tenant of the middle store came to sign the lease today. whatever mania my sister suffered yesterday, she seemed to have calm down, cooler heads prevailing and whatnot.

i wanted to see comet tsuchinshan-atlas again but it was cloudy sunday and monday. today was a clearer day, and i made plans to see the comet after work. my parents closed up the cafe as i left early. i dropped off my motorcycle at their place, grabbed the tripod and binoculars, and walked down to the nearby playground with a clear view of the western sky.

once again i seemed to be the only person interested in photographing the comet. well, that's not true: because in the sky i spotted at least one drone, if not more. it was actually a little cloudy when i got out there but the sky wasn't dark enough yet, so i wouldn't be able to see anything yet anyway. to find the comet, i located venus and looked 2-1/2 fist size to the upper right. using my phone camera, i was finally able to spot the comet through the clouds. i then found the comet with my dSLR camera. by that point the clouds had disappeared and i had a clear view of the comet.

i used my 55-250mm telephoto lens this time. it doesn't have the reach of my 70-300mm lens, but this one shoots quicker, and seems to have better image quality. because it was higher up in the sky with a darker backdrop, i was able to get a better look of the comet than i did on saturday when it was just above the horizon. at 55m i was able to see the long tail of the comet, while at 250mm i got better details of the coma. one thing i noticed was just how many short burst of satellite trails showing up in my 1-2 seconds time lapse photos. it's kind of annoying but something i can easily edit out with photoshop, but still, it's kind of sad that the once tranquil night time sky is now polluted with satellite trails.

an indian family was taking a night time stroll and came across my setup. "what are you photography?" one of them asked me. they got very excited when i told them about the comet. one of them could even see it with his naked eye. i showed them one of the photos on my camera. later my father came to meet me in the park. i gave him the binoculars and it took him a while to finally find the comet, mostly because venus had already set below the horizon, so there was no longer good frames of reference to locate the comet. i only knew where it was because i have my camera lens fixed in its direction, but i could always rely on my camera phone to quickly let me know where the comet was.

we finally returned to the house by 7:30pm. my mother cooked some frozen chinese dumplings for my father and i. i went home after i finished eating. it was a chilly ride, and my layered jackets did not keep me warm. it made me fantasize about owning a heated vest for riding.

i got home by 8:30pm. even though it was still 58 degrees inside the house, it felt warm in comparison to the outside temperature, which was inching towards the 40's. i boiled some water on the electric kettle before taking a shower. i made myself some hot tea afterwards. i can always tell it's cold because i can feel it in my nose, feels like a popsicle.

it's 61 degrees in my house right now and my nose and feet are cold. it's cold enough that my nose has a little dribble. i've yet to turn on my heat, neither have my parents at their place. i heard the weather will warm up next weekend, but until then, we're going through a cold stretch where the night time temperatures will drop down into the 30's.

i didn't get out of bed until 10:30am this morning, on this dark and dreary day. i wasn't expecting it to be so rainy, much more so than yesterday. i finally set out by 11:30am, riding down to market basket to get a few things to make clam linguine (olive oil, italian parsley, shallots). it was only a few drops when i got there, but became a drizzle as a got out. i thought about returning home and sheltering until the rain stopped, but opted to go to the cafe instead where i was picking up a few more ingredients. here i waited nearly 40 minutes before the rain finally stopped. i hung up the fern, vacuumed the floor, restocked the drink fridge, and brought out all the frozen ingredients to thaw.

i didn't get to my parents' place until 1pm. my mother told me earlier my sister had stopped by to drop off her esmei, but they got in a big fight over the lease situation with the new tenant (my sister won't stop complaining about it even though my parents didn't want to hear) so she stormed off with her dog. my mother made me some wonton for lunch. in my haste to leave the cafe, i forgot to bring the most important ingredient which were the clams. so clam linguine will have to wait until tomorrow at the cafe.

