i woke up around 8:30am this morning so i could go pick up my prescriptions at walgreens which opens at 9am. i also originally planned to visit harvard vanguard and get my mother's prescription until i found out their pharmacy isn't opened on weekends. i ended up taking the motorcycle because it'd be quicker. there was just pharmacist working today (the vietnamese lady), and she was busy answering a phone call from a customer so i waited a few minutes before she came to help me.

i wasn't home for very long before i set out again, this time to the community garden to work on my plot. i went via bicycle so i could also bring one of two bags of miracle-gro raised bed soil. they'd been sitting in my alleyway for over a month now, and since that time have gotten wet so that one bag must've easily weighed 60 lbs. i rode gingerly, afraid the extra weight would burst my rear tire.

once again i was the only person in the garden, when i was expecting there to be more people on a nice saturday morning. maybe it was a little cold with temperature in the 50's, but the sun was shining and i got warm enough to strip down to just a t-shirt. my plot looked naturally manicured even though i didn't do anything to it. there was even a lovely groundcover of live sedum, and some forget-me-nots and pink chive flowers about to bloom. the only thing i did today was to top off my 8 grow bags with fresh soil. just one 40qt bag of new soil was enough to top off all the grow bags. in these bags i'll be growing my tomatoes, my eggplants, my peppers.

a couple with a baby came into the garden at one point. i think they have a plot on the western side of the garden. they were not friendly at all, the husband walking around the garden with the baby, but never made eye-contact nor saying anything even though i stood there and watched him. they left after a short while. when i was about to be finished, a woman came in to work on her plot. i didn't recognize her, but she'd been here at least since last season, because she asked if i was going to grow my hyacinth beans again.

i got back home a bit after 10am. i took a quick shower and left for the cafe by 10:20am. my parents were already there when i arrived. one of them was supposed to have the day off but they both showed up. my father ended up leaving soon afterwards, as my parents decided he should stay home because he's having hernia surgery on monday.

my 2nd aunt showed up around 11am. for some reason my sister was there today as well. nobody asked her to work, and we were afraid of bringing it up for fear of causing her to have another episode and storm off again. we were just glad for the additional help, even if it meant bearing some of her harsh disparagements when we did something that she didn't like. i forgot what exactly, but the smallest thing could potentially upset her. she ended up staying until the early afternoon. to be honest though, we didn't really need her help today but we barely had any customers. my personal theory is the porchfest in neighboring somerville stole most of our customers with their hundreds of live musical performances. my mother said it was karma because we had such a good thursday and friday. even a bad saturday we still managed to beat last week's profit.

andrew called me at one point out of the blue, i haven't heard from him in ages. he asked if i was belmont because he was at the neighboring park attending his daughter's soccer game against belmont. i couldn't leave but he said he might stop by the cafe one of these saturdays. i also wanted to go check out buster at the porchfest: not to hear the music (i don't know any of their songs) but rather to fly my drone so i could get an aerial view of just how many people came to see them. but in the end i thought against it, didn't want to have a drone malfunction and have it land on top of bunch of unsuspecting music lovers.

we were down to our second batch of tea eggs. normally when that happens i start preparing the next batch, but we were all out of eggs. luckily (or unluckily) it wasn't busy today and we hardly had any bento box orders so the tea eggs went mostly unused. we did however make a new batch of beef noodle soup broth. my parents started making the broth yesterday, reheated it again today, before letting the beef shank chunks marinate before removing them from the broth and then using the ice paddle to cool it down before packaging into 16 oz. containers for freezing/storage.

i had some homemade chinese dumplings for lunch. my 2nd aunt made them. it took me a while to eat them before i was busy turning the ice paddle to cool down the beef noodle soup. when i finally ate, i made a spicy dipping sauce with the hot chili oil sauce i created 1-1/2 weeks ago.

my father showed up by 4pm to give my mother a ride home. but she decided to walk home instead because the weather was so nice (though a little windy). so while my father drove the car back to belmont, i rode the motorcycle. i had on my fleece jacket but it didn't stop the wind from seeping through so i felt a little cold.

my father and i did a quick inspection of the backyard. we tentatively decided to add 2-1/2 more raised beds in the backyard. as much as i like the idea of having more space to grow things, i also like the idea of having a lawn to mow and walk on even though it's kind of a waste of good growing space.

for dinner my mother made beef noodle soup with the leftover beef noodle broth and leftover beef tendons that we don't sell to customers. tendons actually taste better, has more flavor, my father said you could really taste the beef compared to the lean cuts. this is beef shank we bought from restaurant depot. their price is cheaper, but the cut is less lean compared to the shank we get from foodpak. my mother didn't have any regular noodles so instead used thin noodles, which isn't my favorite because it soaks up the broth really quickly and i'm left with a starchy sludgy mess. but i ate quick this time, so the thin noodles didn't have time to dissolve.

