at his house i found the door to the kitchen was open and the light was on but there didn't seem to be anyone around. i didn't want to just walk in, so i went back out to the sidewalk to wait. a minute later victor came out of his house to greet me. we both laughed, not knowing if the other person was going to hold up his end of the bargain. he invited me inside his house and made some coffee.
we chatted for a long time, to almost 9am, before we decided to do the tour after all. i found out - as i'd suspected - that he wanted me to take some photos of some historical places around harvard square. i learned a lot about him, his very complicated past as a political asylum refugee.
the rain instead of letting up got even heavier. i'd already had 3 cups of coffee on an empty stomach so i was amped up, ready to go. outdoor conditions were terrible, but terrible weather often adds drama to an otherwise boring photo.
it was nice to just walk around harvard square despite the rain, playing tourist even though many of the places we visited were familiar to me. always happy to have a chance to shoot some photos.
we finally got back home by 10:30am. victor invited me to his house for more coffee, i declined his generosity so i could get home and use the bathroom as the coffee was finally making its way through me. i didn't realize it was so late, i just assumed it was still early because i woke up so early. i took a quick shower, packed up my things, and went back out to harvard square again, this time to take the 73 bus into belmont. it was raining even harder by that point, i was afraid my backpack would get completely soaked.
i found my parents continuing with their thanksgiving cleaning. they decided it'd be easier if pansusu stayed at their place as well (instead of living at my place or binbin's empty burlington house), despite the the fact that tang tang was staying there as well this coming weekend, coming up from NYU for the holiday. we've never had anything stay at their place for thanksgiving, much less two different people, which puts a kink in the thanksgiving long weekend food sanctuary.
i didn't feel well after drinking so much coffee this morning, a combination of caffeine overload combined with an overall tiredness from the lack of sleep, like two opposing forces trying to tear me apart. it left me with a slight headache, like the kind i get from being motion sick.
i showed my father the american seller of the portable tent stove he wanted to get from taiwan then later china when he discovered the manufacturer. he ended up ordering a stainless steel version from the sichuan factory, but tracking showed it was delivered to guangdong before returning back to chengdu. regardless, he's now trying to cancel the order and buy from the american supplier instead. even though it's $20 more, the fact that it can arrive in less than week makes it a better deal than getting it shipped from china, which is very unreliable and requires a few weeks of waiting at least.
production was crap today, we didn't even make a single kWh of electricity. i waited the whole day for the late afternoon football game between the cowboys and the patriots. once ugly it was an ugly low-scoring game, new england scoring the least amount of points this season at just 13, beating dallas narrowly by a score of just 4 points. the cowboys had their chances, and the gave went down to the final second. i don't like these close games at all, too nerve-wracking. i miss those days when the patriots pull ahead by a big lead and i spent the rest of the game waiting for highlights. next sunday new england heads to houston to face the texans, who are currently 7-4 and are in the lead in the AFC south division.
during the start of the game i was helping my parents clear out my old bedroom (where pansusu will be staying) by taking all the desktop computers and related equipment down into the basement. a few machines we can probably toss (they were found units anyway, or purchased cheaply off of craig's list), they take up too much space.
when night came around we got a chance to see how the E12 LED bulb that arrived yesterday performed in one of the salt lamps. it wasn't as bad as when i had the bulb in one of my paper lantern lamps, it looks more white than blue. even though the bulb is advertised as 10W, we took a reading with the smart plug which said it was just 0.5W.
after dinner my father gave me a ride back to cambridge. it was still raining. the upstairs lights were on, meaning steve and paul were back at home. they owe me $60 for the gutter cleaning, i'm pretty sure i'll have to remind them to pay because they're not considerate enough to reimburse me without prompting first. they weren't that noisy (at least no tv noises) which makes me think that maybe only one of them was home. i look around for signs of their two cars tomorrow to verify my suspicion.
the highlight of the evening was the sunday night football game between the packers (8-2) and the 49ers (9-1). i support jimmy garoppolo but i'm now hoping they lose so the patriots can have the best record in football. it was a battle of titans, but it turned out to be a dud when san francisco scored 23 unanswered points in the first half. not many teams can come back from a deficit like that, but green bays is definitely one of those teams you never rule out. aaron rodgers managed to string together a long drive - helped in no small part to the officiating which kept penalizing 49er players - to score a touchdown and the 2 point conversion to bring the score to 23-8. but on the following possession, garoppolo threw a long bomb for an easy touchdown, bringing the score to 30-8 and firmly out of the packers hands. final score was 37-8, a game that green bay would like to forget as quickly as possible (they are still in the lead in their division though currently tied with the vikings, not sure how the tie breaks on that works).