first stop was everett, where my mother went to dollar tree to pick up a few additional essentials before their vacation, but really just to score some cheap yarn. i checked and this store still carried colored 16 oz. plastic cups, so i picked up a few for next season. next we went to nearby michael's. my father and i were looking for foam sheets to seal the grease trap (not sure if it'd work, but work a try), while my mother had another chance to score more yarn. the lone cashier would only take cash paying customers, funneling everyone else to self-serve stations. i for one am not a fan of self-serve check-outs, but it seems to be the ongoing trend, despite eliminating jobs and making it easier to steal.
finally we went to costco. it was crowded, but a lot of people were leaving, and we found a parking spot right in front of the store. the checkout lines were long, but by the time we went to pay, they'd shrunken significantly. my father asked me to check out the greenworks pro electric mower on sale for $500 (down from $600). 80v and comes with 2 batteries (4Ah and 2Ah). later i researched the mower online, i still prefer the EGO mower (LM2114, $450), rated at 56V but with a 6Ah battery.
instead of going to market basket, most of what we needed we could find at the medford aldi's. they had scallions and baby cucumbers, two of the handful of fresh ingredients we need to buy every week. originally we were just going to carry everything in a grocery bag, but we ended up buying so much that i had to get a shopping cart.
from medford we got onto I-93 south from assembly square. google maps told me there was traffic delay on the highway from an accident, but it was still the fastest way to get to south boston. we made good time, never had to stop, arrived at foodpak (baifu) a bit before noontime. normally there'd be crowds of homeless and drug addicts, but the area was unusually empty, maybe because of the rain. after we parked though, we could see through the locked chain link fence that a new tent city had formed on atkinson street.
from foodpak we got mostly bulk supplies: a case of boba, a box of pickled mustard greens, bags of rice. it wasn't very busy today, which could be because most asian restaurants on opened on sundays. i'd imagine they'd be busier on mondays, when most asian restaurants are closed.
after that we cut through south boston to get to c-mart. here too it wasn't very crowded judging by the handful of empty parking spots (normally it's very difficult to find parking). after we finished paying, while leaving the parking lot, i noticed a blue SUV. turns out it was a new 2023 maserati levante GT, which sells for $97k. that it was casually double parked in the lot that anyone could just side swipe it was a little surprising. it's a terrible car, only gets 16mpg on the city on 22mpg on the highway. but for someone we can afford it, gas prices is probably not a concern.
we finally left chinatown's outskirts by 12:50pm, headed back to cambridge through back bay. we were blocks away from copley square, where the greek parade would begin at 1pm. if it wasn't rainy today, i would probably be here to take photos. driving along storrow drive, we made it to the cafe by 1:10pm.
after unloading the supplies, we returned to belmont, 1:40pm. i took a quick tour of the wet backyard. some of the lilacs had already bloomed. i didn't bother checking the rain barrels: they were nearly full from last weekend, but after today's deluge, they would all be at maximum capacity.
for lunch we had some toasted croissants smeared with bitter orange marmalade. afterwards we all had a cup of instant noodles, trying out the various flavors my parents bought from costco, to see which ones they want to take with them on their vacation as late night snacks.
NBA playoff games were airing during the afternoon; i didn't think they'd be on until this evening. the heat-knicks game as already in progress, that was the one game besides the celtics matchup that i wanted to watch. i really like the heat, they have a great underdog story, and i hope they can go the distance, if the celtics can't somehow advance. knicks had the lead in the first half, but in the 3rd quarter the heat outscored the knicks 31-20, and that was enough for them to maintain the lead and eventually win the game 108-101. jimmy butler rolled his ankle (it was painful to watch the replay, his foot bent inwards nearly 180 degrees), but was still in the game in the final minutes, as a decoy more than anything else, since he had zero mobility. out of all the heat players, he was the one guy they couldn't afford to lose. hope he gets all the treatment, not sure what will happen to the zombie heat in game 2. maybe they rest him for one game, so he can have time to recover.
the second game of the day was between the warriors and kings, game 7 in sacramento. the game was competitive until the second half, and the kings had the lead going into half time. but then the wheels fell off for sacramento. they had the same "disease" which occasionally plagues the celtics, which is relying on 3-pointers that were falling, and not rebounding. while the kings kept missing, the warriors kept scoring (and outrebounding). it was painful to watch, all that hard work wasted for the kings because nobody wanted to go to the rim, or score some other way besides desperation threes. warriors won 120-100, will face the lakers.
my father made a shrimp stirfry using a packet of lee kum kee tomato garlic prawns sauce. he asked me to search where he can buy more online, but i didn't get a lot of hits. it was okay, but after having tasted high-heat wok-fired shrimps, i can never go back to normal shrimp that's simply cooked over a regular stove.
my father gave me a ride home after 7pm. it was still raining, now a steady stream of rain. the rest of the night was spent listening to the patter of rain on windowpanes and against the side of the house.
i did some grow closet maintenance tonight. i'm down to 2 grow shelves now, after i moved most of the grown seedlings to belmont. a few pots were still empty, while some others had extra seedlings. i took care of the extra seedlings first. they were some peppers, some eggplants, and some thai basil. instead of simply thinning them out, i careful dug out the extra seedlings and replanted them in their own pots. as for the empty pots, none of the 3 habaneros i planted germinated. i actually replanted them a 2nd time, filling each pot with several habanero seeds, but no activity, which is proof that those dud seeds. i reused those pots for transplanting extra seedlings. 4 more empty pots contained 2nd seed germination attempts for 2 blue beans, 1 hyacinth bean, and 1 squash plant. i replanted 1 blue bean, 2 squashes, a 1 bitter melon.
i watched game 7 between the panthers and bruins. bruins was up 3-1 before the panthers tied the series to force a decisive game 7. boston was down in the first two periods, 1-2, but came back in the third period to take the lead 3-2. however with less than a minute to go in regulation, florida scored a goal to tie it and send it into overtime. hockey invented the sudden death overtime, as unfair as it may be, and the first team to score would win. which was exactly what happened to the panthers. i'm just glad i'm not a hockey fan because i'd be devastated, especially after the bruins set an NHL record for the most wins in the regular season. on a purely selfish note, with boston's stanley cup chances over, now the local sports news can all focus on the celtics playoff run.