i got back home around 7pm. i checked my grow closet. more bitter melon seedlings continue to emerge from the soil. i also checked my remaining seeds in wet paper towels: 6 seeds have started to develop roots, while 2 seeds appear mushy and fully dead. the cotyledon also appeared green, i think because it's developing some chlorophyl. i filled 6 pots with soil then planted these final half dozen rooting bitter melon seeds. while i was at it i also checked my 4 luffa seeds in wet paper towels: none of those have germinated yet. one of my potted hot peppers has sprouted a second seedlings. i carefully dug it out with a spoon and gave it its own pot to grow. i currently have 4 long horn pepper plants. finally i checked my cuttings. the monstera has developed a single root, the spider plants several roots, and the tradescantia show signs of rooting. i'm most excited about the monstera, never had one before but i hear about it all the time.

i had time before the celtics game to use the bathroom and take a shower. the game didn't start until well after 8:30pm. the first quarter was harrowing, multiple lead changes. in the second quarter celtics managed to get the lead and keep it even though it was just by single digits. starting in the second half, boston built the lead up to 23 points. cavaliers kept chipping away, got the lead down to single digits again, but in the 4th quarter boston ratcheted up their defense and cleveland couldn't make anymore headway. celtics won 106-93. i think this is a solid win. we regain the lead in the series count (2-1), won on the road, and won despite not playing well initially. these more challenging games (instead of a blowout early on) give the team valuable experience for when they face tougher teams should they advance into the next round (which everyone says they will).

i woke up at 7:30am to get ready to ride into boston. i was about to head out when the timer in my grow closet kicked in and i took a peek to see if there were any more new seedlings. i spotted one bitter melon about to emerge from the soil.

i finally left a bit after 8am. it took me 25 minutes to ride to haymarket via cambridge through lechmere and the science museum. i had an empty box strapped to the back of my rear bike baskets.

this early in the morning, a lot of haymarket vendors were still setting up their stalls. there was nothing noteworthy, i left with some cherry tomatoes ($1), 3 bunches of scallions ($2), a bag of baby cucumbers ($2), and two boxes of blueberries ($5).

i then got onto tremont street, riding by park street station, to ming's market on the outskirts of chinatown. i made a beeline to the produce and filled up my basket: napa cabbage, small cucumbers, bok choi, chinese celery, chinese cabbage, long horn pepper, carrot, garlic chives, and scallions (4 for $1). i also grabbed two bags of dried soy beans to make soy milk. i brought along my 2nd aunt's insurance card: every month they give her $80 to buy healthy food. apparently you can use it at ming's market so i gave it a try. the card paid for $50 worth of produce.

it took me about 40 minutes to ride to the cafe. about to exit off of the appleton pedestrian bridge to cross the longfellow, i spotted a tree with the most amazing fuchsia-colored flowers. at first i thought it was some variety of peach (rather unlikely as peach flowering season has been over for a few weeks now) but when i got closer, i was shocked to discover it was in fact a redbud. this must be a special variety because redbud flowers are normally pinkish purple, not brilliant pink like this one.

i got to the cafe a bit after 10am. my parents were restocking our inventory, making minced pork, beef noodle soup, curry chicken, roasted pork, and chinese sausages. later in the day my sister made a guest cameo to make her 5-spice pork and to marinate some chicken. i made a new batch of taiwanese paocai, but i didn't start until the early afternoon. i was working with 21 lbs. of chinese cabbage this time.

my aunt showed up around noontime. normally not a good time to visit because that's our busiest time, today it wasn't too bad, as the busy stretch happened in the late morning, and tapered off after that. rest of the day was a slow and steady stream of business. we didn't beat last friday's earnings but came close, but had already made enough this week that we nearly tied last week's total, with still one more day tomorrow.

as for my taiwanese paocai, i had to divide up the portions into 3 separate stainless steel mixing bowl, as i didn't have a single container that could hold 21 lbs. worth of cabbage. i told my father i wanted to get a jumbo sized mixing bowl, and i found out restaurant depot sells 30qt (!) stainless steel mixing bowls (winco-brand) for $22.50 (much cheaper than amazon). throughout the afternoon i'd put on my gloves and mixing the cabbage and salt to speed up the reduction. i didn't start mixing the paocai until 6pm. i used 10 cups of vinegar plus 10 cups of sugar. the amount seemed excessive. it was already closing time and i wasn't close to finishing. i told my parents to leave. i didn't finish until 7:30pm. i ended up with 10 quart containers of paocai and 1 quart of leftover sugar vinegar juice (which we can use to pickle our cucumbers).

first thing i did when i got home was to check the grow closet again. many more bitter melon seeds are emerging from the soil, as well as 3 hot peppers. watching seeds sprout never gets old. it's a kind of natural magic, a sort of faith that you plant these seeds in soil and after a certain amount of time, they will seem to suddenly come alive as they peek out from the dirt.

