i woke up at 7am this morning so i could go to belmont and do some gardening before work. i was going to take the bike, but made the sudden realization that it'd be much faster if i went via motorcycle instead.

when i arrived in belmont around 7:45am, my parents were still asleep. first thing i did was spray the cherry plum tree with horticulture oil. i looked at the instructions last night, decided to mix 4 tbsp of oil (2 oz.) with 1 gallon of water. the oil came with a handy measuring cup. i decided to spray today because it was the most optimal day: dry, no wind, and not expected to rain for at least 24 hours. beginning on wednesday night, we get chances of spot showers that goes into thursday, and then friday and saturday looks to be rainy with possibility of thunderstorms.

i climbed a ladder to get as high as possible. the more i sprayed the more i was sickened to see how serious the scale infestation was. this must've been going on for several years already, and i'm only now noticing it. midway through spraying my father came out to water some plants. not only did i spray, but i also did some more pruning of dead branches and branches that were growing at awkward angles. i did the best i could with the horticulture oil, not sure if i managed to cover all parts of the tree. of course this would've been a lot easier to do in late winter early spring, when the tree hadn't leafed out yet. all i can do now is monitor the infestation, continue to apply the horticulture oil if i don't see any improvements. another thing i did was to wrap outward-facing duct tape around the truck of the tree. i did it with both the cherry plum and the kwanzan cherry. this is prevent ants from crawling up the trees. ants will protect and farm the scales, chasing off predatory insects. by keep ants off the trees, beneficial insects like ladybugs can establish a colony and eat the scales.

i planted the solomon seals. some i put with the hostas and ferns along the eastern bed near the entrance gate to the backyard. the others i planted in the southwestern bed, between the small kwanzan cherry and the fence.

another thing i did was put some chicken wire fencing underneath the gap of one of the fences in RB0, to keep rabbits from getting to the radishes. so far this spring rabbits have stayed away from our backyard, or at least i haven't seen any rabbit signs. plants that rabbits normally defoliate - like violets - are abundant in the backyard. i think it's only a matter of time though. once they start breeding, and bunnies become adult rabbits, i expect to find them in the backyard again. in the meantime, if we can plug any holes in the fences, that might be a good start.

my parents left for work before 9am. i stuck around a bit longer, watering the plants in the grow room. these are mainly orchids, pennyworts, pileas, rubber plant, and tradescantias.

i rode to the cafe, arriving around 9:30am, after about 2 hours of early morning yard work.

in the mid-morning - before the customers started showing up - my father and i climbed up to the roof again to replace the HVAC filters. going up the ladder, i gouged a small piece of flesh from my forearm from a sharp exposed corner. having never replaced the filters before, it took us a while to figure out how to open the panel. when we finally did, the old filters were casually arranged inside. the top two filters - 15x20" - didn't look all that dirty. the larger bottom filter - 14x25" - was much dirtier. we've still yet to turn on the AC (even all though the wiring are in place for cooling), but we feel better now that we have clean filters. the ones that my father got are MERV 7. the manual said we can go up to MERV 8 but no higher than that.

maybe because of the nice weather, but today was a very busy day. we never got slammed, but there was just a steady stream of customers coming in, as well as online orders. mostly easy stuff, a lot of bento boxes. and orders with multiple items, which means we make more per customer. today was one of the top five busiest days of the past 3 months.

i didn't make any tea eggs today (made a fresh batch saturday), but did make some boba pearls. i also cooked dumpings several times as they sold out, as well as a new batch of black soy noodles. in the mid-afternoon my father heated up some leftover beef noodle soup (with plenty of tendons and unwanted beef chunks) and we all had that for lunch. later i went over to my sister's place to help her piece together another dog tent for esmei, this one with an elevated platform that she intends to leave outside. esmei wanted to play tug, but when she got tired, she just fell to her side outside in the sun and went to sleep.

i got in touch with my upstairs neighbor jeff. apparently he arrived just last night. i told him i'd drop off some housewarming beverages after he told me he likes IPA beers.

my father's replacement driver license and health insurance card arrived yesterday. the only thing that's missing now was his MBTA senior discount card, which i helped him order a new replacement. the criteria involves sending them a photo of your driver license and a passport quality photo. they used to print your photo on card, but for security reasons, they now just keep your photo in their database.

i left the cafe at 6:30pm. my parents were still there making chinese dumplings. also a customer came in right around 6:30pm and my father said it was okay for him to eat here. that's another pet peeve of mine, customers who show up at closing time and want to dine in. my father never tells them we're closing and that they can only get takeout, but always allow them to eat here.

i didn't go home but instead went to my 2nd aunt's apartment. my 2nd uncle is home alone while my aunt is on vacation in california. she tried calling the home phone a few times but my uncle never answered. my father actually went there sunday as a welfare check; he said my 2nd uncle was fine, but the phone wasn't working. so i went there today to fix the phone. it's an internet phone, so i basically fixed it by replugging it back in. that's all it took.

when i did get home, i bumped into jeff while i was taking out the trash cans. he told me he just spent a week on vacation in hawaii, before coming back to boston. i went to the liquor store around the corner and get him some IPA beers plus some woodchuck amber hard cider for myself. i was just going to leave them on his back porch but he heard me coming and thanked me for the beverages.

