i watched a young mother this morning pushing a baby stroller wearing a safety vest. that's not something you see everyday. what's even weirder is she had this big tablet holder mounted to the stroller handle and seemed to be preoccupied with her tablet instead of watching where she was going. then i saw her crouch down and stick something in the seam between the pavements. turns out she wasn't pushing a baby but instead taking measurements of the sidewalk. on the back of her vest it said, "tetratech," maybe they're doing an infrastructure survey.

i biked to market basket in the late morning to get some groceries. the two tires felt a little flat so i pumped them up before i left (75psi). i stopped to admire the harlequin glorybower bush on ivaloo street, now blooming. it's a name i have a hard time remembering. supposedly they're only hardy up to zone 7, but they seem to be doing fine here, in a shady northeast facing location.

i had some cereal for lunch while watching the news. i got some raisin bran because i wanted something healthy (and not too sweet), and went with the vanilla almond crunch for additional flavors. i noticed some shrinkflation on the box, 15.8 oz. instead of what i assume to be 16 oz. the breaking news was governor andrew cuomo resigning over sexual harassment allegations after mounting pressure. i don't know how i feel about that. i just recently read an article about LBJ and all his many mistresses. what LBJ did was way beyond what cuomo did, but had LBJ been "forced" to resign because of what he was doing, how would the course of US history been changed? at the same time, a truly great man wouldn't take advantage of others, and doesn't deserve to be a leader. how come it's always the democrats who have to clean house? why doesn't the republicans throw out some of their own garbage politicians?

after lunch i started making my second jar of sichuan paocai. this was a fresh patch, using a 5L fido jar, which is what i used to use before i got an authentic sichuan paocai jar.

as regards to brine portions, i followed the recipe of one of the last times i made fido jar paocai, which is 9 cups of water to 3 oz. of salt (ratio: 3 cups water to 1 oz. salt). i made the brine last night using the electric kettle to boil 1.5L of water (equals to about 6 cups) and left it to cool overnight. the star ingredient was of course the homegrown long beans. 12 bundles weight about 0.7 lbs. instead of adding them to the bottle of the jar, i added them in the middle, so they'd be easier to fish out later on. i didn't think all the vegetables would fit but they ended up fitting exactly. i then started scooping the brine into the jar one cup at a time. it ended up using 9 cups exactly. i then added a dash of baijiu before closing up the jar. i put the jar in a container in case it started to leak.

i cleaned my aquarium today. the last time was july 3rd, so about a month ago, which is better than my average of every 2 months. honestly, i should be doing weekly or biweekly water changes because of the amount of hair algae. the aquarium itself seemed clean otherwise, with the exception of a large clump of algae in the back near the filter. i did a full clean, scrubbing the glass with a magic eraser and changing the activated carbon. if i made more frequent water changes i wouldn't need to clean as often. but one of the best part of doing water changes in the summertime is the tap water is the perfect fish tank temperature, no need to playing with the hot and cold adjusters to get it just right.

i watched the suicide squad (2021) today. i went in with low expectations, but the more i watched, the more i enjoyed it. it's very woke: male and female soldiers fight together, full male frontal nudity (for a change), and they don't sexualize harley quinn (part of the reason is because margot robbie has so much clout now, the studio couldn't get away with exploiting her a second time). the big bad was refreshingly creative, the violence gleefully graphic and unabashed to the point of comedy. the chapter titles are also very creatively designed, there are so many tiny details, the film's a fun labor of love. and so many cameos from james gunn's other films!

for dinner i made a buffalo chicken salad sandwich with some readymade buffalo chicken salad i bought earlier. afterwards i ate one of the horned melons. they're surprisingly filling, afterwards i didn't have any urge to snack like i usually do.