there was nothing to eat in the house, other than ramen or a frozen brick of readymade lasagna, which i already had this week. i could've gone out and bought something (steak & cheese sub, burrito, poke) but i was too tired to leave the house. in the freezer i found a leftover square of homemade lasagna wrapped in tinfoil (from november) that i decided to reheat and eat. i let the oven preheat at 350°F for about 15 minutes before throwing the lasagna in for 30 minutes. half an hour wasn't enough time, but i was too hungry to put it back in the oven. the outer edges were warm, but the inside was cold (but not frozen).

i watched a pair of NBA games tonight: pacers beat the knicks 106-111, and the nuggets beat the timberwolves 107-75 (score so far). both pacers and nuggets were down 2-0 facing the possibility of an insurmountable 3-0 deficit. the knicks-pacers game was close, the nuggets-timberwolves not so much. celtics play tomorrow night in cleveland.

we had a large grubhub order come in today at 11am. 25 items, 15 of which were bento boxes. the customer gave us just an hour to prepare everything. my sister happened to be outside, about to take esmei out. i flagged her down and told her what was happening. she said she'd come back after 20 minutes. we had a big order a few weeks ago, so we knew the drill. i went downstairs to grab the folding table. unlike last time though, this order was bigger, and even more customized, like asking us to put names on each items, or each item with different selection of hot sauces. to make matters worse, we entered our lunchtime busy period, so new orders were coming in, whether it be online, via phone, or walk-in customers. it was insane.

when my sister finally showed up, it didn't make it better, as she started criticizing the way we were fulfilling the orders, to the point where it would've been better if she wasn't there at all. the delivery driver showed up 15 minutes early, but it took us until 12:30pm before we finally got everything ready. customers have to realize we can't just magically prepare their order in a matter of minutes, and that they have to give us plenty of time. like we have a harvard customer who occasionally makes a large order: they would call us days in advance to let us know, so we could prepare ahead of time. unfortunately that customer hasn't ordered in a while, not since late february when we mucked up their order.

today was the 3rd most profitable day so far this year, even without the big order. finally by 2pm business started to taper off. the change was so abrupt, we didn't have a single customer for nearly an hour after being crazy busy earlier. i ended up making 2 batches of tea eggs, as we ended up going through something like 3 dozen eggs. i also prepared some fresh boba pearls, made 8 boxes of ice cubes, and cooked several batches of black soy noodles.

i saw esmei in the morning. the vet shaved the base of her tail because it was infected so removing the fur made it easier to apply ointment and to keep an eye on the infection.

besides eating a ruined tea egg, i also air fried some readymade spanakopita. i feel like these would be easy to make, i'd like to make them one of these days. i just need to get some phyllo dough (i've never seen it sold at market basket, but maybe because i wasn't looking hard enough).

i rode home after work, bringing a box with me for when i go to haymarket and chinatown tomorrow morning. i thought it was warm enough that i wore just a t-shirt but with the fading sun it felt a little cool in the shadows.

i checked on my grow closet. one of the hot peppers has finally germinated. another bitter melon has germinated as well, from my 3rd batch of 6 that i planted may 3rd. i've sort of lost track. i just know it's not one of the new batches that i sprouted using the wet paper towel trick. or is it? honestly, i've started so many unsuccessful iterations of bitter melons, i'm just happy to see any germinating. i inspected the paper towel bitter melon seeds. 9 seeds remaining, 6 show sign of sprouting, 2 are still waiting, and one seed was all mushy so i tossed it. i didn't plant them just yet, will wait until they sprout a bit more before putting them in soil. using the wet paper towel technique, i managed to germinate more than 90% of my bitter melon seeds, even though i thought most of them were non-viable.

for dinner i made luxury ramen. i haven't made this since december, so it's the first time this year i'm having it.

i ate while watching the cavaliers-celtics game. celtics lost badly, 118-94. feels like deja vu, the same thing happened in the miami series, boston won the first game, miami won the second one. hopefully history will repeat itself and boston can win the next 3 games to end the series. it was frustrating to watch as celtics seemed to be overly reliant on the 3-pointers even when they weren't going in, or when they had chances for a layup but purposely kicked out to a player on the 3-point line only to brick it and have cleveland grab the rebound. i know analytics say a 3-pointer is more valuable than a 2-pointer even if you miss, but as someone who grew up watching 90's basketball, it just doesn't seem right.

it rained for much of the day, the one day this week i had off. it made my decisions much easier i couldn't do anything until the rain stopped. if it was raining during the summer i might go out for a run, but temperature was in the 60's, wasn't worth it going for a soaking run.

for lunch i heated up a jamaican beef patty in the microwave. as it was starting to look like the rain might be stopping (temporarily at least), i started making preparations to run my errands. i packaged up my 2nd aunt's passport renewal documents as well as my 2nd uncle's permanent resident card typographical error fix request. i taped up a jacket my mother wanted to return to macy's, along with a pair of pants i wanted to return to amazon.