pacers eliminated the no.1 seeded cavaliers tonight. for some reason the pacers are cavalier kryptonite. i could be wrong, but i seem to recall indiana had a winning record over cleveland in the regular season. cavs led in the first half (as much as 19 points), but pacers continued chipping away at that lead, until midway in the third quarter pacers took the lead and never gave it back. it seemed inevitable after cavs lost game 4 to be down 1-3. i feel like history will repeat itself with the celtics tomorrow night. i so very much want the celtics to win the series, but being down 1-3 is not just a fluke, says something about the celtics, says something about the knicks. even if boston win tomorrow night, they're only delaying the inevitable. even if by some miracle the celtics win the series, without tatum they can't go much farther. speaking of which, it was confirmed that tatum did indeed rupture his achilles tendon. celtics front office didn't even announce the news by late afternoon, by which time tatum had already had surgery to repair the tendon. they say the sooner the tendon is repaired (less than 24 hours), the greater chance of recovery. with tatum in recovery for the next year, it's going to be a painful period for the celtics. the team is already too expensive, the front office will definitely be trading some players. the boston celtics will not look the same as they do right now, which is sad.

i cooked some ricotta cavatelli pasta for dinner. i didn't think a pound of frozen pasta was a lot until they finished cooking and i had a huge bowl. not even sure how much calories i consumed, must be in the thousands. so much for losing weight! at the very least i was very full after that pasta meal, wasn't in the mood to do any snacking (not that i could anyway, no snacks in the house, that's one way to prevent snacking).

we need some asian supplies so i'm riding down to chinatown tomorrow morning to get some stuff. maybe help me work off all these calories!

i moved all my houseplants outside again this morning, now that sub-50 degrees nights are a thing of the past. i also added two more trays of seedlings: kabocha squashes and a mix of luffas and bitter melons. they should be ready for transplanting in another week or two.

i went to the community garden, bringing with me 3 more milk crates to use as grow bag bases. my garden neighbor gene was there working on his plot. i noticed he haphazardly tossed a shovel into my garden. gene was also the one who dug up a bunch of my plants one season, including a monkshood, because he got confused where the borderline was. i was there to do some weeding, i noticed a lot of grass in my plot. the strategy was to dup up clumps of garden soil, shake off all the excess dirt, throw away all the grass, and replant the plants i wanted to keep. i ended up with a bunch of extra garlic chives, which i kept (to grow elsewhere). there was also plenty of sedum which i put back into the soil. i worked until noontime before i left.

after i got home, i changed to my motorcycle and left for my parents' place. my mother was about to go with my sister and esmei to winchester fells. i quickly ate some leftover barbecue before joining them.

it's been a while since we went to winchester fells, not since hailey was still alive. my sister used to go all the time, but only recently has she taken esmei, now that she's better trained and can go off-leash and return on command (most of the time). going in late spring affords you the privilege of seeing something ephemeral in our new england woods: ladyslipper orchids! we were still maybe a few weeks early before they all bloom, but we saw plenty of ladyslipper leaves and we did encounter a few in bloom.

esmei loves exploring the woods. when she sees other people she pays them no mind, unless they have a dog, and then she wants to play. a lot of people who saw her thought she was a puppy because of her size. she's not skittish with strangers and will allow them to pet her but shows no emotions. unlike hailey who has a herding instinct and will make sure everyone in the group is together, esmei could care less if the humans in her party got lost. the only person she listens to is my sister, who bribes her obedience with treats. esmei will basically follow anyone if she thinks they have food for her. she's prone to running off and doing her own thing. a few times my sister zapped her with the remote shock collar, but esmei barely noticed the pain.

entering the woods we saw a bunch of jack-in-the-pulpits. the forest floor was littered with canadian mayflowers. they do resemble ladyslipper leaves, except mayflower leaves are shiny while ladyslippers are fuzzy. i saw some shady overgrowth plants that i thought were ginseng (which i knew was impossible) but turned out to be wild sarsaparilla, not to be confused with true sarsaparilla. i found some pipsissewa AKA umbrellate wintergreen. i only identified it through google lens, and i'd never seen it before. it didn't have any flowers but the long glossy are distinctive. we also saw some robin's plantain, which i got confused with rattlesnake plantain, but rattlesnake plantain's leaves are fuzzy and its flowers are tiny orchids. robin's plantain is related to hawkweed, and its flowers are yellow. near the mouth of a brook that emptied into the winchester town reservoir were some yellow water buttercups which i originally thought were carnivorous bladderworts. the yellow flowers have a waxy texture that makes them look plastic. close by was some white bog violet, a new one for me (identified via google lens as well) - thought they were just regular violets except the leaves were different. next to that was some highbush bluberry flowers being pollinated by a large carpenter bee that attracted esmei's attention.

besides plants, there wasn't much additional wildlife. i found a male juvenal's duskywing butterfly (a type of skipper), identified by the median spots on the forewings and two spots on the hindwings. as far as butterflies go they're kind of nondescript and only a real insect fan would get excited about them. i was hoping to run into some snakes but maybe it's still too cold for snakes or maybe they were just hiding. i did see a turtle sunning itself on a rock in the reservoir, next to a common female merganser and a male mallard.

the crazy storms we had a few weeks back toppled a few trees in the fells. it's nature's way of making way for new trees. most of the trees that fell, you could see they were hollow on the inside and were probably due to fall eventually. we had to scramble over a few down trees, while esmei happily ran across the horizontal trunks.

we left winchester fells by 3:30pm. my mother wanted to visit an ocean state job lot store, but i wanted to get home quick because i was feeling car sick and needed to use the bathroom. driving back, there was already traffic going outbound from boston (luckily we were going inbound so no traffic).

