i left my half sour pickles in the sink last night, afraid they might explode and create a big mess. when i woke up, i saw liquids continue to leak out from the pressurized jar. i unscrewed the lid to burp it, then capped it back up to give it a good shake. that's when i noticed something: a few of the pickles were showing blue spots. what's weird was it wasn't at the floating tips, which aren't completely submerged, but instead on the other other ends, the part that's in the brine.

i fished out one of these blue pickles, cut off the blue end, and gave it a taste test. it had that fermented carbonated fizzle, plus plenty of flavors from all the spices i added. i could also taste the cucumber rawness, maybe a longer ferment will get rid of any cucumber taste. it was crunchy, but for whatever reason the cucumbers i used had a hollow center, while i'm used to pickles with a soft and seedy middle. nevertheless, i felt a little weird eating it, because i wasn't sure what the blue coloring was. mold? bacteria? botulism? i ended up storing the half sour pickles in the fridge to stop the fermentation.

later i went online and did a search for "pickles cucumber blue color" with the hopes of finding out the answer. turns out it's perfectly safe, it's a natural byproduct of fermenting garlics, something to do with garlic's sulfur chemicals reacting with acids from the fermentation. i read one way to prevent this is to use distilled water, since it doesn't contain trace elements (like copper) that helps facilitate the reaction. another method i found was to use fresh garlic, as older garlics have more isoalliin that causes the bluing.

when i got to belmont, i helped my father erect the toppled trellis in raised bed 3 (RB3). it'd been overgrown with non-flowering morning glory and moonflower vines, along with hyacinth beans. it just got too heavy, or maybe caught the wind in a bad spot, and the bamboo poles splintered.

my mother called us inside for lunch. i had some leftover chinese dumplings. i also tried some of the hyacinth beans my mother gave my 2nd aunt who stir fried them. i don't think hyacinth beans are good eating (not compared to long beans), i grow them more as an ornamental and to collect the distinctive black and white bean seeds.

i collected some seeds today: hollyhocks, rudbeckias, chinese aster, and mustards. afterwards i prepared RB1 and placed a row of daikon radish seeds in the back, and sprinkled a bunch of japanese red mustard seeds in the front. we used seeds we harvested directly from RB0, where japanese mustards continue to grow non-stop, though my parents haven't really used the leaves for anything because they're just too spicy.

my sister came to collect hailey after she and my 2nd aunt closed the cafe after 4pm.

for dinner my mother made a simple stew used frozen lions head meatballs. channel 4 and 5 had college football, channel 15 broadcasted golf, so the only channel with the evening news was channel 7. big news today was mayor kim janey endorsing michelle wu to be the next mayor.

sunset is earlier and earlier these days, tonight being 6:36pm. i knew there'd be rain overnight so i went outside to check the rain barrel gauge to see how much water we still have left (nearly half). i also saw that squirrels had dug up RB1; probably not to eat the seeds i planted earlier, but rather to bury food for the coming winter. i'll put some chicken wire mesh over it tomorrow to keep the squirrels away. i also got a chance to see a full moonflower. they have a nice scent if you get close enough, but probably stronger on warm summer nights, when they're supposed to be blooming, instead of early fall.

i got back home by 7pm. my usual parking spots were taken, and i didn't want to take a spot by the curb because it'd be too tempting for someone to attempt to parallel park in the space left over (bashing my motorcycle in the process), so i went down to the end of the street and parked in my emergency spot. there's a forecast for torrential rain overnight but i didn't bother covering up my motorcycle.

i was following the red sox game against the yankees. new york was 2 games behind boston yesterday, but they won last night, 8-3. boston was winning today and were up 2-1 in the 8th inning with 2 outs, but the relief pitchers kept walking guys to load the bases, only to have it end in a demoralizing grand slam. red sox lost, so now they're tied with the yankees for the first wild card slot. boston is playing is terribly, even if they make it into the post-season, they're not going to go the distance. luckily we have football to watch.

apple+'s foundation series came out this weekend, i managed to download the first 2 episodes. i've never read any books in the series (or anything written by asimov), but it was always a bookstore staple in the scifi section. the first episode did its job, ending with a spectacular crash of a sky elevator as a result of a terrorist attack. as whether or not if it'll be the next game of thrones as apple is hoping for, that's harder to say, but the episodes look amazing, given apple's deeper pockets than HBO.