taking a peek of my grow closet, i noticed another luffa had germinated. that was the one i noticed a few days ago when i was digging in the soil, before i turned off the heating pad. i now have 3 luffa seedlings, and still waiting for 3 more to sprout. did i mention luffa need 200 growing days to reach maturity? at least rate they won't be ready until november, though if we're growing them to eat, maybe we might harvest them earlier. i remember we grew some luffa a long time ago, but it's been so long, it feels like we're growing them for the very first time. i checked my paper towel bitter melon seeds: two more have sprouted, i planted them in some soil. so far i only have a single bitter melon seedlings, but have 19 paper towel sprouted seeds that i'm still waiting for them to emerge from the soil.

at 1pm i set out to run errands. first stop was the porter square post office. the clerk - an indian man - was giving me a hard time. instead of letting me choose how i wanted to send it, he always picked the most expensive option. when i complained and asked him if there was a cheaper option with tracking, he got angry and wouldn't process one of my packages, told me to go to fedex, said they're cheaper. exasperated, he pulled out a priority mail envelope, which was $10 but cheaper than the $16 option he offered me previously just for sending some paper forms and a green card. i filled out the envelope and went back to him. "where are you from?" he asked me. like now he was curious about my life after previously chastising him for wasting his time? i could've played the asshole but i answered him, "taiwanese. how about you?" he said he was lebanese. i know very little about lebanon so i had no witty retort. "you don't look chinese," he told me. "i don't like taiwanese?" i corrected him, "then what do i look like? hispanic?" he paused, unsure how to answer without offending me. "just not chinese," he said. i told him i've lived in the US for a long time. "45 years," i told him. "you've been here longer than me, i've only been here 35 years," he replied.

next stop was the UPS store on somerville avenue. i was returning the package from macy's as well as some used nespresso pods. i saw a trio of walgreens pharmacist heading into dunkin' donuts for their lunch break.

from the UPS store i went down park street then scott-holden to roberts road, to harvard vanguard, to pick up a prescription for my mother. she hadn't received any notification messages and the pharmacist told me the prescription wasn't ready yet.

i then went cambridge-hovey-magnolia-line-cooney to whole foods, to return those pants to amazon.

harold-dimick-calvin-dane brought me to market basket. i wasn't prepared to get anything, just some bean sprouts for the cafe, maybe some snacks for myself. with that i came home.

at 2pm i rode to belmont. originally i planned on taking the motorcycle to get it inspected in arlington, but i didn't want to ride that far not knowing if it's going to rain again. instead i went to my parents' place to pick up some luffa seeds and to inspect the backyard. my tomato and squash seedlings were outside hardening, but all the rain had flooded their trays. i emptied the water from the trays then brought the seedlings inside, as the next few nights will be a little cold (temperature possibly in the 40's).

i got back to cambridge around 3pm, walked to star market to get some more snacks. i didn't go out the rest of the day. not that i wanted to anyway, as the rain returned, turning the sky ominously dark for a brief period in the late afternoon. i actually closed the blinds and turned on the lights, that's how dark it got.

so i didn't go running, didn't get my motorcycle inspected, nor did i do any work in my community garden plot. hopefully the weather on saturday morning will be nice, that's my next available free window.

i soaked 4 luffa seeds. tomorrow i'll wrap them in wet paper towel and leave them in my grow closet to germinate, like what i did with the bitter melon seeds. i'm also wondering if i should do that with the pepper seeds as well, none of which have germinated yet even though it's been 12 days already, including 10 days on the heating pad. pepper seeds seem to be notorious for slow germination.

today would've been a nice day to do some retroactive blog posting but instead i finished watching onibaba (1964), a horror film about two feudal japanese peasant women who murder wayward samurais and sell their armor for money. the movie is a bit slow, and the horror element doesn't show up until the final third of the movie. they could've easily made it into a half-hour short film. it reminded me of the morality tales of nathaniel hawthorne or the gothic horror of edgar allan poe.

i made korean rice cake for dinner, wanted to use up my expired fried tofu wedges. it helped that i made it less than 2 weeks ago, so the recipe was still fresh in my mind.

i watched game 2 between the pacers-knicks. indiana had the momentum after jaylen brunson left the game after the first quarter, building a 10-12 point lead going into halftime. but when brunson returned in the second half, pacers quickly lost the lead in less than half a quarter and never regained it. knicks won 121-130.

i arrived at the cafe the same time as my parents. in the back cargo area was esmei, like a stowaway. i brought her to my sister's place then returned to the cafe. my sister returned by 12:30pm.

today wasn't too busy at the cafe, a lot of drink orders. we didn't sell any noodles until the end of the day when somebody came in to buy a beef noodle soup. a lot of rice orders and there was a bit of morning drama when i realized after an hour that nobody pressed the button to cook the rice yet. fortunately we had leftover. we cooked 7 cups of rice and i cooked an additional 3 cups in the afternoon. the curse of the rice cooker continues, since as soon as we cooked more rice, none of it got sold.

for lunch my mother made a pork bone broth with daikon radishes and smoked jujubes. we had it with some rice noodles, one of our family comfort food.

