weekends mean english premier league football on television. it was the southampton versus tottenham match. sandy came out of her room to use the bathroom but saw me watching and came to the living room to watch as well (she confessed she'd been watching the game in her room). while she's here, she's been an invaluable resource in understanding english football. she has to be since her older brother is a real manchester united fanboy and owns an extensive collection of football souvenirs (all currently housed in hong kong).

southampton is the town nexts to portsmouth where sandy lives, and only recently joined the premier league. this seemed to have revitalized the town, as it also coincided with a commercial renaissance. however, southampton still seems to be floundering at the end of the pack, and could be in danger of getting relegated to a lesser league should they find themselves at the bottom three by season's end. tottenham - pronounced "tot'em" - is currently 3rd, which means a spot in next year's champions league should they continue to hold their place. their team name is the hotspur, which sounds like a disease or a horse riding equipment, but it's actually an archaic word for a young rooster. tottenham also has the best english player on their team by the name of harry kane, with his perfectly coiffed hair. i ended up watching the entire game with sandy before finally biking out to belmont sometime after 12pm. tottenham lost, 1-2, but that puts southampton in a better position to survive demotion.

my father made me a bowl of ichiran ramen with an egg. ichiran (一蘭) is actually a name brand ramen chain in japan, and my parents even ate at one of their shops in canal city (hakata) when they visited japan for the first time last october. this particular package of ramen they purchased at a japanese 7-11 however. the noodles are straight instead of curly but they said the best part is the tonkotsu broth. ichiran actually has two stores in the US - both in new york city - midtown manhattan and brooklyn. a bowl of noodles will set you back about $20.

i went out into the backyard to check on the solar panels. they were clear but there was still a patch of melting snow in between some of the panels. while filling up a rabbit hole, i saw a dead frozen squirrel buried in the snow. how a squirrel could possibly die i'm not sure, since they have access to the suet feeder so it couldn't be because of hunger. i also pruned some of the maple suckers, but most of them are too tall to be within reach. i ended up embedding a bunch of wood shavings all over my jacket.

all signs were pointing to another record production day. we made 41.60kWh, which beat the previous record for this year at 41.38kWh set just 4 days ago. last march, we didn't break 40kWh+ until the 18th (44.69kWh). pretty much anytime from now until the start of summer, if we get a clear blue sky day, we can expect to break another record. the only thing worth tracking now is seeing if we can break the month record for march 2018, set on the 31st last year, of 46.54kWh.

i biked home after dinner. bringing up the topic of rent yesterday seemed to have finally given sandy the impetus to pay me tonight. it wasn't all of it though, and while i was counting the money, she told me that she'll give me the rest next month, since she's still here for about a week before finally leaving. from the set of unused disposable chopsticks on the coffee table, i knew sandy got some bonchon chicken for lunch today, which she also revealed she ate the rest for dinner.