i got my mother to gave me a haircut. it's gotten long enough that my hair has started to curl up on the back of my neck. i've sort of been reluctant to get it cut however, ever since i noticed my hair has started to really thin out this year. whenever i shower, clumps of hair go down the drain, and it's even worse if i wash it. i basically have to empty the shower trap every week otherwise the tub won't drain. so in my mind i felt like i had an expanding bald spot that was getting worse everyday. one benefit of having long hair is i can sort of cover it up to some extent. the last time i had a haircut was back in february. i always seem to get it at the worst possible time, either when the weather is still cold or turning cold, the times when you could most benefit from having long hair. so i had my haircut and it wasn't that bad. yes my hair is thinning, but it's not that noticeable since it's thinning everywhere, not just in one spot. now i'm going to let it grow out over the winter, and won't cut it until late spring, just in time for summer.

my mother's been on an on brand kick, after seeing my godmother sporting a few pairs. she bought a pair of cloud 5 and cloudultra back in late september: the cloudultra was out of stock, so only the cloud 5 arrived. it was a good looking pair of sneakers, but they were a little small. so she ordered another pair, this time cloudgo wide. they arrived today, and she wore them all day to break them in. they're just as small as the cloud 5, but wider in the toes. this week another pair of cloud 5 will arrive, this time in a slightly bigger size. my mother will compare the two and return one of them.

in the afternoon i started making preparations to move our remaining outdoor houseplants into the basement grow room. but first we had to clean the grow room, which hasn't been touched since late spring, when me moved everything out. having spent so much time in the grow room all autumn-winter-spring, we didn't want anything to do with it once the plants "graduated" and went to go live outside. besides cleaning the clutter, i also vacuumed the dead leaves all over the floor. my father came downstairs to help.

while he was cleaning, i went into the backyard to spray the jasmines and osmanthus with neem oil. i'm sort of on the fence on how effective neem oil spray really is, but i had two old bottles that i mixed a while back and wanted to use them up. i ended up using the new mist sprayer, which gives a wider and finer spray. i didn't see any pests on the plants, but that's always the case in the beginning. i'm more of a fan of isopropyl alcohol (70%) spray, that seems to kill more on contact. maybe during the warm stretch this upcoming weekend, i'll bring out the plants into the backyard and spray them with alcohol. i'm also going to be using a combination of leftover systemic insecticide granules (imidacloprid, recently banned in massachusetts) and azapro drench (azadirachtin, the active ingredient in neem oil). if none of those things work, i'm willing to try bifenthrin, a manmade pyrethroid-derived insecticide (though briefly banned in the EU as possible carcinogenic).

we also moved the dragonfruit cactus and the water reed plant. we wallpapered the grow room in reflective mylar sheets for better light reflection. when the two spiderfarmer LED lights are turned on, that side of the grow room becomes super bright. my father also wanted to try out a new configuration for the rolling utility shelves, by lowering the top shelf; but i found it interfered with the placement of our hanging grow lights, so we ended up moving it back. i think this would only work if we replaced the two spiderfarmer lights with long 4ft T8 grow lights. my mother dislikes our grow room because she thinks it's a waste of electricity. but the lights are only on during the daytime, and if it's a sunny day, we generate enough kilowatts to cover the cost of keeping the lights on for most of the day. i also try to use the most efficient led lights whenever possible, like recently upgrading the heavy duty grow lights from beefy box units to flat aluminum heatsink units (i'm always in search of better grow light LED technology).

my mother made chicken noodle soup for dinner. noodles are my favorite, and even though i started eating well after my parents began, i still managed to finish before them.

afterwards i went back down to the basement to water the plants. most of the ones from the sunroom have been transferred downstairs, with the exception of the holiday cactuses (which require cooler temperature to get them to produce flower buds) and a large batch of pilea plants. i made sure to use Bti-infused rain water, to get a head start on any potential fungus gnat outbreak.

i helped my parents fill in their mail-in voting ballot for the november general election. i myself will go to the voting station that day because i live so close by. just 21 more days! i'm cautiously optimistic. even if harris does win the presidency, there's a good chance the senate will flip to republican, so the federal logjam will continue.

i was hoping to see the comet again tonight, but it started to rain again right around evening time and the sky was totally overcast to not be able to see a thing. fortunately i still have the rest of the week, but each day the comet grows dimmer. it was actually raining a good amount, and i waited until almost 8pm before it finally stopped and i could go home. it wasn't a fun ride. even though it stopped raining, there were puddles in the streets, and every time i went over one, water would splash my shoes and pant legs. i also rode home carefully, as i didn't want to risk slipping on the wet roads.

