we were running early and costco wouldn't even be opened until 10am. but my father was coughing so much in the car, we decided to stop at target first to get some cough drops and cough medicine. it's been a while since i've been to this target. they've expanded their food department while locking up a bunch of essentials behind glass cabinets.
costco was already opened when we got there. the only thing i needed were large bags of miracle-gro potting soil, which is what i use to germinate my seeds. i didn't see any and thought maybe they were in stock anymore. however they moved all the potting and garden soil to the center of the store, and we bought two bags ($11/each). we also got a few things for the cafe. costco was surprisingly unbusy today, and we didn't even have to wait in line to checkout.
next stop was restaurant depot, where my father needed to get cake flour for the vegetarian buns. this place was the complete opposite of costco in that it was insanely crowded. seems like all the small business restaurants in the area where shopping there today. the lines to checkout was a congested mess. don't shop at restaurant depot on mondays if you can avoid it, sundays are better. we only had about half a dozen items but waited longer to checkout than we did to shop. we we behind a guy who was buying 3 carts of restaurant supplies. outside in the parking lot i saw the tipico restaurant truck that i saw earlier at costco. seems like everyone's running the same supply circuit.
final stop was the chelsea market basket. when is this place never crowded? there was that one time i came by myself early saturday evening, there weren't many people then. my father stocked up on pork butts, his favorite thing to horde. here i saw a few people i remember seeing from both costco and restaurant depot. i wonder if they remember seeing me as well?
we finally left by 11:45am. it took us more than half an hour to drive to the cafe to drop off the supplies. besides unloading, we also defrosted some stuff we needed for this coming week. there was already an online takeout order scheduled for tomorrow morning. my father said it was probably a mistake (customers don't realize we're closed on mondays) so i texted the customer to ask and he confirmed it was indeed a mistake, so i cancelled the order. the same thing happened again later in the afternoon.
we didn't get to belmont until 1pm. i thought we were having some leftover corned beef for lunch but my mother already prepared some noodles for us.
there wasn't a lot of time to relax because at 2:15pm my father and i drove my 2nd aunt to the airport. she still tested positive for covid, so we both masked up before my 2nd aunt got into the car. as if there wasn't enough covid going around, she told us that my 2nd uncle also tested positive too. the drive to logan took nearly half an hour. we dropped off my 2nd aunt at terminal B departure for her united airline flight to san francisco then taipei.
the ride back was faster, just a bit over 20 minutes. since the honda hadn't been driven in over a month, my father put the trickle charger on the battery. i was busy doing some spring cleaning in the backyard. belmont resumes garden refuse pickup next week (april) so we can finally empty some refuse bins that've been full since the end of fall.
i weeded the raised beds, pulling up purple deadnettle and stray grass. i pruned some dead perennial stalks and added compost to the peonies, columbine, monkshood, chinese aster, hardy chrysanthemums, and hydrangeas. i then planted some lupine seeds in the bed behind the garden. in RB1 and RB2 i planted a row of oregon sugar pod II. this is the first spring where we've had raised bed fencing, which will protect the tender peas from rabbit predators. i finally finished by 6pm and went inside for dinner.
my father was making dinner, some salted fish, some tomatoes & eggs, some mushrooms & chicken. my mother came out of her bedroom to collect a plate of food and then retreated back to her room. after dinner my father gave me a ride back home. we stopped by the cafe to bring out the compost and recycle bins. total travel distance today was nearly 39 miles. i spent 2 hours 45 minutes riding in the car.
my LED RGB strip lights came today. remember i got both a regular plain "naked" version ($10) and a more robust neon rope version ($30). i'm not even going to bother opening the neon rope, i'm pretty sure i'm going to return it. the regular LED RGB strip light is more than enough. i unspooled the light and tested it out to make sure it was working. i then wrapped it around my foyer doorframe, affixed temporarily with scotch tape. the individually addressable RGBIC led's are cool, but i don't like how you can see the individual led's, they don't blend into each other. maybe on the neon rope light it might be better, but at 3x the price it's not worth it. it also connects to the tuya/smart life app, with many options. a little disappointed there aren't more presets though. to program your own color combination requires a bit of practice. i'm also concerned about how much electricity it uses. the specs say it uses 12W, which is way more than my string fairy lights. but i'd normally run it with just 15% brightness, so i wonder if that means it only uses 15% power? i'll need to check it with a smart plug meter.
celtics played the hawks tonight. boston dominated in the first half, leading by 30 points. it looked like a done deal but the celtics collapsed in the second half, poor defense which contributed to poor offense. hawks made timely shots, clawed their way back, and ended up winning the game, 118-120. celtics was without derrick white and jrue holiday, two key defensive guys. hawks was without trae young, still out from finger ligament surgery at the end of february. good thing is we play the hawks again thursday night, so hopefully we can get some payback.
i bought the soundcore anker space A40 earbuds for my mother ($50). i tested them out tonight, honestly, i can't tell the difference between these earbuds and my motast earbuds ($30). the motast has 140H playtime while the soundcore is only 50H. i also like how the mostat has audio feedback, a woman's voice tells you when your earbuds are paired or turned off. i'll probably end up returning the A40 and go with something else.