i didn't make any tea eggs today. i did make a new batch of sesame peanut sauce. i added too much water and had to add an additional 3 scoops of peanut butter to thicken the sauce.

during a lull in the afternoon, i went out to do some mulching around the parking lot bed. that was before i discovered my sister had used up most of the mulch we bought last weekend, only a single bag remained. i did some cleaning anyway, raked some dead leaves and picked up some detritus around the edges of the parking lot.

by day's end we made more than last tuesday, including two online orders that came in close to closing time.

today was a warm day. i biked back home in just a t-shirt, temperature was in the 70's.

i checked my bitter melon seeds. today was day 4 and i had 17 germinations, which is most of the seeds. so those seeds weren't bad, it's just that bitter melon seeds are difficult to germinate and require presoaking and warm temperature if possible. when the seeds germinate the outer shell comes off. the root tip also has a weird shape, like a plug: maybe that's to anchor the seedling. i planted all the seeds that sprouted, and put back the rest (7) in a wet paper towel for further germination. i also finally turned off my heat pad which uses a good amount of electricity (20W, but that's 24/7 for the past 2 weeks). i'm still trying to germinate the peppers and luffa seeds, but i'm not bothering with the heat pad. the grow closet has enough heat (though only when the lights are on).

i heated a brick of lasagna in the microwave and settled in for the cavaliers-celtics game starting at 7:30pm. other than a brief period when cleveland had a small lead, boston dominated most of the game. by the end it was all bench guys playing as the celtics won by 25 points 95-120.

i seem to be incapable of waking up late anymore. nowadays i wake up before 9am most mornings. this after going to bed last night around 3am, watching 3 episodes of sugar. i couldn't stop thinking about the broken internet at my sister's place. i realized it was down late last night when i couldn't see the webcam anymore. i thought about running to her place to reset the router, but it rainy and cold.

i rechecked my bitter melon seeds, day 3. i saw one seed had germinated yesterday; today there were 3 more. i noticed the outer coat comes off when the seeds sprout. they also sprout from the "pointy" end of the seeds, which makes me think i should've clipped that end instead. i'll check again tomorrow. i removed the germinated seeds and planted them into cups. assuming these seeds will successfully turn into seedlings, i now have a total of 5 bitter melons. i also checked my heat mat seeds, another luffa has sprouted. i moved it into the grow closet. i now have a total of 2 luffa seedlings.

around 9:30am i left the house and went to my 2nd aunt's place. she'd been having problems with the iyf.tv app on her google tv ever since she returned from taiwan (more than 2 weeks ago). i suspected it's an outdated apk. sure enough, the version she has is 2.2.8 (installed back in december). the latest is 2.3.4. the old apk will try to install the latest version, but security measures prevent an apk from installing other apks. even when i disabled it, it still didn't work. fortunately i brought a copy of the latest iyf.tv apk on a thumb drive and installed it that way. it started working after that.

next i headed to the cafe. i brought out food from the freezer so they can thaw in the fridge for tomorrow. i then went to my sister's place to reset the router. because she changed the front door code, i had to go through the back door which was a real hassle, involving accessing 2 keyless entry. i made sure it wasn't a modem issue - all 4 lights were steady. i reset the router and the internet was back online. both my father and sister called me while i was there, asking me to reset the router. the upstairs tenants must've complained. later i heard from my mother that one of them even asked for a discount in rent because of the outage. the router has been acting up lately. i decided to upgrade the firmware while i was there, 3.0.0.4.386_20632 to 3.0.0.4.386_51685.

i left by 10:30am and headed to belmont. esmei had spent the night. she didn't greet me when i came in, just gave me a dismissive look. last night she slept on her dog bed in her play pen. my parents didn't lock the cage, but it left my mother so anxious she didn't have a good night's sleep and ended up sleeping in the living room to keep an eye on esmei. earlier this morning my father took esmei out for a walk so she could go to the bathroom, as she doesn't like to go in the backyard for some reason.

i pretty much spent the whole day doing garden work in the backyard. i came in briefly to eat an egg pancake with some pork floss, but otherwise i was outside the whole time. it was an ideal day for gardening with temperature in the 70's. my father and i made two more fencing for raised bed 3, so now it can be completely protected from rabbits. we also erected the wire trellis for RB3. i mixed a solution of fungicide spray for the grapes: 1.2 tbsp (18ml) of immunox liquid + 0.75 tbsp (2.25 tsp) of captan powder + 1/2 gallon of rain water. immunox (1.55% myclobutanil) is for blackrot while captan is for phomopsis. i planted a bunch of perennials from the plant swap: wild ginger next to the old wild ginger underneath the japanese maple; columbine root near the peonies and hydrangea; purple-leaved fringed loosestrife in the same pot as the wisteria; repotted the peony seedling and bleeding heart seedling; purple asters near the basement entrance; solomon's seal next to the hostas. i planted a row of blue beans in RB4, as well as a single hyacinth bean. i started my beans way too early and many of them already have long tendrils with nowhere to climb. i spent some time untangling the tendrils, and ended up breaking a few in the process. next season, i shouldn't plant them indoors until the end of april. dug up some foxgloves from the western bed and transplanted them underneath the grapevines and the perennial bed behind the garage. finally watering the plants in the basement grow room.

