i went across the street this morning to score some boneless chicken thighs on sale at star market. they only had a single package, so i decided to go to the porter square store instead at some later date. coming back, i bumped into jack who was on his way to do some grocery shopping. i had some leftover homestyle zhajiang noodles for lunch when i arrived in belmont. after my parents got ready, we left for a waltham supply run by 12:40pm.

my father had an empty propane tank in the car to be refilled at the propane station in the VFW hall parking lot on beaver street. when we got there we saw a sign that said they were closed, and would only be opened on the weekends during the winter. when they proceded to the waltham costco. when we got out of the car my father realized he left his costco membership card at home. that's not a big deal because costco can issue a temporary card for members. unfortunately he also left his wallet, which included his driver license, so there was no way to verify his identity.

so instead of costco, we went to the waltham market basket. i returned some cans for deposit and went inside the liquor store to check out their selection of chinese baijiu. the layout of the waltham store is a little weird - i think that's because we always come in from the dairy side - not crowded - and finish in the produce department on the other side of the store - which is always very crowded.

next we went to OSJL. we drove a google route which used a bunch of side streets. it was confusing, and in hindsight, it would've been easier to use drive down main street and make a few simple turns to get onto river street.

i needed to get bird food at OSJL: a bag of sunflower seeds ($8) and a box of suet cakes ($10). i used a gift card that i got the last time i shopped at OSJL. it was given in error, and i wasn't even sure how much was on the card, which turned out to be $20. we returned home via another google route - this time more direction - from seyon to warren to belmont. the only tricky part was a weird intersection at the junction of seyon and warren.

once we got back i set up the birdfeeders. it's already january and i haven't even brought them out yet. just a few days ago i spotted a tufted titmouse in the backyard from the window. i'd never seen them at our feeders but hopefully by putting them out i can attract some. i may also want to set up the spare eufy cam so i can get a clearer view of the feeders in action.

my father was in the basement grow room pruning the plants and i went downstairs to help him water. i brought the two lemon verbena plants upstairs to live in the sunroom. they can survive the cold temperature in there but they will just lose their leaves as they become dormant for the winter. this is also to keep them away from the other plants, after i discovered some spider mites a few weeks back. with the other plants i can treat them with systemic pesticide, but because we use the verbena leaves for teas, i don't add any pesticide to them. i also brought down the fudingzhu osmanthus. it's most likely dead after losing all its leaves in a flourish of tiny flowers, but we'll keep in the basement for the time being just in case it might still be alive. finally, i switched location of the gardenia. it hasn't been doing well, looking very droopy and leggy. that's because my father pruned it a second time before we moved it into the basement, when it only needed a single prune after it finished flowering in late spring. i'm not hopefully we'll get any flower buds again this season. anyway, i moved the gardenia so it was closer to the two big LED grow lights. overall, i think the grow room could use another light. something to consider for next weekend.

we found a wooden plank and put it underneath the aeroponics container for better stability. i also trimmed the clear tubing water gauge so it can fit flush and flat against the tote. i then started filling up the bin. i had a 5 gallon bucket which i filled in the bathtub. the system needs 10 gallons of water to operate. i poured the 5 gallon into the container and marked the water level on the water gauge. at 5 gallons, it was just barely enough to submerge the pump. this would be the minimum. i then refilled the bucket and poured another 5 gallons of water into the container. i marked the gauge a second time. this would be the maximum. i then connected the PVC manifold to the pump and turned it on. it worked flawlessly, no leaks in any of the PVC connectors.

the 180° micro sprayers had a fan pattern, some more fan-shaped than others. the 360° sprayers had a less defined pattern, like the shape you'd get if you held a thumb over a garden hose. the only thing i'm worried about is how i positioned some of the sprayers, the center of the tank doesn't get sprayed. maybe i can fix it by adding more 360° sprayers. i think i'll leave it for now as sort of an experiment to see if the center plants do any worse. it wouldn't be too hard to change, i could caulk the original holes with silicone and drill new holes.

next i added the nutrients to the 10 gallons of water. the instructions for maxi-gro says to use 1-2 tsp per gallon of water. as the plants are still young (the seeds have even germinated yet), i'm going to give them less nutrients, and then increase the amount as they grow bigger. so i decided to add 10 tsp (3 tbsp and 1 tsp) of maxi-gro powder. i forgot maxi-gro comes with its own convenient scoop in the bag. i mixed the powder in a container first, tried to dissolve as much of it as possible. i wonder in the future if it wouldn't be better to dissolve it in some hot water first, as there were still a lot of undissolved powder at the bottom. just for kicks i decided to take a TDS (total dissolved solids) measurement of the concentrated nutrient solution. i think it went off the scale, because the meter said 2000 x10 ppm. earlier i also took readings of the tap water: pH 9, TDS 72ppm. once i added the nutrients, the 10 gallons of water now read pH 5.72 and TDS 675ppm. the optimal values for mustard greens are pH 6.0-7.5 and TDS 600-1000ppm. i found a different source (from india of all places) that said optimal values are pH 5.5-6.5 and TDS 600-1200 (EC 1.2-2.4).

i resoaked my clay LECA pellets. i had some in belmont but they weren't enough. some of them also had been used before, so there could be residual nutrients. i brought all my LECA from home to add to the pile. i tested the cycle timer to make sure it works. i'm using the 1 minute on 5 minutes off cycle.

so now i wait for my seeds to germinate before starting my aeroponics setup. the pH and TDS i used are for mustard greens. the requirements for celery (i couldn't find any info for chinese celery) are different: pH 6.5 but a TDS of 1260-1680ppm. apparently celeries are heavy feeders. so there could be a chance they don't do as well.

once it got dark, my father was in the kitchen making a prepackaged taiwanese ningxia stinky tofu broth. we had it a while back, but that time we added too much water which diluted the flavor. this time we didn't dilute as much, and also added more salt.

i headed back home around 7pm. just for fun i used the pixel 7 to take a photo of the orion constellation, which i could see peeking over the horizon. the results were pretty amazing for a hand-held shot: it resolved stars down to magnitude 6 (not visible to the naked eye in the light polluted suburb) and even a small smudge for the orion nebula. it also captured a plane flying across the sky, a blurry streak of lights and contrail. i wonder how much more details i can caputre if i used a tripod with a phone attachment.

that wasn't the only astronomy show. riding up huron avenue, i could see a large orange ball on the horizon. at first i thought it was one of those lighted led billboards, but it was way too bright and way too large. i stopped the bike and dug out my camera with the telephoto lens to get some clear photos, but it's a real challenge to capture: either the dark landscape is resolved but the bright moon completely overexposed, or the moon exposed correctly but the landscape completely dark. after a few minutes i gave up.

there was a bulls-celtics game in boston. celtics lead for 3 quarters, but the bulls made a push in the 4th quarter to make it interesting (got as close as 101-99 with 30 seconds to go). but boston clamped down and managed to win the game in the end.