i packed the produce onto the back of my motorcycle and rode to belmont. i went with my parents to the waltham market basket to get more groceries. like at star market, the place was crawling with college kids (probably from nearby bentley and brandeis).
back in belmont, my parents left to drop off the supplies at my sister's place, where she was having a barbecue later in the evening. it was something she off-handedly mentioned a few days ago, but then changed her mind when she had a fight with my mother, but then changed it back less than 24 hours ago. i didn't really want to go because there's only standing room in her backyard, and she gets angry if you don't like the food she makes, but i went for the novelty of it.
my parents came back an hour later, but left again by 5:30pm to help my sister prepare. i followed behind a few minutes later on my motorcycle. my sister has a portable coleman BBQ grill that uses a small propane tank, but my father used alex's old barbecue which uses a standard propane tank. even though it was my sister's barbecue, my father and i ended up doing most of the cooking. my father was really impressed with the performance of this grill, which seemed way better compared to our 6-year old charbroil classic. i personally think our grill is just as good, just that this one is in much better shape while ours is so corroded it may need to be replaced or at least get some new parts. the issue with our grill is that numerous flare ups and uneven heating. when we first got it we didn't have any of these problems, but now foods get burnt and using the grill has lost much of its joy.
the 2 astrophysicists living upstairs come down around 6:30pm, just when we were about to finish cooking some of the food. besides the italian sausages and the barbecue corn, we also had chicken. normally barbecued chicken come off the grill tasting a bit raw, but these were cooked to perfection, not sure whether it was the marinade, the type of chicken meat (thigh?), or maybe it was the grill. we also barbecued some wings which were cooked perfectly as well.
i'm not sure why we started the barbecue at 6:30pm, which seems to be a terrible time, as sunset this time of the year is a bit after 7pm, and dusk is when all the mosquitoes come out. i was bothered by a mosquito initially, but it left me to find more choice blood meal. eventually it got so dark it was time to call it quits, but by then everyone had already ate. everyone moved inside to my sister's place to enjoy the air conditioning (did i mention today was an oppressively hot and humid day?). i left by 8:30pm, which was about the time everyone else left as well.
ever since the summer solstice, every day there is less and less daylight, which means less and less production. today looked like a day where we might get a perfect bell curve, but clouds started showing up in the afternoon which reduced the production by a little bit. even so, we are not going to hit another 50+ kWh day.