after some cereal for breakfast i rode the motorcycle to belmont. it rained again this morning, but not as much as yesterday. i had my towel ready to dry the bike but it wasn't necessary. i ran into my sister walking the dog before she left for work at the cafe.

we had some insect visitors in the garden. a female black swallowtail was fluttering around in the backyard (females have more blue; males more yellow). i had my camera but the wrong lens so wasn't able to get a close shot. by the time i went back inside to grab my telephoto and macro lenses, it flew away. maybe it was attracted to the garden because of the carrots (its caterpillars also feed on dill and parsley but we're not growing enough of it). i'll keep my eyes open for eggs and possible caterpillars.

i also spotted a tiger bee fly. they're kind of scary looking because they look like a giant fly with checkered black and white patterns. they're harmless though, unless you're a carpenter bee: the larvae feed on carpenter bee eggs. i used to hate tiger bee flies because of what they do to carpenter bees, but now i like them after seeing the numerous bee holes found on wooden posts in the backyard.

i had some green pea soup in the late morning, then some lamb noodle soup in the afternoon when my mother returned from the cafe. my father was busy installing an air conditioner in the basement. we have as many as 3 dehumidifiers running downstairs to keep out the moisture. the problem with dehumidifiers is they heat up, so during the summer on particularly humid days the basement can get sort of warm. that's when father figured we could dehumidify the basement with a window-mounted air conditioner. since the AC exhausts to the outside, it could keep the basement dry while not warming it up. he came across a fairly new 5000 BTU unit. after installation, we're still waiting to see if it'll actually work (or whether we might need a bigger AC, or put it elsewhere in the basement).

my mother had her own project, busy knitting more flowers. she found a few more patterns, watching the how-to videos on youtube on the ipad and then trying them out.

the best part of tonight's episode of breaking bad was the cameo by jim beaver as an illegal arms dealer. he's better known for his role as whitney ellsworth on deadwood, prospector and husband to alma garret. the scene looks like something out of taxi driver, but his dialogue is so reminiscent of deadwood i have to think the showrunners did it as tribute.