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today was day 2 of the heatwave. i slept with the window open last night after moving the trash cans in renee's alleyway so the dripping from the upstairs air conditioner doesn't tap on the trash cans the whole night. i got up around 9:30am and went outside to look for the instant pot my father was supposed to deliver on his way to market basket for some supplies. i didn't see anything so i came back in, but as soon as i did that, i saw my father's car pull up to the street. not only did he drop off the instant pot, but two empty storage bins as well as two boxes of boba bars.

there wasn't time to rest this morning as i had errands to run. first i went down to the community garden to water my plants. once again, lynn was there as well tending to her garden. i ended up using the other hose. afterwards we chatted about our plots. it was hot, we were both sweating, and she told me she better get back to her gardening before she burned up.

next i went to the UPS store to return the pair of wireless earbuds. normally i can just scan the return item, but because these have lithium ion batteries, they're considered a hazard so i had to package them up and have them shipped to a special place.

finally i went to market basket to get some groceries. i could've gone with my father earlier, but i didn't know what i wanted to buy yet. i decided to make some chicken caesar salad for dinner and assembled the ingredients.

once i was back at the house, i didn't leave the rest of the day other than to throw out the trash. temperature was in the mid-90's, and if i didn't need to be outside, i shouldn't be outside. naturally i had the air conditioner on. i always run it in energy save mode, which i think actually wastes more electricity because i noticed it doesn't run very cool. only when i switched to normal cool did i really start to feel the cold. even then, it never got below 80 degrees inside my house despite running the AC for most of the day. i'd have the AC on for a few hours, then turn it off to take a break. once the temperature got back up to 83-84 degrees, i turned on the AC again.

frances has started to buy things again for me to ship to her in oslo. it all started with special extra wide shoes for hans, but then today a slime kit package arrived on my doorstep, along with a giant (and heavy) box of candies and cheetos.

the results of the soil test we made back in late april finally came in today. apparently my plot has either the 2nd or 3rd highest lead level in the garden with 128 ppm. the optimal range is less than 22 ppm, which means just barely a trace of lead. it may sound bad, but the acceptable lead level to be deemed safe is less than 600 ppm, so i'm still well below that limit.

my mother called me, asked me to go with her to the foot doctor tomorrow morning so i can act as translator. she said she'd come pick me up at 9am and told me to go to sleep early.

when evening came i made my chicken caesar salad. i grilled 2 large chicken breasts in the pan instead of the foreman grill. i've found although that foreman grill is convenient, it wastes a lot of the meat juices and it's easy for the the chicken to end up too dry. grilling them in the pan - although more of a hassle, preserves the juices. i also tried some of the mio sweet tea liquid water enhancer ($3). it did taste like sweet tea, but having tried the 4C half & half (ice tea & lemonade) water enhancer, i prefer the 4C more. the mio just has a mellow sweetness, while the 4C has an acidic bite to it which i like better.

i ate dinner while watching game 4 between the bucks-hawks. despite missing trae young due to injury, atlanta was the more dominant team tonight and had the lead for most if not all of the game. the bucks were starting to make their comeback play in the second half, until giannis antetokounmpo hyper-extended his left knee and fell to the ground in pain. he was out for the rest of the game, flying back to milwaukee and geting some tests tomorrow to see the extend of his injury. the shock of losing giannis was too great for the bucks to overcome, and the hawks extended the lead to 20+ points. this is terrible, this was supposed to be the bucks year, especially after beating the nets. if they don't win the finals this year, will they be able to get as far next season? this is probably good news for phoenix though; with a crippled hawk (no trae young) and bucks (no giannis), their path to winning the finals is that much easier now, provided they beat the clippers, which might happen as early as tomorrow night.