my father home alone had already moved back out all the houseplants including the wintering hot peppers and osmanthus cuttings. he trimmed some garlic chives and planted them in a long pot with some leftover fertilizer of unknown NPK content. unfortunately we don't have a lot of space for garlic chives. we used to have a garlic chive patch near the southwestern corner of the yard, but ever since we planted a hawthorn and transplanted a kwanzan cherry we bought online, that corner is now completely shady. we may plant them in the elevated long rectangular plants we have behind the raised beds up against the sunroom. those planters are often neglected, but garlic chives are perfect because they thrive on neglect, as long as they get watered periodically and have plenty of sun to grow.

we pruned the big kwanzan cherry and the krauter vesuvius purple leaf plum. an errant wisteria had grown up against the fence onto one of the cherry branches, choking it to death. fortunately it was a branch overhanging into our backyard neighbor's property so we decided to cut it off. all day long i was waiting for my horticultural oil to arrive so i could spray the cherry plum. it actually did arrive around 4pm but the delivery person put in the mail box so i decided see it until it was too late to spray. it wouldn't have been a good day anyway because it was so windy. i'm going to come back this weekend in the afternoon when the cafe isn't busy to do some spraying.

i planted the strawberry i got from the plant swap into an upside down 2 liter plastic soda bottle that i made some drainage and hanging holes. the funny this is we have plenty of hanging pots that i don't need to do this, but i've seen it done elsewhere and always thought it was cool and wanted to grow my own strawberry from a hanging soda bottle container.

we didn't have time to make more raised bed fencing for RB0. instead we used the 4 that we did have to make a small enclosure (though a rabbit could easily sneak underneath to eat the radish leaves). as for the seedlings outside of the fenced area, we used some wire fencing loops to protect them until we can finally make more raised bed fencing.

we didn't fire up the grill today to cook the extra lamb chops nor the italian sausages. we'll put them in the freezer and save them for next weekend. instead we just ate leftover barbecue from yesterday, which we still have plenty of: chicken wings, drumsticks, ribs. there was also plenty of leftover pasta salad.

i went home around 7pm. after a quick shower (wash off the stink from hiking in the woods), i settled in to watch game 4 of the celtics-knicks series. celtics ended up losing 113-121. boston led for the first 3 quarters, but lost the most important 4th quarter. to make matters worse, jayson tatum suffered a non-contact injury with just minutes left in the game. he had to be carried off the court, and a hallway camera caught him being escorted away in a wheelchair, his face buried in his hands. the celtics were already unraveling, but the shocking lost of tatum sent them spiraling. just like the cavaliers, the celtics are now down 1-3 in the series. as for tatum's injury, nobody wants to say it, but it looks like an achilles rupture, which means he won't be available to play next season as he rehabilitates.

i didn't think jeff moved in yet because the lights were out upstairs when i returned home, but later in the evening - around 10pm - i started hearing noises upstairs even though i never heard anyone go up. did he already move in? but why were the lights off? maybe he took a nap so he could watch the timberwolves-warriors series. golden state about to lose, down 1-3. in other NBA news, the dallas mavericks won the NBA draft lottery. they only had a 1.8% odds of getting the number one pick. looks like cooper flagg is going to dallas!

my father came by this morning to pick up the pasta salad, the barbecue meats, and some plants for belmont. while he continued home, i rode to the cafe to put away the tea eggs and leftover rice, before heading to belmont as well. it was so warm, i took off my jacket, but i did feel a little chilly on the motorcycle. i caught my parents before they left for costco to get a few more things for our afternoon mother's day barbecue (including the ribs).

my father had mowed the backyard earlier, but i mowed the front lawn. i was tasked with cleaning up the house, particularly the sunroom. some stuff went to the garage, while others went down to the basement. decluttering was top priority, and i went whether the mess took me, whether that's the sunroom, the backyard, the living room, or the basement. my parents already came back while i was rearranging the basement grow room. my mother said costco wasn't surprisingly not very busy.

i continued cleaning. i vacuumed the house. i trimmed some hedges in the front yard. i moved all the osmanthus cuttings outside. i hung up the ratcheting hooks from the maple tree. my father helped me move the tiered plant stand to an area near the perennial bed behind the garage.

even though the guests weren't due to arrive until 4pm, my father started grilling around 2pm. i was in the front yard at the time and could smell the aroma of memphis ribs getting cooked. i thought it was too early, but with so many meats that need to be grilled, there wasn't time to wait for everyone to arrive first.

my sister's godmother was the first time arrive, she came on her own via MBTA. she brought korean popsicles and a glutinous rice cake she'd made. my aunt and matthew showed up around 4pm bringing with them beers. we all started eating before my sister finally arrived with esmei close to 5pm. my sister brought marinated beef. despite the warm weather, it was actually kind of breezy today, and underneath the shade of the maple tree, it can be a little chilly.

besides the ribs, we also grilled two variety of chicken - wings and large drumsticks. later we grilled some cumin-coated lamb chops as well. the thicker pieces were a little rare, but the smaller one that i had was cooked to medium. in between eating i also took matthew on a tour of our backyard, including our secret basement grow room where it was a showcase of orchids.

my sister found a tick on esmei's head that she removed with a pair of tweezers. i noticed a scale infestation on our cherry plum. before matthew and my aunt left, i gave him a bag of lily-of-the-valley to plant in his own backyard. my sister gave her godmother a ride home. once everyone was gone, we continued cleaning outside, clearing the table. i moved all our outdoor plants to either the basement or the sunroom as the temperature tonight is supposed to drop into the lower 40's. i also finally turned off the furnace, which was basically switching the power off.

