on tuesday mornings i run. i got up by 8am and was out the door before 9am. i timed it that way so when i got back, lauryn will have already gone to the office. now at the tail end of summer, the weather isn't as hot anymore, with temperature in the 60's and a crystal clear blue sky. after crossing the JFK street bridge, i stopped to take a photo of a tree i glanced in passing last thursday. it had unusually large fruits, which at first i thought was some variety of crabapple. but later when did some searching, turns out it's a type of wild pear. i'll try one later in the season when they're fully ripe but i get the sense they'll be hard and astringent, great for jams, not so much for raw eating. coming back, i also revisited the avon-shephard silk tree. it really does have a nice odor, not overpowering, reminiscent of a pleasant undefinable soap fragrance.

i didn't bother going to the community garden since i planned on going later in the afternoon. instead i went straight home after the run. i got back a few minutes before 10am and lauryn was still home. so finally left by 10:10am before i hopped into the shower.

so i started thinking about this last night, and then all throughout my run this morning. my molar - the one that was causing the debilitating toothache last weekend - no longer hurts anymore. in fact, it's pretty much returned to normal, i can even chew with it now and not hurt. i even tried mashing my gum on that side, trying to get an reaction, but there was none. so that made me think: maybe i don't need to pull it just yet? what if i just left it there? would it be causing any damage? so i called doctor huang to ask him for advice but i only got his voicemail. by then i already knew what i'd decided, so i called doctor chan's office and cancelled the appointment for tomorrow morning. i'm going to keep the tooth for the time being, so long as it isn't hurting. once the pain comes back, i think it's an easy appointment to get it pulled, and then start the process of installing an implant. so all that teeth drama, after having seen 3 different dentists, and i'm back to where i started, tooth back to normal again.

i called my mother to let her know my decision. because i wouldn't be going to chinatown tomorrow, i decided to go today, for two reasons: get some braised duck for my mother, but also some portuguese egg tarts for jeff. i asked my mother if she needed anything else, but i'd just visited ming's market monday morning to get some supplies. i left by 11am, getting to chinatown around 11:30am.

first stop was hong kong eatery, to buy half a braised duck (鹵水鴨 $20 not including taxes). for some reason it took them a long time to prepare the duck, i waited over 15 minutes. after that i went to top bread next door for the portuguese egg tarts, which i've gotten before. they're just $1.70, so i got 4 for jeff, and 6 for my mother. i also picked up a few additional pastry items. it took me a long time to pack everything into my rear baskets. i brought towels to line the bottom, so the egg tarts wouldn't get jostled if i rode over a bump. i finally left by 11:50am.

it took me longer to ride back, because i went as slow as possible, to not jostle the pastries. i got on the esplanade and crossed into cambridge via the MIT bridge, riding through central square then cutting across the public library to get home. the ride back took more than half an hour. when i opened the pastry boxes, i was shocked to find several egg tarts smashed to bits, especially the box for jeff. i ended up eating one that was just a mashed mess, and transferred 3 of the better tarts for jeff, figuring i'd tell him the story of why there's one less. the other six i packed up then rode to the cafe.

when i arrived at the cafe, i discovered the 6 tarts were once again smashed, to the point where not a single tart didn't suffer some kind of damage. still edible, both my parents took one while i ate another one myself. despite being super fragile, these portuguese egg tarts are actually pretty good, very tender, not too sweet, and not expensive either. if i ever buy then again, i'm not sure how i'd transfer them home without having them all broken. maybe if i bring an egg tart tray, and put the tarts in those, i might be able to protect them.

my father made modification to the kitchen, adding the second sur la table air fryer oven, so now we can have two working simultaneously. the second air fry oven shares the same outlet with the rice cooker; as long as the rice cooker is keeping warm, it won't pop the circuit breaker.

i returned home around 1:30pm, taking with me some of the pastries (but leaving all the egg tarts for my mother). as soon as i got back, i walked down to the dollar store looking for some twine to tie up some escaping bean and squash vines in my garden. they didn't have the ball of twine i found last time, but they did sell a thick 9ft coil of twine so i got that. i walked straight to the community garden and put up the trellis, which was more than long enough. while i was doing that, this strange guy whom i'd never seen before approached me. i thought maybe he was just a curious tourist, but he actually oversees all the cambridge community garden (his name was david dash). i also picked a few tomatoes and peppers for jeff later tonight.

i didn't get back home until 2:45pm, where i finally had some lunch.

the rest of the day was spent waiting for evening, to go upstairs and have dinner with jeff at 7pm. he actually texted me a bit early, said the food was almost ready, and i could come up whenever i wanted.

i came in through the back door, where a table of food awaited me. jeff made a roast that he'd been working on since sunday night, slow-cooking it before giving it a final broil with some brown sugar glaze. we ate korean style, using pieces of lettuce to hold the roasted pork, scallion ginger sauce, and korean-style hot sauce. he also bought some kimchi from h-mart. there was rice and a salad as well but i didn't touch any of those. we washed everything down with some hard cider, and then had vanilla tillamook ice cream.

earlier i was watching breaking news about trump's latest indictments, 4 counts of attempting to overturn the 2020 election. jeff - normally an independent - told me before the 2016 presidential election that he saw signs trump might win. he's not sure who will win in 2024, but he wouldn't rule out trump. we also talked about all the various wildlife, both here in cambridge and back home on the west coast. we have turkeys here that they don't get in california. he had a roof rat infestation in his house, and he rigged up a trap where he'd be alerted to the presence of rats in his backyard, in which case he'd shoot them with a pellet gun. his west coast home doesn't have much of a sunny yard, so it's hard to grow stuff there, though his dream is to one day have a property big enough where he can garden year round. jeff also told me he was big into cooking, so much so that he and michelle have taken classes in beijing and here in cambridge at the culinary institute (baking class). having been to china numerous occasions for work, he got really into mapotofu, although he finds that his recipe isn't nearly as spicy or numbing enough as restaurant style. the way his schedule works, he spends half the time back on the west coast, where he just works from home, before returning to cambridge. but he's set up his schedule where he only has one weekend in boston, so hasn't been doing too much, though he said he's trying to do more, with book talks and live podcast recordings. i asked him about his car, which judging by what he told me last year, he was looking into getting an electric vehicle. they already have a hybrid, and may end up getting a plug-in hybrid, which would have enough of a battery that they'd hardly ever use the gas tank. he's actually returning to california on thursday, so gave the leftover roast to me since he wouldn't be able to eat it.

we finished up by 9pm, i went home by just walking downstairs. lauryn wasn't home when i left around 7pm, but she was back now, having no idea where i was. i spent the rest of the night watching talking heads discuss the latest trump indictments on MSNBC.