at one point my parents took esmei to the watertown dog park near arsenal yard. while we were planting we had to keep her inside otherwise she'll dig in the dirt as well. she kept trying to get into the basement (even crying) until i let her downstairs so she could explore for a few minutes before i called her back outside. around dinnertime she slept on the kitchen floor, waiting for someone to feed her. after dinner she went inside her playpen and slept on her dog bed.

my father grilled some t-bone steaks on the barbecue. even after about an hour of thawing they were still a little hard because they'd been previously frozen. i coated them with oil then sprinkled salt and ground pepper. we grilled on high 5 minutes each side. the final steaks looked pretty good, but the meat near the bone was still a bit rare, while the rest of the steaks ranged from medium-rare to medium.

i got back home by 7:30pm. two NBA playoff games tonight, pacers-knicks, timberwolves-nuggets. i was rooting for the pacers but they lost 117-121. as of right now, minnesota looks to beat denver, taking their series to 2-0. the defending champions nuggets look seriously vulnerable and could very realistically lose the series.

today was plant moving day, the annual event where i relocate most of my indoor grown seedlings to belmont for transplanting into the raised beds. included in the move was also most the free plants i acquired from the plant swap yesterday. the only ones i saved where the cuttings: tradescantia 'nanouk', monstera, and spider plants - i placed them in water underneath the closet grow lights to hopefully develop some roots before i move into dirt. i checked my heat pad seedlings, one of the luffa finally germinated, i moved it into the grow closet.

after 2 days i checked on my wet paper towel bitter melon seeds germination: out of 34 seeds, only one of looked like it sprouted. i wrapped the seeds back up and left them to germinate some more. if by the end of this week they still haven't germinated, i'll need to buy new bitter melon seeds online.

my father was due to arrive sometime after 10:30am. i started moving out my plants and setting them on the front steps. that's when my new upstairs neighbor sheri came downstairs. she was with another woman whom i learned was her sister kim, here in town helping her move from her central square apartment. sheri sent me e-mail last night saying she couldn't figure out how to open the basement door, so i showed her how i do it. the secret turned out to be the key, the one that she had was rusty and didn't work as well. when we went back to the front of the house, my father had already arrived. together he and i moved the plants into the back of the honda before leaving for belmont.

since rain was in the forecast for later today, i suggested we mow the lawn for the first time this season, then we could get a free watering afterwards. while my father mowed, i assisted by weeding dandelions and moving lawn furniture out of the way. i also unpacked all my plant swap haul, resoaking those that needed to be water, and trying to figure out where to plant them. we didn't do any planting today because it was a little cold, hopefully it'll be warmer tomorrow.

my mother made some wonton soup for lunch which i ate around 12:30pm. my sister was supposed to drop off esmei around noontime, but didn't arrive until almost 2pm. she's leaving her dog at my parents' place until tuesday while she goes to vermont. she brought several bags of dog stuff, including food and treats and toys, as well as additional dog fencing. she was giving us a list of instructions, none of which we'll follow once she's gone.

esmei spent some time in the backyard before coming back inside. around 3:30pm she took a nap on the living room floor. after an hour she woke up and went to sleep on her dog bed inside the open play pen. occasionally we put the cone on her so she wouldn't lick her wounds, including a cut or infection at the base of her tail.

in the early afternoon there was a magic-cavaliers game. winner would face the celtics in boston on tuesday. cleveland ended up winning, even though orlando had the lead for most of the game until the middle of the 3rd quarter. cavaliers are the easier matchup, so this is good news for the celtics, especially since it looks like porzingis will be out for the second round while nursing his soleus strain.

my mother made dinner, while esmei hung out in the kitchen. completely fearless and no regards to consequences, esmei jumped up to the kitchen counter a few times, trying to get to the food. she's tall enough that she can see over the counter, and with some hops can get to some items with her front paws.

my father gave me a ride home after dinner around 7pm. by then there was a light drizzle.

i woke up a bit before 9am this morning, after going to bed last night at 12:30am. even though i didn't have to wake up early, i still found myself waking up every hour to check the time. i wasn't going into the work today, at least not the first half. instead i was going to the mid-cambridge plant swap. i haven't gone in a long time, not since spring 2019. the pandemic sort of got in the way, and then the past year or two i'd forgotten about the plant swap until i saw a reminder in a community garden digest recently.

i spent the morning selecting some seedlings to donate to the plant swap. i gave them three different variety of tomatoes (cherry 2, 'cloudy day' 4, 'independence day' 2) and some buttercup squash (4). i mostly picked my secondary transplanted seedlings, saving the best ones for myself. i had some chinese eggplant seedlings but they were too small and i didn't think it'd attract many takers.

