i installed macOS catalina onto a USB thumb drive today. unlike big sur, it successfully installed, even though i was worried from my many failed attempts at installing big sur. still not satisfied with this option, 
i tried booting up with the big sur installed thumb drive again. like before, it started up fine, but once it reached the midway point, it wouldn't progress any further. i did some more research, i haven't found any info of users successfully installing a working bootable version of big sur onto a thumb drive (other than a boot installer version, 
which isn't the same as a working OS). there's a possibility that big sur just won't run from a thumb drive, and apple has no incentive to fix the issue on OS 11 (big sur) when they're already on OS 13 (ventura). but at the very least i had a working bootable copy of macos catalina on a thumb drive. later i went online and download the digital version of the 2022 H&R taxing software for the mac. it was only 35MB and costs $35 (not including taxes).
since i've been running my machine non-stop doing these long installs, i decided to do a time machine backup. i was surprised that the last time i backed up was in late october, 5 months ago, so i was overdue. backup files showed that i attempted to do a backup in late november but never completed it. i left the mac to run time machine while i did other things.
it was time to set up my grow closet. i had those heavy duty 3/4 size germination trays which fit perfectly on my adjustable shelves, 3 trays per shelf. i have 3 shelves, and each tray can hold a dozen 16oz clear cups, for a total of 108 plants. these are the larger plants; for smaller seedlings (like for flowers), i start them in 2x2" cell packs, which i have plenty of, and those i'll probably germinate outside on the deck since they have a clear cover. i casually sorted through my seed packets, combining what i had at home with what i brought back from belmont. for some reason my lupine seeds have gone missing again. i emptied all the containers from the closet shelves to make room for my eventual seedlings. i stacked the boxes behind my sofa.
in the afternoon, when the sky started to clear up and the sun started peeking out behind clouds, i walked down to the dollar tree to pick up some clear 16oz. cups i use for planting pots. i ended up buying some regular pots, some 9-cups food containers, plant dishes, and candy. as for the cups? they only had the solid variety, i don't think they sell the clear kind anymore. i use the clear because i can tell how much i've watered and check out the progress of the root growth. i'll look for cheap clear cups elsewhere, if all else fails, target carries them though slightly more expensive.
in the late afternoon i had som homemade tzatziki and pita as a snack. the tzatziki i made last week was still good. time machine was still running from since this morning, but i could still use the computer in the meantime.
my mother called me, said there was going to be a big grubhub delivery order tomorrow. there was actually one last wednesday, but the customer cancelled last minute for some reason. but he ordered again yesterday (for wednesday delivery) except we weren't opened so nobody saw the scheduled order. he called today just to confirm the order went through, that's how my parents knew about it. it's a big chunk of change, enough to be a single day's profit with just one online order.
for dinner i heated up a brick of lasagna while watching the celtics-wizards game. celtics fell behind in the first half and i had a bad feeling about it. wizards put the celtics in a 20 point hole beginning of the second half and boston had zero answer. at one point the celtics were down almost 30 points. that's when mazzulla swapped out all the starters for bench players. the bench guys actually went on a streak, and almost got the game to within single digits, before the wizards went back up to 20+ points. at this point i'm resigned to the fact that boston will advance no farther than the 2nd seed.
when it came time to throw out the trash, i finally cleaned my sichuan paocai jar. i started that batch back in early september; by late october the cabbage had already turned soft and wasn't that good anymore. yet i couldn't bear to throw it out, and kept it still. the final straw was when a layer of kahm yeast started forming on the surface of the paocai. if i ever make sichuan paocai again, i have to remember to eat it quick and not wait months.
by late evening the time machine backup was still in the "cleaning up old backups" stage, so nearly 10 hours. i ended up stopping it so i can get some work done. i'll probably run it overnight to see if i can get it to back up.
i couldn't stand it anymore: staingate was getting too much, i could barely see through my macbook pro screen. i'd read about a way to clean the fading laminate using toilet bowl cleaner, but i looked up methods online, and all it takes is just simple listerine and a microfiber cloth. so i tried it, figured i had nothing to lose. sure enough, with some elbow grease, slowly but surely the laminate all came off, revealing a clean screen once more. it's actually so easy, i'm surprised apple doesn't mention it as an official fix to staingate. but i guess that would mean admitting they made a design error, which they probably don't want to do.