t
o
n
y
a
n
g
'
s
 
w
e
b
l
o
g


MAR

01

2017

even though i was spending the night at my parents' place, i still went to sleep at 3am. i was watching another episode of the expanse. i must've been sleeping on the bed wrong because it felt cold, but i was too lazy to crawl beneath another layer of blanket.

i woke up at 9am when i received a call from the senior care center confirming my grand uncle's address; apparently they got confused when i said APT 1 instead of 1F. the woman i spoke to yesterday told me they would issue a new check today. i stayed in bed and watched another episode of the expanse before finally getting up at 10am.

i had 2 hours to kill before heading to the cafe. i used the bathroom and took a shower. my grandmother called my father's phone and was surprised that i answered. she got confused as to which day they were leaving, and thought they were going to china instead of taiwan. before i left i turned down the heat to 50°F; no point keeping the house warm if nobody is going to be living there.

i left for the cafe 20 minutes early when i saw through the webcam that my grand uncle was already up and waiting for his lunch. after my 2nd aunt finished making it (my grand uncle actually called the cafe at noontime, thinking we might've forgotten him) i brought it over. while he was eating, i cleaned his plastic portable urinal and let hailey out in the backyard to use the bathroom.

after my grand uncle finished eating, i took the plate of food away along with some used chinese newspapers. at the cafe, my sister's friend stopped by to let us know they didn't want the belmont victory garden plot anymore. the plot belongs to us but we didn't want it; instead of returning it, we let my sister's friend use it (they wouldn't have to get a plot through the lottery), they just needed to pay the annual fee ($65). she wanted to keep it, but said her husband didn't want it anymore and didn't think they'd have time for gardening this summer.

there was a mail from the senior care center, warning my parents that they'd gone over the maximum allowed hours worked per week. since they're not here to inquire about the notice, i will adjust the timesheet accordingly (only subtract 2 hours per week).

my parents haven't been gone for more than 24 hours and i'm already dealing with a bunch of their stuff: senior care phone call, call from my grandmother, lunch for my grand uncle, excess overtime warning letter, and garden plot return. my 2nd aunt also told me she needed some limes.

i finally returned home around 1pm. i had to parallel park in a spot in front of my house, and i'm a terrible parallel parker. but i managed to get it in just one try, although i did do some minor back-and-forth adjustments because i didn't know how far i was from the curb.

it felt a little weird to be away from the house for a whole day. i think weird because somebody else was living here, versus if i came home to a house i knew was empty from the time i left. but everything was just as i remembered it. a package arrived for me yesterday: i thought it was the external drive, but it was actually my essential oils order from piping rock. however, on the doorstep was a new package, and that was the hard drive. also arriving in the mail: my flower seeds: hollyhock zebrina malva and columbine mckana giants.

i made myself an english muffin ham cheese and egg sandwich. i'm trying to eat all up all deli honey ham before it goes bad. i don't know if i'll get honey ham again in the future, it's a little too sweet for my taste. i still have a lot of it, i'll be eating honey ham the rest of the week.

today was day 2 of my sichuan paocai sauerkraut. it was a little unusual to see that the airlock was still clean. but when i checked the bowl, there was about a quarter cup of liquid. it must've leaked out from the side of the lid instead. and the plastic cap seemed to be bulging in the middle, or could've been just my imagination. i opened up the jar to repack everything and then secured the lid once again. almost immediately, milky cabbage juice starting flowing up the airlock spout. it smelled more like sichuan paocai than sauerkraut, can't wait to taste it.

i ran my diffuser with the new bottle of eucalyptus oil i got. it scent is strong initially, but after a while it sort of goes away. or maybe my nose just gets used to it. faint eucalyptus still has this sort of clean refreshing scent, almost like a very mild mint flavor. i've got nearly 60mL of eucalyptus essential oil (typically i just get the small 15mL bottles) so i've got plenty left. i like eucalyptus better than tea tree. tea tree has a paint cleaner chemical smell, while eucalyptus reminds me more of soothing aromatherapy fragrances.

even though at times it looked like it might rain, it never did. temperature was in the mid-60's, warm but not like the 70's of last week. i rode down to market basket for some groceries, didn't need my jacket. i gathered some tuna fish sandwich ingredients.

at 6:15pm my father sent me a voice message via the line app on his phone. i took me about 10 minutes before i noticed. i quickly told him about the excess overtime warning. i was then able to live chat (audio) with my mother over line. it was surprisingly clear for airport wifi (they were in hong kong at the time, waiting for their flight to taipei), actually clearer than when i call them at the cafe VoIP phone.

for dinner i reheated my last slice of chicken pot pie. karen didn't get home until 9pm. she had a busy day, first going to the MFA after work, then returning to porter square where she and her friend paula had dinner at a thai restaurant, before taking some time to discuss meal plans for their clients. she went to sleep immediately afterwards.

i finished out the night watching the latest episode of legion live streaming from the verizon tv website followed by several more episodes of the expanse (i'm almost caught up, already on season 2, 2-3 more episodes to go).

close to midnight i saw my grand uncle was up in his chair, holding his bib as if he was waiting for lunch. he might've gotten confused as to what time of day it was (despite our dementia clock). fortunately my sister was home at the time and i asked her to go check up on our grand uncle. he sure if he was confused, but he was definitely hungry. my sister gave him a cup of yogurt, then made him some toast (i'm surprised he ate it, he doesn't like solid foods these days).