i didn't get back home until 8pm. i moved all the plants from my backyard porch inside the house to prevent any frost damage. i looked up how to treat scale insect infestation and the common way seems to be spraying with horticultural oil. nothing seemed to be available at home depot (at least nothing in stock), so i ended up ordering 16 oz. of bonide all seasons concentrated horticultural oil for $14 due to arrive tomorrow (hopefully by the afternoon so i can spray).

i watched game 4 between the cavaliers and pacers. cleveland dominated indiana last game, putting the series at 1-2. tonight was another must-win, as very few teams ever come back from a 1-3 deficit. in the first quarter the pacers pushed their lead to nearly 20 points. by the second quarter the wheels came off for the cavaliers, as the pacers had a 41 point lead going into halftime. it was a lead they would not give up. end of the third quarter, the lead had dropped to 35 points. by the end of the game, the deficit was 20 points. to make matters worse, donovan mitchell didn't play in the second half due to some unspecified injury. pacers win 109-129. this game is also interesting in that the celtics seem to be mirroring the cavaliers. both top seeded teams started their 2nd round series being down 0-2, and both teams dominated in game 3. would boston continue to echo cleveland, get demolished by the knicks tomorrow night? i guess we're find out in less than 24 hours.

it was cold enough inside the house (63 degrees) this morning that my heat kicked on. i forgot i didn't turn it off yet for the season. the heat hasn't been in for weeks. it may however kick on again tomorrow night - when temperature is supposed to dip down to 44 degrees - but after that night time temperatures will be in the 50-60's for the foreseeable future.

inspecting my grow closet this morning, i noticed a pepper seedling had popped up in a pot that already had a bitter melon seedling. that's because it's a reused pot. i'll need to transplant the pepper at some point. my transplanted snapdragons are also growing, but they probably need to be transplanted outdoor at some point before they get any bigger.

the rain that fell overnight was slowing down this morning, but it was still wet outside, so i donned on my rain gear, knowing i wouldn't be wearing it when i returned home. coming onto rc kelley street, the road was blocked by a wall of pedestrians. apparently they were attending a historical lecture. it sounded interesting, and i wanted to listen in, but i also had to get to work, so i walked my bike onto the sidewalk to get by them before continuing on my way.

i made a new batch of tea egg spices, 20 packets. we got a few orders midway through and i had to stop what i was doing to fulfill the orders. i also made a new batch of tea eggs. not that we were in any danger of running out today, but tea eggs taste better the longer they steep in the tea brine, so this new batch will be perfect come next week.

one of our regulars - little moustache ("小鬍子") - came to eat on thursday and came back again today despite the rainy weather. he bought his girlfriend, they both ordered bentos, they finished everything.

even though we didn't make our daily average, we still made some profit despite the bad weather. the rain didn't stop until almost 2pm. by the time we closed a 4pm, the sun was coming out. my aunt invited my parents out for some korean barbecue in honor of mother's day. i was invited too but declined the invitation because i had to get home to watch the celtics game which started at 3:30pm. i also convinced my mother to have a mother's day barbecue tomorrow because of the nice weather.

i bumped into leon when i got home. we chatted briefly about the celtics, both not believing that boston is down 0-2. i turned on the tv when i got inside. the celtics were up 15 points, and were playing much better than the previous two games. the game was very similar to the cleveland game last night. knicks never led, celtics had a 31 point lead at point. final score 115-93. payton pritchard had the most points for the celtics with 23.

during halftime i transplanted that stray pepper seedling i saw in my bitter melon pot.

originally i wanted to catch some somerville porchfest action, but that was before i realized the celtics were playing. the game ended at 6pm, which was also the time when porchfest finished. i biked to market basket afterwards to get some barbecue ingredients. i passed plenty of people leaving porchfest, all of them young.

when i came home i started making my pasta salad. i haven't made it since may 2023. due to shrinkflation, the box of tri-color rotini was only 12 oz., not 16 oz., so i had to get a second box to make up the difference.

i'm not sure how i came across this pasta salad recipe but it's really good. besides the pasta and not counting the dressing, there are 8 other ingredients. i also really like how colorful the salad is. tri-color rotini is key. recipe calls for a cup of black olives but i accidentally only bought about half a cup's worth. for ham i had 10 oz. of frozen smoked ham in the freezer that i thawed and then chopped into cubes. because my mother loves arugula, i added 2 cups worth of arugula. the next time i make this salad, i want to try adding some anchovies to the dressing for even more flavor.

after i finished tossing the salad, i put it in the refrigerator to chill. it was already after 8pm. too lazy to reheated my leftover pizza, i just ate it cold with an orange seltzer.

i walked to star market this morning to get some lamb chops and asparagus on sale, before returning home and biking to the cafe for work. i didn't bring my bag because i knew it'd be raining when i come back home later. i did bring my rain jacket and rain pants and wore my rain boots.

with the rain coming in today, i figured it'd be a slow day. but the rain didn't start falling until almost 2pm, so it was dry enough during lunchtime that we got busy. even after it started raining, we continued to get customers, so it's not always true that bad weather means no business.

my father's replacement costco card arrived at the cafe today, while his bank cards came yesterday. he now has most of the cards he lost, the only thing missing is a replacement driver license. i need the new license so i could get a replacement MBTA senior pass card. it's still a mystery where his wallet went. my personal theory is he accidentally knocked it into the trash can. i also think it'll just show up one day, in some place nobody bothered checking.

