my father was coming to pick me up because it was raining. i had about 30 minutes to pack up my overgrowth bean plants so they could be moved to belmont and transplanted in the backyard and then squeeze some fresh orange juice. while i was in my grow closet, i noticed some dry gravel trays and parched pots so i had to water them first. finally i got around to squeeze the oranges. normally it'd take me 20 minutes but i managed to do it in record time, 8 minutes to squeeze a dozen halves.

i had some savory pancakes for lunch dipped in a spicy soy sauce. my father had a bunch of wild tomato seedlings on the dining table. i thought he was just moving some seedlings from the muffin starter tray into pots, but instead of thinning them out, he was still transplanting them in clumps. later he'd snip off the extra seedlings with scissors, until i told him he could just easily pull out the unwanted seedlings. even with the extra pots that he found and made, there was still way too many seedlings. he made the rookie mistake of planting way too many seeds, and now faced the difficult task of thinning them out and realizing most of them will have to be thrown out.

later my father moved all the tomato seedlings to a makeshift plurple grow light stand in the bedroom. just for a few days, before the weather gets warm enough that he can either put the seedlings in the sunroom or outside.

by the early afternoon the rain had mostly stopped. i did a bit of flying with the drone, just to check out some spring scenery. i flew to 700 huron, which my RC signal usually drops down to just 2 bars because the building blocks the connection, but something strange happened today: i accidentally went a bit further out than usual, and i noticed my signal strength going back up to 100%. i didn't want to push too far and decided to turn back, at which point the signal dropped again. another interesting i saw when i was in the air were the apparent divisions in the trees. not just between trees, but within the branches of individual trees; somehow branches know not to overgrow into another branch space and keep their compact space. i probably won't be able to see this once all the leaves come out, but while they're in their current leaf bud phase, the clefts are very apparently.

my father and i went out into the backyard in the late afternoon. we were trying to figure out how much to expand the southern garden bed so we can grow beans and bitter melons. but then i figured out instead of expanding, we could just push in about 8 inches and grow in the existing bed. we hammered down 3 u-posts and my father tied up some bamboo poles.

the whole day i was refreshing the fedex tracking page when they notified me yesterday that my sister's godmother's HDTV would arrive today (sunday). but it seemed to be stuck in connecticut, and by day's end there was still no movement until the message on the page changed to "scheduled delivery pending". i also helped my parents sign up for a cambridge small business pandemic grant. they're not sure if they'll get it since they already received pandemic money in the past, but it doesn't hurt to try. also because the small business neighborhood outreach coordinator came to them directly with flyers about the grant.

i drove the car home after dinner because my sister asked me to drive her to her second moderna vaccine appointment in the morning. i was afraid i wouldn't be able to find any parking because there's street cleaning tomorrow, but not only was there a space in front of my house, but there was also a private street space, which i ended up taking because it doesn't involve parallel parking.

i watched the oscars tonight. out of all the movies nominated, i only saw promising young woman. chloe zhao won for best director and best picture. that's got me curious enough to want to see nomadland now. i was kind of shocked just how dowdy she was, no makeup, no-name dress, and sneakers. but that kind of casualness is actually kind of refreshing in the normally staid academy ceremony. i'm curious to watch nomadland to get an idea of how she'll approach marvel's eternals which she's scheduled to direct.