my mother called me this morning, asked if i could contact her hospital and schedule a covid test 48 hours before she leaves for taiwan on march 22nd. her original plan was to get tested through cambridge which does walk-in testing at harvard square on sundays. but she wasn't sure if she'd be able to receive her test result in time, and figured an appointment in a hospital setting would be better. they'd obviously dealt with this before and i was able to book an appointment without any problems. the only issue is she leaves on tuesday, so she needs to get tested on sunday, and the nearest place opened on sunday is in kenmore square. good news is it's a drive-through appointment, so it should be fairly quick, and she's been that medical facility in the past.

i'm at a point now where i'm pretty much bageled out. not that i don't love bagels, but what i don't like is the cranberry walnut chicken salad i put on my bagel for lunch. it's just too sweet and lost its novelty compared to the first time i had it and thought it was most delicious thing. now i don't think that anymore. nevertheless, that's what i had for lunch. there's just enough for one more serving - i'll eat it tomorrow - and i'll finally be done with it.

i filed cambridge small business pandemic-relief grant paperwork for my parents today. it's the 3rd grant they've applied for. i've been collecting supporting documents over the past few weeks - utility bills, invoices, credit card statements, 2019 & 2020 schedule C profit & loss statements, etc. i finally had enough to send out the application online. whether they get the grant or not who knows, but worth a shot applying. the deadline is the end of the month.

i went out around 2pm. the weather today was very different than yesterday. yesterday we nearly hit 70 degrees, today we hovered around freezing (32). since my trek utility bike was temporarily busted (due to a flat wheel), i went to my backup fuji bike. i haven't been on that for a while, i was surprised the tires were still inflated, though i did pump them up a bit. i went to blick art materials in central square, where they sold for $3.12 a bottle, cheaper than staples (the only other place that carried it), which is $4.99. i needed rubber cement to patch up tires, since the bottle i currently (purchased april 2018) have has dried up. i haven't been in that store in a long time, not since it was still pearl's art supplies (closed in 2010). i noticed there was no longer access to the basement, all sealed up like you never knew this place used to be 2 floors of art supplies.

since it's not often i come to central square, and i didn't want to go home empty-handed (besides the rubber cement), so i pulled up my phone and ordered something with the mcdonald's app. they always have various deals, and i picked the 20 pieces of chicken mcnuggets for 50% off ($4). i walked my bike the few blocks to the store and locked it outside while i went in to grab my food, already paid for and waiting for me. i put the mcnuggets in an insulated bag which i remembered to bring and rode him via mass ave.

i went by michael's store, hoping to catch a glimpse of him, but his shop was closed. i wonder if it had anything to do with the situation in ukraine, i believe he has family there. i cut through the edge of harvard yard which turned out to be a mistake, as students were getting out of class and the streets were clogged with young people. in the future, avoid harvard square on the weekdays if possible.

back at home, i put my bike in the basement (it's going to snow all of tomorrow) then went inside the house to enjoy my mcnuggets. i'm old enough to remember when mcdonald's introduced their mcnuggets in the 80's. it was revolutionary, bite-size crispy chicken morsels made from indistinguishable chicken scraps, with various flavors of dipping sauce. i was allowed to choose 3 flavors, i went with: tangy barbecue, hot mustard, and sweet 'n sour. tangy barbecue is the best, hot mustard is okay, while sweet 'n sour wasn't that good. to be honest, i actually don't like mcnuggets all that much. given the choice, i prefer burger king's chicken tender, where you can actually tell it's chicken, and their barbecue sauce is much better. but in a crunch, i'll eat mcnuggets. i ate while watching another intro to nuclear engineering lecture. i ate half, saved the rest for later.

cambridge is lifting its indoor mask mandate march 14th, in less than 3 weeks. boston and somerville haven't decided yet, but they'll probably make a decision within the next week or so. i'm not sure how i feel about going maskless. i suppose it's evitable, we can't mask forever, but i've gotten used to it. wearing a mask also meant i didn't need to shave and look presentable. some people actually look better with a mask (while others look worse). plus, i also recently bought supplies of KN95 and KF94 masks. who knows, maybe there'll be another variant and yet another outbreak, and we'll be back to masking again in no time.

my mother called me soon after she got home, said her apple magic trackpad wasn't working, even after replacing the batteries. because she couldn't find a wired mouse, she had no way of controlling her imac, so she couldn't use it. i called her back a few times and she finally managed to connect the trackpad to the computer.

later in the evening i heated up a container of leftover chicken burrito bowl. i scooped out way more than i realized, must've warmed up 2 servings. in order to reconstitute leftover rice, i added about a cup of boiling water to moisten it all. it didn't look great (like a bowl of vomit, with bits of chicken and beans and corn) but it tasted good. however there was simply too much, and i only ate half, leaving the rest for tomorrow night.