i showered when i got home. a great thing about short hair is washing it is so much easier. i watched the monday night football game between the bills and jets. i was rooting for the jets because they seemed to be the underdog despite having aaron rodgers. it was a fun game to watch, seeing two great quarterbacks in their elements. it was evenly matched, and the game came down to the wire. i thought the jets should've won though, but they couldn't convert twice in the red zone, and their kicker missed failed to score a field goal both times. aaron rodgers can only do so much with a garbage team.

i downloaded a copy of alien: romulus. i only watched the first 20 minutes but it's definitely a scifi right up my alley, oozing with well crafted world building and high production value. besides, cailee spaeny is in it, and she alone is worth watching. i do think the film is essentially a slasher pic, just set in space. i can already see the cast of young actors dying off one by one. it is an alien franchise after all.

normally we do a supply run on monday but because today was rainy and i needed a ride to belmont, my parents decided to pick me up and get supplies afterwards. there was hardly any rain at all, most of it seemed to have dried up, just a few wet spots in the streets.

we were going to needham-waltham, so coming to cambridge we were going in the wrong direction. to get to where we wanted to go, my father went onto route 2 and then down route 95 south. even though we passed by market basket and costco, we decided to go to the needham restaurant depot first, so we took a very circuitous route. despite the distance travel being twice as long, it was all highway driving, so it actually might be faster than if we traversed watertown-newton to get to needham.

the thing we needed to get at restaurant depot was beef shank for our beef noodle soup. it seems they only have it at the needham warehouse. my parents went early last monday morning but they didn't have any in stock. we got lucky today as they had two boxes (50 lbs. each). we also checked out their linguine noodle selection. they do sell 20x1 lbs. boxes, but they were all sold out, nothing left but the 2x10 lbs. variety. my mother also bought a large bag of 50% discount littleneck clams after she saw a woman last week buying the same. there was a long checkout line as they only had two cashiers working.

we got back onto route 95 north to get to market basket. since we normally go on mondays, we never seen it when it gets crazy crowded like it was today. it was hard to find parking and we parked at the marshall lot next door and walked over (so did many other customers). in the sky the clouds were doing something strange; it looked like sea waves. apparently they're asperitas clouds, a new cloud formation that was only recently added in 2017.

a place like market basket reminds me of the registry of motor vehicles: it's the great equalizer, and people across all demographics all come here to shop for their groceries. it's like a communal watering hole. it's a great place to people watch, to see so many different americans all in one place. (though that's not entirely true: market basket primarily appeals to a lower to medium social economic base; whole foods on the other hand attracts a more high scale clientele).

my father had the butcher shop grind big chunks of pork butts into various consistency, both fine and coarse. the coarse grinding here is much thicker than what we made using our own home grinder. makes me wonder if we need to get a different grinding plate to accomodate an even coarser grind. it also came with a sector hole plate which i assumed was for making sausages but i went online and some places called it a mincer plate. that one may give us a thicker grind.

after market basket we went to costco our final supply run destination. we didn't really need anything, but was already going in that area so decided to go anyway. my mother was buying a replacement pair of sneakers for my 2nd uncle, who had his previous pair stolen because they have a habit of leaving their shoes outside the apartment. despite not needing anything, we still left with a bunch of stuff, as always the case with any costco trip. like anywhere else, i'm always people watching. the customers seem to be a third white, a third asian, and a third indian. my father went to load up the car after he finished paying while my mother and i got some fabled costco $1.50 hot dog with soft drink.

sitting in the back seat of the element made me all sort of motion sick. i had my parents turn on the AC just so i could feel some cool breeze which made me feel better. although there hasn't been much foliage color change in cambridge, driving on the highway i noticed a lot more colors, especially trees lining the expressways. it started to rain again, but only very lightly, not even enough to bother turning on the wipers.

we got to the cafe by 1:30pm. after unpacking everything, i went to go retrieve esmei and bring her to belmont so my sister could go to an emergency clinic and get her foot examined. unlike hailey who got flustered whenever anyone else but my sister took her away, esmei didn't seem to care who she was going with. she happily hopped into the back of the car and got on one of the seat so she could look out the window as we drove. she has good eyesight and always seem to get a little excited whenever she sees another dog outside.