i had some ham-daikon-seaweed soup mixed with rice for lunch, along with some steamed white fish my father had made. later we tried some french flan my sister bought from costco yesterday: it tasted good, but the flan consistency was a little too hard, like maybe they added gelatin. to get to the caramel layer on the bottom, you basically had to mash up the flan.

my father went to home depot yesterday to get the properly sized filters for our rooftop HVAC. unfortunately we didn't have time to install them, and then it started raining. contractors for the next door bakery came today to continue working on interior renovations, so the sound of hammering and drilling filled the entire day.

when my parents went to my godmother's place on wednesday for dinner, she gave them a large potted parlor palm (chamaedorea). it was doing fine at her apartment, but just one day in our care and the palm looks dead. the problem is parlor palms are shade loving plants, and we left it outside in the sun. to make matters worse, temperature last night dropped into the upper 40's, and this tropical plant did not like that. we've since moved it indoors, hopefully it can recover.

a girl actually returned her beef noodle soup order today, said the noodles weren't cooked. this has never happened before. we cook the noodles the same way every single time for the same length of time. we recooked her noodles and gave back her order. she finished everything and said it was delicious, but we hope she never comes back. picky eaters are the worst customers.

in the late afternoon i assisted my father in deep frying a new batch of salt & pepper chicken. the past few times we did it, we closed the kitchen door to keep the oil smell from getting to the rest of the cafe. we thought we did a pretty good job, but when my sister stopped by, she immediately complained about the oil smell.

it was pouring rain when i left for home. not the worst rainstorm i've biked in, but definitely not pleasant. my rain gear kept me dry though, but it was cumbersome and i couldn't easily turn back to see traffic behind me, so i just took it on faith that cars wouldn't hit me. nobody was upstairs when i got home, so it looks like jeff hasn't moved in it. i went to my backyard porch to empty the flooded seedling tray. i also readjusted the gutter downspout extender in the front yard so it'd flow out onto the sidewalk instead of back into the garden.

my parents went to trader joe's after work to get a few things for the cafe tomorrow (baby cucumbers, scallions). my mother called me to let me know she found a purple mini tote bag, the only one she was missing to complete her set.

tufts students rumeysa ozturk was finally released from a louisiana detention center today after she was abducted by masked ICE agents more than 6 weeks ago and moved out of state before the local courts could stop them. i hope she can go back to her normal life after being a political pawn in trump's reign of cruelty.

for dinner i heated a supreme pizza in the oven. i ate while watching the cavalirs-pacers game. this was a must-win game 3 for cleveland, since no NBA team has ever come back from being down 0-3. cavaliers lead the entire time in a statement game. win game 4 and they tie the series, making it into a best out of 3 series. this is the blueprint the celtics are hoping to achieve to get into the conference finals. we'll find out tomorrow night.

when i left my house this morning i couldn't turn the key in the front door lock. not sure why, maybe all the recent moisture formed some rust inside the mechanism. it was a simple fix, i grabbed a can of WD-40 and sprayed inside the lock, which remedied the problem immediately.

i brought my computer to the cafe so i could resolve the unpaid hybrid water heater issue from last night. i checked with the bank and the reason why the purchase was denied was because there wasn't enough credit left on the card. seems that when we reported my father's lost credit card, the bank put on freeze on any pending autopayment, so last month's balance was never paid off in full. i made a manual payment but the credit line may take a day to update. in the meantime we decided to use another credit card. when i called home depot, the person i spoke with wasn't sure he could give me the sale's price from last night if he had to cancel and reissue the purchase with a different card. so for the sake of simplicity, we decided to wait. by afternoon the outstanding balance on the previous credit card still hadn't been paid yet, but i noticed they already opened up our credit line again. so i called home depot to try the card again. turns out i could've done it with a different card and it wouldn't make any different. the old card went through, purchase made. we're scheduled to go pick up the heater next week.

i rewired the cafe nest thermostat for summer cooling, after going down to the basement and turning off the furnace for good. the reason why i do this is because the thermostat does play nice with both the furnace and the air conditioner. when they both connected at the same time, the furnace will go haywire making unnecessary repeated calls for heating. so twice a year i rewire the thermostat for either heating or cooling. it's kind of a hack but it seems to work. i can't even remember how i figured out how to wire it in the first place, like some kind of lost technology. i only know how to do it now because i have a chart that explains where the different colored wires go.

since i was working to get cooling in the cafe, my father brought out the ladder from the basement and we climbed up to the roof to inspect the HVAC unit. we wanted to know where to replace the filters, which we've never replaced before. the roof of the cafe is completely white, and it took my eyes a while to adjusting to the blinding light. there doesn't seem to be any obvious place where a filter would go, but we did see a filter sticker on one of the panels. unfortunately we didn't have any tools that could open up the panel. after we climbed down, i checked the model number to find a manual. it stated the HVAC doesn't take just one filter, but actually 3: 2x 15"x20"x1" or 2", and 1x 14" x 25" x 1" or 2".

my 2nd aunt showed up at the cafe in the late morning. i got a chance to fix her phone. the reason why she wasn't sharing her status on google maps was because she turned off her gps. once i turned it back on i could see her again. she left before we got busy.

it wasn't that busy during lunch time, and by early afternoon it didn't look like we'd make our average profit. but the thing about summer hours is we still get business throughout the day, and by day's end, we still make out okay. it may look bleak at first, but over the course of the day the customers will show up.