clearing out these surplus seedlings left me with more growing room in my grow closet. i did some reorganizing. the 6 kabocha squashes i planted all germinated, but 3 of them sprouted before i noticed so grew very leggy. i added more soil to help hide the long stems.

i still had plenty of time to kill before the start of the plant swap at 12pm, so i did some vacuuming, especially after i got dirt all over the kitchen counter. i finally left by 11:40am, figuring it'd take me some tim to securely attach the box of plants to the back of my bike with bungie netting. i then rode gingerly to fayette park, careful not to jostle the plants and knock them over inside the box.

i set up my seedlings in the edible plants pile. i didn't know anyone there except for helen. i grabbed a few things right away, including a bag of wild ginger and some snowdrops. i then stuck around to see what other plants would be coming in. plus i answered questions about my seedlings whenever anyone grabbed one of them. i was happy to see all my seedlings ended up finding new homes.

i bumped into lisa, who came to check out some plants. she pointed me out to frances, whom i recognize but i don't remember how. did we work on a programming project together?

i left by 1pm, carefully tying down my box of new plants to the back of my bike before riding home. i put plants into water, those that needed it. i had a pretty good haul: wild ginger, snowdrops, solomon's seal, walking onion, hellebore, columbine, bleeding heart seedling, chinese lantern, purple-leaved fringed loosestrife, peony seedling, purple asters, strawberries, tradescantia 'nanouk' cutting, monstera cutting, spider plant cuttings.

my plan was to ride the motorcycle to the cafe so i could borrow the car and come back to get some plants. however when i got there around 1:40pm, my mother told me my father had already gone home because it wasn't busy. with my sister and 2nd aunt helping out, he wasn't needed.

i spent the next 2 hours working the end of a saturday shift. my mother had walked to the cafe this morning, stopping by trader joe's to pick up some items. my father went to baifu this morning to gather some additional supplies. my sister took off to check on her dog. like my mother said, today wasn't busy, unlike last saturday when it was crazy. something must be happening to drive the customers elsewhere. was it the somerville open studios? who knows. i spent the time making a new batch of tea eggs and make some new ice cubes.

close to closing time, my father showed up to give my mother a ride home. i made it to belmont first. my sister was also there after she got kicked out of decordova museum because they were holding a wedding function. a new chewy delivery had arrived, and my sister some time offering various new treats to esmei. they left soon afterwards.

i returned home after dinner, getting back around 6:30pm. i parked a block away, and went out again later to put on the rain cover. i put a few more plants in water, before bringing some indoors while leaving the rest outside.

there was a western 2nd round NBA game today between the timberwolves and nuggets. minnesota ended up winning 106-99. anthony edwards put on a show, and the whole team stymied the nuggets. nevertheless, denver nearly came back. if this game is what's in store for the rest of the series, it's going to an epic battle.

things i did today at the cafe: restocked the drink fridge; shredded some sushi nori for miso soup and ramen; cooked a new batch of boba pearls; made 10 more tea egg spices.

my mother made some egg-kielbasa-bokchoi again for breakfast. i had some only in the late morning after i was done cleaning. she was criticizing me all day and usually i can tune it out but it set me off today. she complained about the plastic trays in leave in the fridge, so defrosting containers don't drip down the wire rack shelves. she said the trays prevent her from easily reaching further into the fridge. i just stared at her and then didn't speak to her the rest of the day.

i started getting a pain in the heel of my left foot. it felt like a splinter, but that didn't make sense, because how could i suddenly get a splinter inside my shoe? it's probably the dry skin on my heel cracking. hopefully it'll go away soon.

my sister brought over esmei a few times. once when they were going out, another time when they came back, and one more when my aunt stopped by in the late afternoon. in all those occasions esmei showed no emotions. she will gladly accept pets, but she is not a dog who will nuzzle a human for attention, preferring instead to just watch the world go by, which seems to be her favorite pasttime.

my silent treatment with my mother finally ended about an hour to go before closing time. despite the fact that my parents insisted i go home because it wasn't busy anymore, i decided to stay just in case. that turned out to be the right decision as we suddenly received a bunch of orders in rapid succession, at least half a dozen bento, 2 of which were unadvertised salmon bento that demanded special attention. there was no time to hold grudges as we worked together to fulfill the orders. we managed to get everything out in time but the last and biggest order we forgot to add a miso soup. i ended up refunding the customer and sent him a text explaining what happened.

and like that the day was over. that final hour we nearly doubled today's profit. i'll be a few hours late to the cafe tomorrow because i'm going to the plant swap first. i got my sister to cover for me while i'm gone. i think she agreed only because she's leaving esmei with my parents over the weekend.

i rode home with a large cardboard box in the back of my bike. i forgot my bungie netting, so i had to hold the box with one hand as i steered with the other.

i forgot to take out my soaking bitter melon seeds this morning, so i did it when i got home. i placed the seeds inside of wet paper towels into a ziploc bag and placed it on my heating mat. i'll check in a few days to see if any of the seeds have germinated. if not, i'll need to buy fresh seeds online. it's early may, i still have time to start the seeds for a summer crop.