two packages were waiting for me at my parents' house: my new twin-sized heavyweight winter comforter and its duvet cover. i wasn't expecting them until monday and tuesday, so this was a pleasant surprise.

while my mother ate her hot dog as soon as she got in the car, i saved mine so i could eat it when we got back to the house. my mother also made a simple clam soup using nothing more than littleneck clams, ginger slices, and white ground pepper. despite it being so minimal, it actually tasted pretty good, and the ginger give it a spicy kick which really hit the spot on such a cold and clammy day. we got so many clams, i thought we could turn some into fried clams. but i learned that little necks are not suitable for fried clams; fried clams are made from soft-shell clams (AKA steamer clams).

i kept an eye on esmei as she wandered through the house, looking for ways to cause mischief. i even let her outside when she was crying near the back entrance, thinking she needed to use the bathroom. no, she just wanted to explore the backyard, and even chased after a rabbit despite it being forbidden under her heartworm treatment care. finally after 2 hours esmei got bored enough that she went to sleep. she jumped onto my mother's bed at first, and my mother covered her up in layers of blankets and pillows. that probably made her too hot and a short time later she came back to the living room to sleep on a pillow on the couch.

esmei didn't sleep long, just an hour, before she woke up at 5pm. i was actually sleeping myself on the zero gravity chair, when i heard her crying. when i woke up i saw her staring at me from the couch. i went to go pet her and that's when i discovered two small deer ticks attached to the back of her neck. i texted my sister but she was already minutes away from belmont. the clinic she went to didn't have an x-ray technician on the weekend, but they did put her in a boot. together we held down esmei so we could pull out the ticks. one came out clean, the other one got beheaded, so we have to monitor esmei, make sure she doesn't get an infection.

my sister left before we had dinner. my parents made sichuan-style spicy sour fish soup served over rice. my mother also cooked up a tofu stirfry which is her favorite (feels like we eat it every weekend) but i didn't have too much of that.

my father gave me a ride home after dinner. the sky was so cloudy today, there was no chance of seeing the comet. i took a shower when i got home then made some tea. i used my new stainless steel insulated mug that i bought from temu a few months ago. what a ripoff! no insulation whatsoever, the outside of the mug was piping hot, made worse by the fact that the stainless steel conducted all that heat to the outside. too late to get my money back, i can still use this mug, but as a really hot and inefficient drinking vessel.

i watched game 1 of the NLCS between the mets and the dodgers. in this year's playoffs i'm rooting for los angeles, mostly because of shohei ohtani, but there are also former red sox representatives, like mookie betts and kike hernandez. they're also a fun team to watch, i love their silly base hit celebration. dodgers - who could barely score any runs in their win against the padres to advance - scored 9 runs tonight. mets were shut out, the final score 0-9. the insufferable yankees are also in the playoffs (again), but as someone who lives in the boston area, by law i have to root against them no matter the circumstances.

earlier there was a texans-patriots game. i only watched it in the background. new england lost again (1-5 this season so far, race to the bottom hooray), but the game was noteworthy in that drake maye started and threw three touchdowns but also threw a few interceptions that all ended up in eventual touchdowns for the texans. final score 41-21. there was also a celtics pre-season game against the raptors. none of the starters played, i only catch a glimpse of the game, seemed like boston was still leading by 20+ with just bench players. so the final score surprised me - 111-115 - though the celtics still won. the real season doesn't start until october 22nd, when the knicks visit the celtics.

under the cover of the heavyweight comforter, i slept as good as i have in a while. it insulated enough so that even when i stuck my feet out to cool off, i could always pull them back in and have them be warm again. it was like sleeping underneath a soothing warm cloud.

my phone made an unusual sound early this morning but i ignored it. when i eventually rolled around to look at my phone, i was surprised to see an event notification: boston 10K for women. yes, i was originally planning on checking it out, but surely sleep was more important? but i quickly did the math in my head, and i figured i could go see the run and still have time to get some things from market basket before getting to the cafe for work by 10:30am. so i got out of bed around 8:30am, quickly used the bathroom (didn't even have time to shower), then left the house by 8:50am.

the run started at 9am, so i wasn't sure if i was going to make it. i was hoping they'd start late (as often the case with any events that require a lot of logistics). besides, from where i wanted to watch the race - at the intersection of mass ave and memorial drive - was about the 1-1/2 miles mark, so even if they did start on time, i could still make it.

