because my craig's list seller didn't contact me last night, i already ordered a replacement magsafe (L-type) replacement cable ($10). but this morning i got an e-mail from him saying he could meet anytime from 9am to 5pm, all i had to do was tell him when i could come and he'd send me the address. we settled on 11am, it'd take me about an hour to get to the south end (traveling by T as it was raining today). the address was 500 harrison street, a place my mother and i discovered when we went to the lamb jam back in may, so i knew the place.

i assumed it was a guy, but i couldn't really tell from the e-mail, and he didn't give me a name. some sellers are very forthcoming, while others keep a cautionary distance. this one was the latter. from the language i could tell it was a young person, because he dropped acronyms like "lmk". lmk? it took me a few seconds to figure out it was "let me know." in my own personal correspondences i rarely use acronyms, preferring to spell everything out. when i asked for a phone number in case i ran late, he offered some excuse that he was at work and they don't allow people to use their phones (although receiving e-mails seemed to be okay).

i was happy to note that 500 harrison street is close to chinatown, that i could do some asian supermarket shopping afterwards. the closest subway station wasn't south station but rather broadway station. the route was fairly simple, just a roundtrip on red line. if everything worked out fine, i could be back at home in 1-1/2 hours. i rarely travel beyond south station on the red line. i could probably count the number of times i took the T south of boston on my hands: in january 2016 i went to the jfk/umass station to buy a cablemodem, in april 2015 i visited fields corner to explore little saigon.

i can't recall ever being at broadway station before, or if i did, it was a long time ago, like the late 90's, more than 2 decades (or perhaps back in july 2001, when joel and i made a saturday of station hopping). when i arrived it took me a second to get my bearing. essentially i wanted to cross I-93, using the pine street inn tower as a beacon since 500 harrison street was just a few doors down. the area was dotted with luxury condos, though the rows of nearby train tracks revealed this region's industrial pedigree. i got onto the traveler street bridge and made my way west. there was a faint drizzle but nothing serious enough to warrant taking out my umbrella.

i arrived at 500 harrison street almost exactly on time. i sent my seller an e-mail as i waited in the building's lobby. he showed up downstairs a few minutes later. a white guy in his late 20's or early 30's, somehow i was expecting to see an asian fellow. he looked to be in the designer field, too well dressed and well groomed to be a software developer. he handed me the charger along with a length of extension cable. he then taught how me to wrapped the cable so the magsafe cord wouldn't get kinked and stressed. that's funny, because i was probably using a mac long before he was born (1986), but i humored him well intention. i paid him the $25 and concluded our transaction. i still never got his name.

so it didn't take me long: about 17 hours after i discovered the apple magsafe charger was broken, i had in my possession another working charger.

from there it was just a short 4 minute walk to ming's supermarket on washington street. i was there to look for bubble tea tapioca balls, the thing we couldn't find yesterday at the malden 88 supermarket. i looked everywhere but couldn't find them here either until i asked somebody and he pointed to a nearby shelf (next to all the packaged rice) that had a selection of different tapioca balls. the one i wanted was a large 1kg package of instant tapioca balls, which sells for $3.99 a bundle. i called my mother to confirm and bought 2. i went through the rest of the supermarket but didn't see anything worth buying so i paid and left.

by then the rain had picked up a little bit, but still not enough for an umbrella. i debated whether to get something to eat in chinatown, but the closest place i could think of (chinatown cafe) was a 7 minute walk, the same amount of distance that'd take me back to broadway station, so i decided to go home instead. i went down east berkeley street, passing by the large construction site (corner of harrison-east berkeley) where they're digging a pit to lay the foundation for a future mixed-use condo. i returned to broadway via west 4th street. i passed by one of those fancy condos and saw a many struggling to carry all his things into the building. i held the door for him, which actually seemed to scare him a little bit, as he murmured his gratitude. only later did i see he was carrying a bag of golf clubs. though the neighborhood is gentrifying, that area can still be a little sketchy, and the people who live there - though rich and fancy - still need to keep their guard up.

it was just 8 stops back to porter square. the rain continued, though a little drizzle at best. when i got back home, i heated up the scallion pancakes my 2nd aunt had made and cooked up a cup of make pot coffee. i ended up drying out the pancakes until they were just salty oily shingles. after finishing my coffee, it took just 10-15 minutes before i needed to use the bathroom.

the rain became increasingly heavier as the afternoon wore on. i spent the day listening to the patter of rain drops and the malfunctioning gutter dripping water outside. i did a load of laundry, really wanted to wash my bedsheets (feeling kind of itchy these past few weeks when i go to bed, keep on imagining bed bugs) but there wasn't enough room in the washer, i'll need to do another load. i love running the washer and dryer when the weather is cold because they warm up the house a little bit. i ended up just changing the sheets.

it was cold enough today that i busted out the tea for the very first time this season, some rooibos tea in my baking soda scrubbed clean contigo 16oz. travel mug. i was also hoping that the warm fluid will help clear up a bit of a phlegmy cough i've developed over the past few days.

my father called me in the evening to let me know he's tried recharging my old motorcycle battery with the desulfating charger and it seems to be working. he measured the battery initially and saw it only had 6V of charge (it's a 12V battery) but that's enough for the desulfator to work. he's hoping he can revive the battery back to its original condition.

my oneplus one android phone is unusable now. well, technically i can still use it, but the moment it powers on, it will begin to drain the battery and grow hot. it's not a battery issue because only the top of the phone gets hot, so its processor related. i ran the phone in safe mode and that didn't happen, so there's definitely something wrong with the software. i ran a malware detection app and it was able to remove a trojan horse, but i think the system's corrupt beyond saving. the only thing to do now is to reinstall the system. so i tried backing up my data using the helium app, but it was just too slow. most of the important data have already been backed up by google, i just need to copy any photos and then i can wipe the phone. i also made an inventory of the apps i've installed on the desktop. having to wipe the phone will give me the opportunity to install a new ROM, maybe lineageOS, since the cyanogenOS already installed hasn't been supported for years.

i had some chicken ravioli with pasta sauce for dinner.