for lunch we had some leftover beef noodle soup from yesterday.

i hadn't followed the news today so turned on the tv in the afternoon to see any conclave news. so i was very surprised by the breaking news that a new pope had indeed been elected, pope leo XIV. not only that, but the first american pope, which came as a shock. in retrospect, it's kind of brilliant on the cardinals. you have on the one hand a very powerful american who many feel represents the worst of humanity. and now you have another perhaps equally powerful american who hopefully will represent all that is good. pope leo XIV was born in chicago, so that city is brimming with pride that one of their own is the new pope. and there's the jokes, like maybe now the cubs will finally win a world series (word has it the new pope is a lifelong fan), or the debate over deep dish pizza versus italian pizza.

i made a new batch of tea eggs, the second batch i made this week after the one i made on tuesday. at this rate, if we get another busy day tomorrow, i'll need to make a third batch come saturday. i'm running out of tea egg spice packets as well, will need to replenish my supply. i might do that tomorrow if we get a lull in the afternoon.

my parents made a new batch of curry chicken but didn't have time to divide the portions, will wait until tomorrow. we may also need to deep fry some more chicken tomorrow, we only have a few servings left. same thing with charsiu pork, will need to roast a batch in the morning.

a girl took the last of our pileas. not to worry, i'll harvest some more this weekend. i just need to remember to make the plastic pots this weekend, using a hot awl to burn some drainage holes.

my sister went to the waltham costco after taking esmei for a hike and got some eggs. they were out of the 30-trays, but she managed to get 3x 24-plastic-boxes of eggs for $7 each which is a pretty good deal. we're waiting for my father's replacement costco credit card to arrive so we can make a costco run ourselves. the card is supposed to get here today.

i biked home after work. early morning forecast said it might rain, but it stayed dry for the entire day, though at times the sky did look a bit dark and seemed to threaten rain. the rain will come tomorrow though.

my upstairs neighbors left for their vacation home this morning. i won't see them until the fall. that meant the house was super quiet when i came home. however it's only temporary, as summer renters move in this weekend. since i had some time, i went into the backyard and planted the ginger. i was looking for the foam flowers and noticed they were completely gone, eaten by rabbits.

for dinner i tried some sapporo tokotsu ichiban ramen. i've never had it before. i made a simple ramen, cooked the noodles first, before adding the sauce packet, an egg, and some chopped scallions. it wasn't anything special, just a salty broth. i could really taste the MSG. maybe with more additions it might be better. on the packaging it looked like they added some ham slices and beni shoga pickled ginger slices.

i went to pick up a prescription for my mother, then stopping by market basket to get a few things, before finally arriving at the cafe. it didn't rain today, but the sky was a mix of thick clouds with occasional intermittent sunshine. it was also warmer, temperature in the 70's. overall a nice day given how rainy it's been since the weekend.

nice weather meant busier time at the cafe. even beginning in the morning, we started getting online orders and customers coming to eat. it's almost like everyone who didn't come yesterday decided today was the day to make up for it. the signs were all there for what would be a very busy wednesday.

we ended up beating last wednesday's profit, a day where both my father and i were in belmont doing yard work while my mother, 2nd aunt, and sister were working at the cafe, as it got super busy. depending on the weather for tomorrow, it might even be busier still.

people continue to take the free pileas. by day's end there was just a single plant left. i'll pot more baby pileas this weekend. an old woman came in and took a plant, but she thought it was the money plant that produces translucent circular seed pods. she remembered seeing those when she used to live in los angeles. i took her to come back next week and we could give her some, as those kind of money plants - lunarias - grow like weeds in my parents' backyard.

i was watching news of the conclave all day, hoping to see what color smoke was coming out from the sistine chapel pipe. being that it was just the first day, black was the most likely color meaning a new pope hadn't been elected yet. but the cardinals were taking their sweet time, and it was starting to get dark in rome, so i turned off CNN. i only heard the news of black smoke a bit later. i'm kind of hoping the filipino cardinal will become pope, it'd be cool to see an asian pope.

my father and i replaced the battery to the automatic door switch outside. they use these weird non-standard 23A 12V batteries. we bought some a while back - they're the same batteries in our remote control plugs - but replaced the door switch with an old battery since it seemed to work. that battery finally died on us, so we replaced it with a new battery. my father measured the voltage of the old battery - 9V - and it was still working until very recently.

i made a new batch of tea eggs today, cooked black soy noodles twice, cooked two batches of frozen dumplings. my father finished making a new batch of beef noodle soup. the second to last step is to quickly cool the broth so we can portion it out before freezing. we used an ice paddle for a while, until we discovered it's actually much quicker by dunking the pot of hot soup into a larger pot filled with cold water. after that we finally portioned out the servings.

early evening was even busier than noontime. customers continued to show us, even when we were thinking about tidying up and closing for the day. it did make that final 1-1/2 hours go by pretty fast. before we knew it, it was officially closing time.

i raced home to watch the knicks-celtics game. with the cavs down 0-2 against the pacers, the celtics did not want to be in a similar hole. the game had a weird energy, even though celtics lead for much of it, they kept making uncharacteristic turnovers. that could be because of the knicks tenacious defense, but new york was also making similar bumbling mistakes. was it just nerves on both teams? even in the first half, i thought to myself, "you know, the celtics could very well lose this game." it was one of those times were i hated being right. boston did in fact lose! 91-90! just like in the cavs game, where they lost by a single point. could the eastern conference finals be a matchup between the knicks and pacers? i wasn't even upset, just had to laugh over how ludicrous it was. celtics continued to launch 3's even though they weren't going in.