on a saturday morning there was hardly any traffic. i didn't bother wearing a helmet and i ran every red light i came across just to make time. i basically rode down my usual route to get into boston - down beacon-hampshire - but took a right approaching kendall square at galileo way and vassar street to get onto mass ave. police had already blocked off the section of mass ave in front of MIT, so i had the whole street to myself as i made my way to the river.

the boston 10K for women used to be called the tufts health plan 10K for women. it's now "presented" by REI, which i guess means they don't get to rename the run after themselves. the 10K used to be on columbus day monday but has since changed to columbus day weekend. for whatever reason, i've only seen it twice before - once in 2004, then in 2007. there also used to be a wheelchair division but they've since done away with that (actually i'm wrong about that; they still do have the wheelchair race but there was only one runner this year so she wins by default).

i only packed my 55-250mm telephoto lens and my 3D fuji camera. i didn't bring my gopro nor my insta360 camera, even though i could've had a chance to use them both. i parked my bicycle to the nearest signpost and got myself ready. it was a sunny morning, and the glare from the sun would create harsh shadows as well as backlighting the runners. i shot in manual mode, f/8 1/1600 sec variable ISO.

because the runners come back along memorial drive, i have a chance to catch them twice. actually three times, because after the 4th kilometer mark they cross back into boston via the mass ave bridge.

in total there were about 4000 runners. one thing i don't remember seeing is a few male runners mixed in with the female runners. they're weren't bandits, i saw they had official bib numbers. maybe they're running in tribute for a fellow female runner? i also tried seeing what shoes everyone was wearing: nike, asics, new balance, brooks. a few hokas. i didn't see any on cloud though.

i left around 9:50am. i headed to market basket. i realized this when i left the house this morning but i forgot my wallet. how was i going to pay? i did however have my phone. maybe they accept google pay? i checked online and saw they do take google/apple pay but i wouldn't know for sure until i tried it. i got my things - cilantro, scallion, milk, eggs - and went to pay. i asked the cashier if they take google pay - knowing full well i'd be screwed if they didn't - and he said yes, pointing to the contactless payment area on their card reader. i tried it and sure enough it worked. i think this is only the third time i've ever used contactless google pay with my phone.

i got home by 10:25am. i quickly grabbed my things and took the motorcycle to the cafe. as i pulled into the parking lot, my father was outside setting up the tables and chairs. i opened the patio umbrella before realizing it was too windy today then closed it back up.

first thing i did when i got to the cafe was to make a new batch of tea eggs using old eggs. i cobbled together 30 - some from the fridge, some from my own house, some from my parents' place.

we also finally got a chance to use the vevor meat grinder. i'd watched a how-to video with some tips. they said to put the detachable metal parts of the grinder in the freezer. likewise, the meat should be slightly frozen as well. this is all done to keep the meat from thawing and clogging up the machine. my father paid no attention to this advice. the pork he was grinding had been sitting in the fridge for a few days. they were also in large strips, when one of the advice was to cut them into smaller cubes. i figured the grinder would jam because we didn't follow any of the advices, so i was surprised when it worked nevertheless. the ground pork was coming out at a very fast pace, like spaghetti strands. my father grounded all the meat in just a few minutes. so those advices didn't mean a thing. my father took all the ground pork and fried them in a large pot. the solids he'd use to make minced pork, the rendered fat he'd throw away because we already have plenty of it.

my sister brought over esmei again. she tied her leash outside on the patio deck and her dog fell asleep under the shadow of the closed patio umbrella. my sister was also helping out at the cafe even though we already had 4 people working there today. she did bring esmei home before returning to the cafe, then left for good in the afternoon.

it was busy today. even though it was just half a day, we made as much as a full day. this caps an overall very busy week. surprisingly, since we figured people would be out of town because of the columbus day long weekend. columbus day is a weird day though. back when i worked in an office, i don't ever remember getting columbus day off. it's one of the lesser holidays. to make matters worse, the internet went down a few times during the back half of our busy stretch. the internet has been pretty stable for a while, so maybe we werwe due for an outage. an elderly customer asked to use the bathroom. even though we told him the bathroom wasn't for customers, he insisted. in the end we let him use it, but i told him to come in through the back so he wouldn't walk through the kitchen. he had an accent, and later when his wife asked to use the bathroom as well, i asked her where they were from. "holland," she told me, "though people often think we're german."

