i woke up at 3:30am after having slept for about 2 hours to leave my house by 4am to go to my parents' place where we were scheduled to leave for the airport by 4:30am. that early in the morning, there was hardly any cars out on the road, i saw about 6. the most awkward part is waiting at traffic lights when the streets are completely empty. traffic lights in those places should adopt a flashing yellow/red at intersections in the wee hours of the morning, so people don't waste their time waiting. my parents already had their suitcases waiting by the front door when i arrived. while they went through the house making last minute checks, i set up the timers. i also turned off the furnace. if the temperature drops to the point where it warrants turning it back on, i will. but their furnace is one of those old fashion furnace that still burns oil even when it's not actually heating just to maintain the minimum temperature. i guess my rule of thumb is if i haven't turned on the heat at my place, i won't do it at my parents' either.

we left at 4:24am, my father driving. there was a bit more cars on storrow drive going into the city, a lot of people also heading to the airport. we arrived at logan airport terminal B by 4:45am. we could already see crowds of people inside the glass walls, with traffic jams of more people getting dropped off. after my parents removed their luggage, i got back in the car and returned to belmont.

one of my options was to drive back to cambridge, sleep in my own bed, then return to belmont later in the day to return the car. but when i left this morning, there was hardly any parking spots, and the spot that i vacated was already too tight for me to try and do a parallel park, so it was easier just to go back to belmont. i got back in under 20 minutes, even less cars leaving the city. i wasn't particularly sleepy, but crept into my parents' bed and read wall man manga on my phone. i called my parents an hour later to check on their status. they'd already checked in and gone through security, and was now waiting at their gate for their 8:15am flight. they were there way too early (3 hours), and there was no advantage since they couldn't pick their seats in advance but had to wait until the gate desk was opened, which wouldn't be until a hour before departure. when they checked in earlier, the only seats they could select was the flight from chicago to tokyo. boston to chicago and tokyo to taipei, they could only get remainder seats.

after having spoken with my parents, i decided to sleep a little after all. there was nothing to do anyway, and my plan of planting my garlic bulbs couldn't begin until the sun came out. i slept well, and as i had no obligations other than some gardening, i was in no rush to wake up. my sister interrupted my sleep around 10am with a text asking if i wanted to go hiking with her and her dog. i said no, said i was going to garden today. 30 minutes later i heard sounds in the house as they stopped by my parents' place while i was still sleeping. i decided to finally wake up, didn't want to waste anymore daylight, as there was a somerville street festival happening in the afternoon on somerville avenue that i wanted to check out.

i went into the backyard and started preparing raised bed 0 (RB0), the one closest to the back entrance, the smallest bed. it's where i grew my garlics this season, and i wanted to convert the entire bed to growing just garlic, with the possibility of some cucumbers on trellises and nasturtiums in the corners come next summer. there was currently still a large zucchini squash and some nasturtiums. i pulled the squash even though there were still a few baby squash; i figured this week there might be a killing frost, many of the leaves are already diseased, and it simply wasn't warmer enough for the tiny squash to mature. after pulling it out, i decided to get rid of the nasturtiums as well, so i could completely till the bed.

i dug out all the scallions, which i will plant back. these scallions aren't anything special, just remaining scallion roots we bought from the supermarket and replanted. they look nothing like store scallions, which are pencil thin. these are thick, like broom handles, more leek than scallion. also when i was tilling the soil i found a lot of garlic bulbs. they were already sprouting, so it made it easier to find. at first i thought they were hard neck garlics i planted last fall that i failed to dig out, but i think they're actually normal store bought garlics my father decided to plant for fun to see if they'd produce more garlic. i dug them all out and set them again to be replanted later.

i went to home depot around noontime to get some bags of manure for the bed. they seemed to have cleared out a lot of their garden supplies, and i couldn't find manure anywhere. even their outdoor plant department was just pots of chrysanthemums, nothing else. all they had in terms of soil additives were either bags of potting soil or garden soil. i put 2 bags of garden soil on my flatbed cart. i thought they were $8.50 a bag (1.5 cu. qt.) but when the guy rung me up, i saw they were only $6 a bag. so i decided to get 4 more for a total of 6. i also went inside to look for a miter box. home depot online said they had them in stock, when there was nothing when i went to the aisle/bay. i could've asked somebody for help, but decided not to waste time and try a different home depot later in the week.

back in belmont, after offloading the bags of garden soil into the backyard, i ended up emptying 2 bags of soil into RB0. the new garden soil was on the wet side and had a rotting smell which reminded me of manure. i mixed it with the existing soil to give it a drier consistency. i replanted the scallions back in their original spot. with the rest of the bed i started digging holes with my fist, about 2-3 inches deep and 6 inches apart. instead of rows, i did a honeycomb pattern. i thought i'd have a lot of red korean garlic cloves left, but i ended up using 6 bulbs, as each bulb only contained 6-7 cloves. i still have 5 more bulbs, which i will plant elsewhere (most like RB2). i read it's important to have light, fluffy soil so the garlic roots can have an easier time growing. after filling the bed, i still had a bit of room, so i separated some of the garlic bulbs i grew this season and planted the cloves. these are also hard neck (like the red koreans) but i don't know which variety. i also grew them from very small cloves, and they're not very big yet, although bigger than what they were before. growing garlic takes patience, as i won't be able to harvest these garlics until the summer, so it's going to take 9-10 months.

my sister was originally going to take hailey for a walk in the woods, but when i told her i needed a ride back to my house (otherwise i'd need to take the bus, and sunday buses run just every hour), she waited around until i finished with my garlic planting. i also planted some spring beauties (Scilla siberica) i bought from OSJL. and those regular garlic bulbs i found, i replanted them along the side of RB1 after sectioning it off and filling the "well" with fresh garden soil. my sister also helped me to fix the splitting corner on RB0 with a metal L-bracket.

i was finally finished by 2pm. my sister stopped by the cafe to pick up some refrigerated wild mushrooms to give to michael before finally dropping me off at home. it felt weird to be back, almost like i went away for several days, even though i was just here early this morning. it was cool in the house (65°) so i plugged in the aquarium heater. after using the bathroom, i left the house for the somerville street fair. i hadn't had breakfast or lunch yet, so i quickly ate a banana. there was a costume parade at 3pm i wanted to check out.