during halftime i boiled some frozen dumplings for dinner. after the game, i watched episodes 7 & 8 of andor, hopefully watch episode 9 from bed. the gorman massacre!

i called my father to ask him if he wanted to buy the rheem proterra smart high efficiency hybrid heat pump water heater. we saw it online over the weekend, and noticed there was a special spring deals sale that was ending tonight. the hybrid heat pump water heater is normally $1819, but $1489 during the sale (a savings of $330). my father's been clamoring for one of these for years, after discovering that the appliance that uses the most electricity in the house is the hot water heater. a hybrid heat pump water heater is 4x more efficient and because it has smart features, we can schedule it so it only heats during the day when we get free electricity from our solar panels. plus we can get a $500 energy efficient appliance rebate from belmont, so the final cost (not including taxes) comes out to be about $1000. he ended up agreeing to order it so i bought it online. it's due for pickup next week.

even though it wasn't raining yet, i got dressed up in my rain gear since i figured it'd be raining when i returned home. today was just a wet and cold (50's) day. we didn't bother setting up any of the patio furniture since nobody would want to be sitting outside.

esmei came over, we fed her some cabbage cores which she happily crunched on until they disappeared. my sister took her out, later said she was running down a hill and face planted into the grass.

with the bad weather we figured it'd be a slow day. it didn't match last tuesday's profit, but we still made above our daily average which was pretty good. mostly bento orders, a few beef noodle soup, a few fried rice. it never felt that busy, just a slow trickle of customers.

after we closed, my parents over to my godmother's house for dinner. it'd been raining intermittently throughout the day, but had stopped again by the time i was going on. nevertheless, i put on my full rain gear. if nothing else, it kept me dry as i biked over puddles, of which there were many.

i didn't eat the entire day, so when i got home and weighed myself, i actually lost weight. i checked on my plants on my back patio, as well as the plants in my closet. i just hope it isn't too cold for the outdoor seedlings, although i heard it's going to be in the 70's tomorrow. i had a few more new bitter melon seedlings. i even had a new luffa seedling in the wet-napkin-ziploc bag. later in the evening i extracted that seedling and planted it in a pot. i also started a dozen chinese asters in a starter container.

after a shower, i threw a frozen chicken alfredo into the oven to bake. i watched game 2 of pacers-cavaliers. cleveland showed the world that what happened in game 1 (when the pacers won) was a fluke. other than the first few minutes, cavaliers firmly took control of the game, had a double digit for much of it, at times up by 20 points. but pacers never quit, and in the middle of the 3rd quarter, they mounted a comeback. that resulted in one of the most amazing final minutes of any NBA game. down by 3, haliburton went to shoot 2 free throws with just seconds left in the game. he made the first, missed the second, but got his own rebound, and with about a second left in the game, launched a 3-pointer to put indiana ahead. cavaliers couldn't do anything with a second remaining. pacers win 120-119. that means the number 1 seed in the eastern is now looking at a 0-2 hole going into indiana for 2 games. here's hoping the celtics can at least win their game tomorrow, so they don't face the same problem cleveland has.

it was raining this morning. i went outside to empty the trays of my seedlings so they wouldn't drown from all that water. i then spent some time dividing up all the sprouted snapdragon seedlings, transplanting each seedling to an individual cell. i ended up with 4 trays of snapdragon seedlings, with 12 cells per tray. i used the fordhook snapdragons and lavender trays, as those seeds (planted on 4/11) never sprouted. i planted 2 trays of nigella seeds.

i fresh squeezed some juice with the haymarket navel oranges i got on friday. i didn't realize it at the time, but i actually got a dozen cara cara oranges. the juice - amazingly sweet - was also a deep orange color. it looked more like grapefruit juice.

i picked some plants i wanted to take to belmont: some wild ginger, a bearded iris rhizome, a strawberry, and the potted mayflower.

my father came to pick me up at 11:30am. i did consider staying home today as it'd be raining for most of the day, but i had some other things i needed to do in belmont, like water the grow room plants.

i had some leftover barbecue for lunch, on top of a scallion pancake with pork floss rollup, and some silver fungus soup.

during a lull in the rain, i went outside to do some planting. i planted the wild ginger and may flower underneath the japanese maple canopy. i planted the bearded iris next to my other collection of bearded irises. i also brought out the gardenia. it wasn't producing any flowerbuds, and i figured the cooler outdoor weather might be better at inducing flower formation.

i watered the plants in the grow room, now mostly orchids, pileas, and tradescantias. since the wire shelving outside was no longer being used, i moved it into the grow room and used it to shelve some plants. it allowed me to turn off some grow lights, conserve a bit of electricity.

for dinner my father stirfried the haymarket swiss chard while my mother made her steamed egg & pork with ginger and scallions. after dinner my father gave me a ride back home.

i took a shower before settling down to watch game 1 of the knicks-celtics series. it looked like the celtics had the game firmly in hand in the first half, but the knicks fought back to take the lead, only for the celtics to tie and go into overtime. knicks won in overtime when a new york player snatched the ball from jaylen brown's hands before he could launch a 3-pointer that could potentially tie and enter a second overtime. sucks that celtics lost, but the good news is the series just got extended.

i moved my tomato and some more bitter melon/squash seedlings outside. this allowed me to shut down one of my grow closet shelves, saving me some electricity. i noticed two more bitter melon seedlings had sprouted in a wet-napkin-bowl; i picked out the germinated seeds and planted them.