for dinner i heated up a frozen pepperoni pizza in the oven. it's my first time using the oven since i replaced the gas igniter. i'm happy to report the oven performed like the way it did before. even the oven light worked, which hasn't been the case for nearly 2 decades. the only lingering issue is the oven temperature is off by 25 degrees. it's something i've known for a while so i compensate by adding an extra 25 degrees. but despite that, the oven is very accurate, maintains the temperature i set it at without any issues. i did briefly do some search online on how to replace the sensor. it doesn't seem too hard and it doesn't involve taking apart the oven. unfortunately a new sensor can range anywhere from $50-$150. i rather save that money for a new oven in the future.

i ate while watching the cavaliers-magic game. the celtics will face off against whoever wins this series. i was rooting for orlando, since it'd extend the series to a game 7, giving boston 2 more extra days of rest before the 2nd round of playoffs. sure enough, the magic won 96-103. now i'm rooting for cleveland to win on sunday, as they are the weaker game which it comes to a celtics matchup. magic would be a harder opponent, but boston should beat either of those teams to advance to the conference final.

i started rewatching counterpart, the scifi spy thriller starring jk simmons. it's definitely on my top 10 list of best tv shows. the less you know about the show the better (don't want to spoil anything), but simmons acting is just amazing.

a day off from work and it's back to the grind. i didn't leave the house until 9am, too many things to bring. luckily my parents were already at the cafe by the time i arrived, most importantly cooked some rice to start the day. i brought the new hot sauce i made last night. my mother made some breakfast (eggs, kielbasa, bokchoi), we tried it with the hot sauce. i wasn't a fan, but my mother seems to like it, and said it was really spicy. she did note it was slightly chunky, compared to my previous fermented sauce, which had a more saucy consistency.

thursday is our slow day but we made slightly more today compared to the past two days. we just had a bit more customers today, and that uptick gave us a small bump.

my parents made a new batch of beef noodle soup, about 20+ servings. my father used the beef shank he got from restaurant depot, it seemed okay, but he cut them into too small pieces. i made a new batch of tea eggs, after having already made a new batch just 2 days ago on tuesday.

my godmother showed up in the afternoon. by then it wasn't too busy, so i went out and did some mulching around the city trees next to our property. temperature today was warm, in the 70's and sunny. i scraped off the dirty top layer of old mulch with a cultivating tool before adding an inch of new black mulch. i used up 3 bags, the remaining 5 bags i reserved for the mulch bed around the parking lot. i may need to do some raking beforehand, so i left that work for another day, the bags of mulch piled on top of each other. a girl came out of the cafe asking if she could take photos of my gardening tools. it was a strange request but i obliged her.

i went back to my sister's place to help her set up a patio umbrella. earlier i heard esmei barking when she heard me gathering the mulch bags but couldn't see me, so she thought a stranger had shown up. this is unusual, because she never barks at strangers. maybe it was the sound that scared her. i noticed the fur on her front leg is starting to grow back, half black half tan. her stomach fur looks like it might take longer.

my mother made lamb rice pilaf once again, her third time. i brought my raisins this time. she prepared a portion for me just as we were closing. by then the weather had turned. no longer was it sunny, but instead overcast with dark ominous clouds. i checked the doppler radar, it seemed that i was safe despite what my eyes were telling me. i raced home in just a t-shirt, but regretted that decision as the temperature had actually dropped. not only that, but with just a few minutes before i arrived home, it suddenly started to rain. big fat drops that immediately soaked my clothes. luckily i was going home and could change into some dry clothes when i got back.

i ate while watching the bucks-pacers game, which started at 6:30pm for some reason. bucks briefly had the lead for the first half of the first quarter behind the return of damian lillard, but then the pacers took over. indiana won 98-120, advancing to the next round. the bucks season was a bust. all that hope and excitement when they signed lillard was all for naught. they even fired their winning coach for doc rivers, which wasn't really an upgrade. goes to show that it's not easy assembling a winning NBA team. just because you add a star or two doesn't guarantee wins.

it's been 10 days since i planted a second round of bitter melon seeds. i even used the heat mat to speed up germination. they should've germinated by now. so tonight i went digging. i was shocked to find not only had none of the seeds sprouted, but they were all hollow on the inside. actually, one seed did germinate, but it hadn't emerged yet; i moved that to the grow closet. the rest i picked out the dead seeds and tossed them. i'm starting a third round of bitter melon seeds. i noticed the white seeds are all dead, while the brown seeds appear more viable. i saw instructions online where you clip the end of the hard seed shell and let the seeds soak overnight. afterwards you bag them in wet paper towels and leave them someplace hot (80-90 degrees ideally) before they hopefully germinated after a few days. if this still doesn't work, i need to buy fresh seeds online. the mistake we made was we forgot to save any seeds from last season, so i only have 2021 and 2022 seeds.