i have experience fixing all aspects of a toilet, from replacing the supply line shutoff valve, to changing the fill valve (2009, 2018), to removing the tank and putting in a new flush valve (2019), so i had a pretty good idea what needed to be done. the problem was the tank was no longer filling up with water. there was an obstruction, and the most likely culprit is the rubber washer on the shutoff valve had fallen off, blocking the pipe.
after turning off the water main and letting the water drain out from the sink, i started to empty the water from the toilet tank. flushing got rid of most of the water, but there was still a little bit left that had to be sopped up with a sponge into a bucket. 
i then disconnected the supply tube from underneath the toilet tank. i ended up removing the whole supply tube to check if anything was stick inside (there wasn't). i then released the handle of the shutoff valve. sure enough, it was missing the washer. my father ended up digging out the missing washer from the valve assembly. to repair it, we removed the handle from a new shutoff valve and attached it onto the old assembly (which was still soldered to the supply line). we reattached everything and i went down into the basement to turn on the water main.
the blockage was still there. not only that, but for some reason the new handle wasn't pairing up correctly with the old assembly, and we couldn't shut off the water. after turning back off the water main, my father put back the old shutoff handle, just switched the rubber washer. with the water main turned back on, the blockage was still there, but at least now we were able to turn off the water into the toilet.
that could only mean one thing: the toilet fill valve was broken. fortunately we also had that part, and it was a simple matter of replacing it, which took all but a minute. i used a pair of plumber pliers to loosen the plastic lockring holding the hold fill valve in place before putting in the new one. i didn't even need tools, the new plastic lockring underneath the toilet tank was designed to be tightened by hand.
when we turned on the shutoff valve, it suddenly started filling up the tank. the toilet was working again!
before i left, my godmother (who was at the cafe, along with my 2nd aunt, for their little knitting circle with my mother) asked me to change the time and calendar in her subaru forester because she recently had her car battery replaced and it reseted everything in her car. my father and i went to go take a look, it wasn't that obvious, i had to consult a youtube video that showed me the setting to adjust the clock was actually located on the steering wheel itself, not the center console.
my father gave me a ride back to my house, i stashed my bike in the back of the car. he came to pick up the wooden planks i got from renee.
it was warm enough today (68°F) that i opened a few windows when i got back home, because it was still 63°F inside my house. i wanted to go down to the pharmacy to see if could get a flu shot but forgot, i'll try to do that tomorrow.
the bio-flow stick didn't seem to work, because the bathtub was still slow draining this morning. when i took another shower in the evening, plunged the tub a little bit and suddenly it was back to draining fine again. i'm not sure whether the bio-flow had anything to do with it, or was it the plungers, or a combination of both. i'll have to see how long this lasts before it starts slow draining again.
i didn't have dinner until around 10pm, just heated up a can of soup, trying to eat up some of the items i got during the height of the pandemic back in the spring. i added some frozen spinach and chopped up some carrots for some added nutrients.
when i went to go throw out the trash, i saw a pile of computer parts stacked in front of my house, obviously the work of renee. i saw something that caught my attention right away, i tried not to be too excited as i finished bringing out the trash cans.
it was a macintosh SE! my first macintosh was a macintosh plus back in 1986. i was very angry with my father when he told me he gave it away to xiaoxu without asking me first, who collects antique radios and would be interested in an old mac. i still have other macs, including a quadra 700, and various other iterations that still used a floppy drive, but the mac plus had that classic mac shape. this one was an SE, a more advanced version of the classic mac. it had 2 floppy drives, but this one was fitted with a 20MB internal hard drive (which takes up one of the floppy drive slots). the original price for this machine was $3900. it belonged to renee because her name and her husband were scratched into the case (which i covered up with a piece of electrical tape). the plastic housing was also very yellow from age, but nothing that can't be fixed using retr0bright.
there was also an old keyboard and mouse on the sidewalk, but they looked too dirty so i didn't take them. i also didn't take another mac that was out there, an LC, since i have no use for it. there was no power cable but i have plenty of those and after cleaning up the SE, i fired it up just to see if it could still run. it flashed the floppy disc icon with a question mark, meaning it couldn't find a startup disc. the slot with the internal hard drive was flashing though, but there could just be no system on that one. i have old mac system discs, so that's not a problem. but at least i know it still runs.
later in the evening i went outside and got the keyboard and mouse (ADB port versions). though dirty, i could clean them up easily, wouldn't need to dig through my old computer parts to find a matching keyboard and mouse. the keyboard is an appledesign keyboard (M2980, introduced in 1994, alps dome with slider version), not the more sought after (mechanical) apple extended keyboard (the SE originally came with the AEK). the bottom of the mouse still shows the original biege color. i wonder if renee didn't also put out an AEK but somebody already took it, knowing right away what a find it was. that could also explain the missing power cables.
finally, it was foggy tonight. fog is something we don't see much of in these here parts, so it's always a treat when we do have it. i couldn't resist taking some photos (2:30am) of the freaky weather, was almost tempted to go outside and walk around if it wasn't so late already.