i went back to market basket again this morning to get a few things: petite sirloin steaks (two pieces, around $11-12 each), pomegranate polar seltzer, and some italian sausages with fennel. once i returned home, i grabbed my things and took the motorcycle to the cafe around 10am.

i spent the next 3 hours making taiwanese paocai. my sister poked her head into the cafe, taking esmei to some dog party. i weighed the 7 heads of cabbage, i had about 27 lbs. worth. i saved one for my mother, leaving me still with 24 lbs. after removing the cores, the total further reduced down to 22.6 lbs. i started breaking apart the cabbage by hand. my father showed up to help. he also fixed the blades on the mandolin and brewed a new batch of black tea and green tea before returning to belmont with some of the barbecued meats i bought. i rounded down my cabbage to 22 lbs. and added 22 tbsp of salt to the shredded cabbage to let them reduce. usually i give it at least 2 hours, but for the sake of time, i only reduced it 1 hour, stirring occasionally to spread around the salt. i ended up with 13 containers of taiwanese paocai and 1 container of just sugar-vinegar pickling solution that my mother will use to make her pickles.

i finally left the cafe around 1:30pm. i had some silver fungus soup and a scallion pancake rollup with pork floss.

my father was in the backyard working on installing the on-demand pump for our rain barrels. the sky darkened and it started to rain, before it cleared up again. we went back outside to finish the installation. the water was spurting intermittently until my father suggested we clean out the filter, which seemed to fix the problem.

i pulled up a few more dandelions while my father transplanted red japanese mustards throughout the raised beds. i dug up some stray rudbeckias and planted them into the perennial flowering half of RB3.

i fixed my awl by mixing some epoxy and re-inserting the metal shank. whether it works or not i won't know until i use the heated awl again to create drainage holes in plastic cups for making pots. my father suggested i use a soldering iron, but the heating element of an iron is too short to go through multiple plastic cups at the same time.

my mother marinated the 3 lbs. of frozen chicken wings i bought. these were a different brand than last week and were much smaller. my mother improvised the marinade last week, and once more improvised again. around 5:30pm my father went outside to grill. besides the wings, we were also cooking the sausages. we made sure the wings reach above 165 degrees this time. after those were done, only then did we grill the steaks. i sprinkled sea salt and ground black pepper onto each side. we waited until the grill was at 500 degrees before grilling. figuring the temperature would drop, we were surprised the weber kept steady at 500 degrees. we used the meat thermometer to make sure the steaks were at 135-145 degrees before removing.

the wings and sausages weren't cooked crispy enough. yes technically they were done, but getting that extra amount of grilling would make them that much more delicious. the chicken marinade wasn't strong enough, and the wings themselves were just too tiny. the steaks were cooked to perfection. however, petite sirloin is not a good cut for steaks as they're too lean. that's why we didn't hear the sizzling of rendered beef fat dropping into the flames, and grilling the sirloin was unusually quiet. without the right amount of fat, a steak can be bland. next time, get better cuts of beef. next time, make a proper chicken marinade. next trime, grill until crispy.

i rode home after dinner, trying to outrun some impending rain clouds approaching from the west. on huron avenue i had to do a double take when i saw a weber genesis grill sitting out on the sidewalk. i pulled over and walked a block back to check it out. if it was in good condition, i could wheel it to my sister's backyard. it was genesis special edition, with front facing burner knobs. it looked to be in very good condition, and with stainless steel cooking grates. unfortunately a sign taped to the grill said it was for sale at $250. i thought it was free! sitting out on the sidewalk, it'd be easy for somebody to just make off with it. brand new, a weber genesis costs at least $800-900. i took some photos and sent it to my father. as much as we'd love to have a weber genesis with front facing knobs, $250 is just to expensive. my father asked me to ask them if they'd sell it for $100. afterwards i went onto facebook marketplace and saw someone in medford giving away a weber genesis for free. unfortunately it looks to be the same model with have, with side facing knobs.

i didn't realize there was a pacers-cavaliers game tonight. when i got home it was already at the end of the 3rd quarter. even more surprising, the pacers were leading! i sat down to watch the final quarter, rooting for indiana. sure enough, they ended up beating top-seeded cleveland, 121-112. i think the cavaliers underestimated their opponents, a mistake i hope the celtics don't make tomorrow against the knicks.

after that it was the warriors-rockets game. golden state was up 3-1 in the series, how did it even come to a game 7? i wasn't really paying attention the game, even less attention when it looked like the warriors were winning. these are the 2-seed rockets! facing off against a 7-seed warriors that made to participate in the play-in tournament just to get into the playoffs. warriors won 103-89. they face off against anthony edwards and the timberwolves, who dispatched the lakers.

i totally forgot to put the cover on my motorcycle as it started raining again. i went out a bit later, after the rain had stopped, to wipe down the bike with a microfiber towel (had to squeeze the water out of it a few times) before putting on the cover. it's supposed to rain for much of this coming week.

ever since i put money into that roth IRA, i haven't invested it into anything yet. it's just been sitting in a money market fund, quietly making me $13 during this financial tumult. but today i finally went ahead and put money into two mutual funds: fidelity international capital appreciation fund and fidelity telecom and utilities fund. honestly, if i was smarter, i should've invested a few weeks ago, when trump cratered the market. i could've bought a bunch of shares at a lower price. but who knew the market would bounce back? it could've easily went the other direction as well, dropped even further.