it was raining this morning, but once again, there was a window beginning around 10am where it was dry for about an hour. that's when i made my run via bicycle down to the cafe. outside was a tall fluorescent green cone with a sign taped to the top: no parking, moving van, september 1st. this is great news, means the psychopath who lives across from me renting renee's first floor apartment will finally be leaving. he's left all his lights on for nearly a month. i looked through the kitchen windows and the place is a mess. i even thought maybe he died, his body rotting undiscovered since nobody else lived there. i think i saw the guy who currently lives there once, he gave me a dirty look, and i wonder if it's because i complained to his previous roommates (before they left) about the lights always being on. what i wouldn't give for complete darkness when i go to bed! i just have to endure 2 more nights of madness.

i saw my sister pulling up her car in front of her place. when i got to the cafe, my mother said my sister was taking hailey to the emergency room because she stopped eating and drinking. i went down to check it out, my sister was in the middle of attaching 3 harnesses onto hailey to lift her out of the house and into the car. as soon as we lifted hailey out of her dog bed, she plopped right back down. since she can no longer really walk, she's been urinating in her dog bed, so there was a stink. i asked my sister what was the point of taking hailey to the emergency room. all the doctor's going to say is to put her asleep. besides, my sister said she managed to get hailey to drink some broth, so she wasn't completely unresponsive. i told my sister all she can do now is to make hailey comfortable in these last remaining days. even my sister said herself that if hailey doesn't improve by tomorrow, she might call the doctor to make a house call to put hailey asleep.

back at the cafe, i replaced the 3 HEPA filters on the honeywell HPA300 air purifier. supposedly you're supposed to replace them annually, but we haven't changed them out since getting the purifier back in december 2021, so almost 2 years. along with the HEPA filters i also replaced the activated charcoal pre-filter.

my mother made a new batch of tea eggs yesterday using the spice packet i made. hard to gauge if has the same taste, i like my tea eggs to steep a few days before trying them for maximum flavor. i also made a new batch of tea eggs, since we were already using the ones my mother made. for this batch i used a commercial spice packet, simply because it was already opened. later in the afternoon i ground another 10g spice packet. i'm starting to think it doesn't need all that grinding. the key is to pulverize the larger pieces like cinnamon bark, licorice root, allspice berries, and anise. everything else can be left as is.

i set up the 2nd of our remote wifi temperature sensors for our basement freezers. now if someone should accidentally leave the door open, i should get an alert on my phone via the smartlife (tuya) app. as for the contact sensor, there's no use for it at the cafe. i will bring it home and install it on my own front door, as part of a smart home automation sensor. like turn on the lights when i get home, or telling me when a roommate leaves or return.

i was so busy today, i didn't eat until 2:30pm, some leftover garlic chive pastries my 2nd aunt made. afterwards i had an aprium, one of these new fancy hybrid fruits my mother recently discovered at trader joe's, a combination of apricot and plum. it has a sweet yet slightly tart taste, juicy yet crisp. they sort of remind me of pluots (actually, i think pluots are plum and apricot hybrids as well). aprium is apparently a trademark name.

no sooner had i finished those pastries did my mother make me a bowl of rice noodle soup, like eating a double lunch. so much for weight loss.

the weather cleared up by late afternoon, even the sun came out. i returned home by 4:40pm.

i wasn't hungry in the least bit, and figured i might skip dinner. around 10pm i was in the kitchen carving up the watermelon i bought yesterday, and decided to have a small bowl of century egg congee after all. i ate while watching the latest indiana jones movie. so far i don't like it (especially the cgi young indiana at the start of the movie).