since my last visit about the same time last year, GBM has expanded: they bought the tires dealership next door and turned it into their service/repair department. the expansion was recent, right before the coronavirus shutdown. the service office still looked brand new, like it was just painted, hardly anything inside except a bank of registers. a folding table was placed by the door, a sign said only one customer could come in at a time. the woman i spoke to earlier beckoned me to enter. she asked how i wanted to pay for the inspection ($15). cash, i said, but added i could also do credit card if that was more convenient. so we did it with credit card, i read the numbers to her from across the room. she gave me back my registration and receipt, and said a mechanic would be right with me.
a minute later somebody came out. this mechanic wasn't wearing a mask, so i gave him some space to work. he pumped the brakes, checked the horn, turned on the lights, and passed me by putting a new inspection sticker on my license plate. just like that i was done!
instead of going home, i took a detour and went to my parents' place first. my mother was out taking her walk while my father was in the backyard setting up the scaffold by RB4 so there was a wooden shelf for some jasmines. he said the area by RB4 actually gets the most sun compared to any other place in the backyard. as for the scaffold, he sanded off the rust and repainted everything in a white primer. i suggested we just make a simpler lower platform with our wooden planks and some bricks and get rid of the scaffold.
my mother returned home by the time i was about to leave. i updated my parents on when kevin was moving out (june 10th is when the current tenant leaves, 11th is when the professional housecleaners come to clean the room, 12th seems like the most likely move date), told him to only pay me for the 2 weeks that he's here even if there's a few additional days. they suggested he pay in full (whole month), and i can split the difference with my parents once he finally moves to my grand uncle's upstairs apartment. my mother was going to make me some lunch, but i said i had a lot of stuff i needed to finish eating back home otherwise they'll go bad.
that other stuff turned out to be a bunch of avocados. i made avocado toasts on my own for the very first time. besides one avocado, i also added some chopped garlic and a drizzle of olive oil, per my mother's instructions. the whole wheat bread i got yesterday from star market, toasted two slices. it was just like my mother's avocado toast, although i wonder if i shouldn't add a pinch of salt to make it more savory, or maybe drizzle some hot honey. i washed it down with some cold ice tea, my new drink of choice now that the weather is turning warmer.
the weather was so nice i couldn't stand to be indoors. around 2:30pm i told kevin i was going out for an hour, and ended up biking to the memorial drive trader joe's to look for some incan corn. there was a short line, only a few minutes of waiting. an attendant by the entrance gave you a courtesy squirt of disinfecting gel if you wanted it. they don't seem to carry the incan corn anymore, so i ended up getting some snacks (wasabi seaweed, spicy dried mangoes, rice crackers).
next stop was the allston 88 asian supermarket (now the hong kong supermarket). i went a new way where i crossed the BU bridge and rode west on commonwealth avenue until i hit 88. i haven't been here in a while, not since GC was my roommate and i brought him here for some lunch followed by some shopping. the food court was still opened, though only a few shops were operating. there was no customers, the employees were all napping and seemed bored. they reorganized the supermarket a little bit, rearranged the aisles, made it more cramp it seemed, but seemed to better stocked. not so much in terms of produce but everything else. i bought a few things, including what they called "honey tangerines" (5/$4) but what my mother calls "ugly fruit" oranges.
coming home, i continued west until i hit harvard avenue, and went north on my usual route back to harvard square and home. the weather was so nice it seemed to have given me an extra boost of endurance and i felt like i could pedal all day and not get tired. i finally returned home by 4:30pm, catching kevin just as he was about to take a rare step outside, going out for a run.
i figured i had half an hour of privacy before he returned home, so i went to go use the bathroom before taking a shower. like clockwork, he came back at exactly 5pm. although he was covered in sweat, he didn't bother taking a shower to clean up. i shuddered over what it meant in terms of smells, but kevin keeps it clean for the most part (other than peeing on the floor, which he did twice today), so i wasn't too worried, even though i found the practice disgusting. i was just happy he left the house for a change.
another near perfect production graph (53.63kWh) even though we're 2kWh off from the record. the sky this morning was a deep cobalt blue because of how dry and sunny it was. a typical clear summer's day has a milky look to it because of the humidity. i'm not sure if we're going to achieve another record day but 50kWh+ is not too shabby. i predict our graph won't get any higher, but will expand horizontally and make up the difference that way.
i finished the last of my fried chicken around 6pm, the same time kevin was making dinner, just a wing and a piece of thigh. i was going to make some chicken broth rice noodles for later, but i wasn't the least bit hungry by that point, so decided to use up my rotisserie chicken tomorrow night instead.
i've been spending some time retroactively updating old posts for may. i still got 6 days that needs to be filled in, it's a slow process but the sooner i finish the sooner i can erase the photos off of my computer.
i thought kevin went to bed around midnight but he woke up at 1:30am to use the bathroom. i usually don't like to go to sleep until he does first. this way i can check that he didn't leave the bathroom faucet dripping or if there's any pee on the floor. also as i've mentioned previously, i can use the bathroom in peace knowing that he isn't waiting to use it.