my alarm went off at 5:30 this morning but in the end sleep won out over birdwatching and i decided to get a few more hours of sleep instead of going down to mt.auburn cemetery again. yet another expectedly slow day, i didn't get out of bed until almost noontime. neither of my clients contacted me. client S wasn't that much a surprise, but not hearing anything from client N was a cause for concern, since they seemed so distressed yesterday, and i basically blew them off as retaliation for blowing me off earlier. but when i don't hear from clients, i just assume everything's okay (i'd definitely hear from them if they weren't).

with that in mind, and another day of fine riding weather, i decided to head into the city. i went to chinatown first to get some groceries, first to the china supermarket on lincoln street, followed by ming's market near the south end. my backpack was bulging with all the things i've bought.

next i went to haymarket. since i'm not as familiar with the area, it took a while to find parking, and i ended up stashing my bike in between two metered spots; it was probably illegal so i only took a quick browse of haymarket. my parents wanted me to get them some avocados but the ones i saw were too ripe and the same price as the better avocados from market basket ($1/avocado). i ended up getting $6 worth of seedless red grapes (6 lbs.) and some cilantro ($1.50/2) and parsley ($1).

my motorcycle ran out of gas at the 140 miles mark (normally on a highway i can get 180 miles, around 60-80 mpg). a carload of college boys driving a honda prius were snickering behind me as i pulled off on the side of the road. not sure with other motorcycles, but on mine there's a valve that toggles the reserve tank. i switched to the backup and managed to get to the hess gas station. filling the gas tank isn't an exact science either. i basically have to eyeball it. today i didn't do a good job because i put in too much gasoline and it overflowed the tank. it was kind of embarrassing but nobody saw me so it was okay.

i went to the cafe to make my delivery. since i didn't have lunch yet (3pm), my mother took the opportunity to make me an omelette with her new omelette maker that she ordered after seeing one of those 30 minute infomercials on television. she even got one for me (it was a buy-one-get-one-free deal). everything was great until she happened to look at the invoice: the cost of shipping and handling ($33) was almost the cost of the omelette maker itself! she was all incensed for getting ripped off, but i gave her some money to cover the cost of s&h so she wouldn't feel bad about it.

client N finally did call me back. as i predicted, everything was fine, hence the silence. they ended up performing my suggested solution one last time, and wouldn't you know, it worked! i'm glad everything worked out because that means they'll finally stop bugging me and they won't see it as my fault (if they didn't fix it).

in the evening i made some lasagna for dinner. in total, including the time for the sauce to simmer and baking in the oven, it took 2 hours. the ground beef i bought a few days ago turned out to be ground pork. i noticed something was wrong when the meat turned white instead of brown after i cooked it. in the end though, it tastes about the same. i didn't have a big lasagna dish (i used it as a carrying tray when i made chinese new year flan back in february, the dishes are still at my parents' place) so i ended up using two smaller dishes.