i reconstituted my leftover half baguette in the oven: wetted first before wrapping in tin foil then making for 12 minutes at 300 degrees, before uncovering and baking again for 4 more minutes to make it crispy. i then served the slice baguette with leftover brie cheese.

my mother wanted to drink some mango daiquiris so i made some around closing, nearly killing the vitamix blender once again (and yes i smelled smoke again). the problem is too much frozen mangoes and too much ice. the final result wasn't sweet enough because i only added a cup of mango nectar. i had to add in some sugar syrup. i used a cup of rum but honestly there's no need for it. i only add it so the mango slushie wouldn't freeze solid if you put it in the freezer. the rum gave it a slightly bitter flavor.

a bunch of packages arrived today. the PAR38 150W equivalent 3000K 1600 lumen flood light LED bulbs came today. that was the first thing we did when we got to belmont, change out dining table light. i was afraid these new bulbs wouldn't be wide enough, but it worked pretty well. hope these don't flicker like the old LED bulb. my latest temu order arrived as well. it included a rotating timer, which both my father and mother thought was a good purchase after i showed them how well it worked. i got another mi band charging cable, this time from a different temu seller. this one worked perfectly, had the proper curved indentation that fits the back of the fitness tracker. it worked so well, i was compelled to write my first review on temu with an attached photo.

my sister showed up with esmei. she wouldn't allow her to go into the backyard because she's on an excitement restriction due to her heartworm condition, and she didn't want esmei to chase after any squirrels or rabbits. instead my father took esmei out for a supervised walk. my sister had been complaining about a broken foot the past few days. we ignored her because she usually complains so much, but when she showed us the bruising on her foot, it looked broken and we told her to go see a doctor.

for dinner we had leftover rice from the cafe as well as some leftover stirfry from yesterday. my mother made another luffa stirfry, but the luffa gourd she used was too old and was already getting fibrous. both my father and i kept spitting out tough pieces of luffa that we couldn't chew.

i kept my eye on the clock and quickly ate. sunset today was at 6:06pm, and i wanted to be out looking for comet tsuchinshan-atlas 30 minutes after sunset. i grabbed my heavy duty metal tripod, my 70-300mm lens, and a pair of binoculars, and marched out to the playground.

i thought there'd be other amateur astronomers like myself but i was the only one out in the park. because it's been so cold at nights, there were no mosquitoes (plus the fact that it's mid-october). the last time i saw a comet was back in july 2020, the NEOWISE comet. that was a comet that was high up in the sky, while this one is low on the horizon.

i knew tsuchinshan-atlas was to the right of venus, about 2-1/2 outstretched fist width. it was hard to see at first, but as the sky gradually darkened even more, i finally spotted the comet through binoculars. supposedly it has a 1.4 magnitude. it looked like a bright fuzzy ball with a blurry streak pointing up into the sky. tonight seems to be the best night to see the comet, as tomorrow and monday both look to be rainy and cloudy. the comet was visible with the naked eye if you knew where to look. i'm curious if my drone could capture the comet? i used night sight on my pixel phone, but i found that using the regular setting was better, as it presented a more realistic view of the night sky (versus night sight, which unnaturally brightened the sky).

i returned to the house around 7pm after the comet disappeared down the horizon.

i got back to cambridge by 7:45pm. there was a celtics pre-season game against the 76ers, the first game at the garden. philly opted to sit out all their best players: paul george, kyle lowry, caleb martin, tyrese maxey, kelly oubre. joel embiid wasn't even with the team. celtics didn't take it easy on the 76ers, and didn't play down to their competition, which was something they occasionally did last season. the first year after winning the championship, they're learning to hone their killer instinct. boston scored 40-18 in the first quarter alone. at one point they led by 54 points. the final score was 89-139.

i accidentally discovered a hidden feature on my mac tonight. i accidentally hit the function key twice and it brought up a dictation function that i didn't know about. i didn't realize dictation was available on this version of the macos (mojave). it can also dictate in different languages as well. as a matter of fact, this entire paragraph was written using the dictation function.