i woke up this morning and went out running because i didn't do it yesterday, having exhausted all my clean running clothes. it was only 10am but the temperature outside was already hot. i kept my clothes on about half way before i peeled off my t-shirt and used it as a towel. traffic was a little bit more than what i usually see, but it was still fairly empty. along the bank of the charles river next to the JFK bridge were a dozen people painting. i peeked at their works when i went by, some better than others, smelling that familiar oil paint fragrance. the last time i oil painted was in high school over a decade ago, i'd love to do it again, but it's a messy hobby and in this world of instant gratification, i rather take a photo to capture the moment instead of spending days if not weeks painting it. i walked briefly before i got to the drinking fountain, and after splashing myself with water, i quickly finished out the route. i always have this air of superiority after a run, not sure if i ever mentioned this before. i'll walk by someone and just think in my head, "i just ran 3 miles, what did you do?" not that i'm particularly in shape, but i definitely feel superior somehow over people who don't exercise. walking back home, i got the weirdest expression from this skinny girl (she might've been foreign), looked at me from the corner of her eyes when she walked by with this "look" (narrowed eyes, corner smile) that either said, "you think you're hot but you're not" or "come home with me topless boy," i don't know, my girl sense radar has been off recently. i kept on walking and saw from across the street a group of girls dressed up as pirates, enjoying the attention. i wanted to shout "yar!" to them but figured in the remote chance that they might be actual pirates (instead of just pirates wannabes), it wouldn't be such a good idea.

a block away from my house i stumbled across something on the ground which i knew right away to be money. i picked up all the bills and looked around briefly, not sure whether if i was looking to see who dropped it or maybe i just didn't want to have any witnesses. it was a fistful of dollars (actually various denominations) and i didn't count it until i got home, $77 total. what do you do when you find money on the street? leave it there, hoping whoever dropped it will come back for it? put up a note, "if you lost some money, call me"? i feel kind of guilty for taking it, but is there any good way i can get the money back to the rightful owner? $77 exceeds my previous personal record of NT$1000 (new taiwan dollar), which at the time was US$40. that was only a single bill though, this was a handful of bills, like somebody threw it on the ground or they're just super careless with money.

after a shower and some minutes jujjing my hair with product, i motorcycled back home to belmont, where my family was going to the yangtze river restaurant in lexington for dim sum buffet, bringing suhan along as well. my godmother's son jack works there, and once again gave us the VIP treatment, bringing out fresh dim sum straight from the kitchen as soon as they were done. the dim sum at yangtze river is pretty good for the price, although their foods tend to fall on the light side in terms of flavor. their are also buffet tables, but the food on those are more traditional chinese restaurant dishes, not related to dim sum. all i know is after i have my tripe and chicken feet, i'm happy. the best asian food dim sum i've ever was at the tokyo restaurant on the fresh pond parkway. it's more expensive ($20/person?) but the quantity and quality of food is definitely better. i've never been to tin tin, another chinese buffet place i know, but i've heard good things about them, i'd like to give them a try one of these days. not only did we get great service because we knew jack, we also got his employee discount on our meal. after we finished eating, my sister drove me back to belmont.

i rode out to the claypit pond again in belmont (last time i was there was last week) to see if i could have some more luck getting insect photos. i went to the large patch of milkweed i saw from last time. i was disappointed to see that a lot of the flowers were already wilting, which meant there was hardly any insect activities. the thing with insect photography is you have to have patience, and you have to know where to look. it's almost like a game of "where's waldo?" while trying to pick out the bugs. i saw a robberfly with a treehopper impaled on its piercing mouthpart. while it was busy feeding (i could see its abdomen moving in and out like a balloon), i took a few snapshots. robberflies make good subjects because they're not very afraid since they have a predator mentality. that doesn't explain dragonflies though, which are predators as well, but sometimes they're difficult to get close enough to get good photos. i saw my first cicada shell of the season, then later heard the familiar buzzing up in the trees. i finally figured out what those red bugs were from last weekend, they're actually boxelder bugs, i was able to identify them from an adult specimen.

robberfly with treehopper	pondhawk (male)	cicada shell
ladybugs	immature boxelder bug	boxelder bug

the one new insect i saw was an elongated long-jawed orb weaver. i didn't know what it was at first, but i spotted it from a few feet away resting on a leaf. at first i thought maybe it was an abnormally long silverfish, but upon closer inspection, i realized it was actually a spider. i've never seen a spider like this, all "elongated". from the photo you can see that it's a male spider because it has clubs on the tips of its pedipalps. when i got a little too close for comfort, the spider broke out of its elongated resting position and opened up to a more traditional spiderform. also notice that the third pair of legs is is normal sized while all the other pairs are super long.

elongated long-jawed orb weaver

i returned to cambridge, watched the red sox beat the yankees, took a nap on the couch, and woke up to some dinner, the leftover linguine i made last night. a few hours later, still hungry, i had some navratan korma, which is a creamy vegetable medley with nuts served on brown ice. feeling vitalized from my nap, and still hungry for some reason, i might go hit some korean ramen in a cup next.