we made ham & cheese & egg english muffin sandwiches for breakfast with the ingredients i brought to the cafe. esmei came around in the late morning, sitting out on the back deck that the contractor came yesterday to assemble. in the afternoon my sister was taking esmei out to winchester fells for the very first time. esmei seemed listless sitting in the backseat, until i moved a bag from the center console, afterwards she moved to that spot, that's her choice seat when it comes to riding in the car.

it was busy around lunchtime but wasn't too crazy. we'd probably make our average profit, but it wouldn't be a record day. weather forecast says it'll be in the 80's on saturday so we might be busy, but we also might not, if people are getting easter monday off and taking a 3-day weekend. just seems like we're down this week, with the passover holiday and the jewish daycare being closed because of it.

my parents were making a batch of vegetable buns but we were out of vermicelli. i could get some from market basket, but this was the perfect opportunity for me to visit the davis square h-mart. google map said it'd only take 9 minutes via bike. the ride down walden street was treacherous as there are no bike lanes. i ended up riding the sidewalk half the time. i also stopped to admire some flowering cherry trees, some pink ones with maroon sepals, and big white flowers that turned out to be a yoshino cherry.

the davis square h-mart has been opened since january, but this was my first time visiting. it's a lot bigger than i thought, feels like it's larger than the central square store (mostly because the front part of the central square h-mart is a mini food court). the selection was amazing: besides all your korean items, there was also a lot of japanese, chinese, and other asian supermarket staples. i could've stayed there longer, but i had to get back to the cafe. i left with some mung bean vermicelli, banana milk, clam flavor soup, and sundae (blood sausage). felt like all the people working there were hispanic.

riding back, i admired an okame cherry and a private residence yoshino cherry.

we ate the sundae when i got back to the cafe. i never knew sundae is a warm dish. the only other times we've had it, by the time we get back home, the blood sausage is already cold.

my parents made a new batch of vegetable buns using all three steamers. it should last us for a few weeks at least. earlier this morning i helped my mother render a spiral cut smoked ham. she then simmered a leftover ham and smoked turkey wings broth, which i had for a late lunch along with some rice.

i tried binggrae banana milk for the very first time. i've never had it before, always see it at the asian supermarkets, but they're always so expensive (typically $8+ for a 6-pack of juice boxes). it was on sale at h-mart, that's the only reason why i got it. the taste is familiar, i must've had it before in the past, tastes just like...banana milk. i could probably make it myself easily and a lot cheaper, just blend banana with mix.

no big orders, but just a slow trickle of customers, ending in an ubereats delivery order at 6pm. those are the worst because even though we don't accept new orders after 6:15pm, often times we end up waiting beyond closing time for a delivery driver to arrive. fortunately that didn't happen today and we managed to close on time.

returning home, i wasn't in the mood for dinner quite yet. instead i watched a few more episodes of dan da dan on my laptop from the couch, snacking on some potato chips and pretzels. i even eat dinner until after 9pm, reheated two slices of quince. they're still gooey a day later, and i'm already starting to get sick of it, even though i still have one more serving left for tomorrow night.

i had a lot of ideas of things to do on my one day off, but most of them ended up not happening. i wanted to go for a run, but managed to rationalize myself out of it because 1) it was too windy today (40 degrees but wind chill made it feel like the 30's) and 2) i was still feeling a little congested. i thought about riding down to MGH to get some lab work done, but i checked my patient portal page and i don't need to do that until the end of the month.

so just like that, two big things i planned on doing today got cancelled. plus time seems to go faster on my day off, so before i knew it, it was already noontime. i ended up doing the one thing i knew how to, which was to do some grocery shopping. i decided i was going to make a quiche tonight for dinner and wrote up a grocery list. i biked down to market basket to get my supplies. one of things i needed was cubed ham. a 1 lbs. package sold for $5, but i could buy a 7 lbs. boneless smoked ham hock for just $7, so i went with the ham hock option instead.

seems like suddenly today a lot of cherries blossoms have flowered. the okame have already bloomed weeks ago (they're the first to flower), but all along beacon street the autumnalis have flowered as well. i even saw an akebono flowering cherry. seems like the cold winter and the plentiful rain we've been receiving for the past few weeks have produced a bounty of blossoms this season.

first thing i did when i got back home was to render the ham. i'd cut it into slices then freeze any parts i wasn't going to use today. what i thought was boneless ended up having a big chunk of ham bone on the inside. that's actually a good thing, because i wanted a ham bone for making stock. it make for some challenge cutting however. i cut up about 12 oz. of diced ham, then saved a few slices for myself, before freezing the rest. for a late lunch i made a ham & cheese & egg english muffin sandwich. i didn't eat until 2:30pm.

none of my wet paper towel seeds (luffas and bitter melons) have germinated yet, so today i brought out the heating mat. hopefully with this added heat the seeds will finally germinate.

yes i put money into a fidelity roth IRA retirement account, but the money isn't doing anything just yet until i invest it. i'm still not sure how where i should put the money, i'm entirely clueless on the matter. added to this complication is the only trump tariff and international trade war, with the market fluctuating wildly. so i've been basically cramming on investment info, trying to figure out what i should be doing.

don't know why, but i did some research on cannabis vaporizers today. i think it was because i got a discount card in the mail for a nearby cannabis dispensary that opened recently. that led me on a search for cannabis smoking tools, and i learned about all the pros and cons about using a vaporizer versus a traditional pipe. and with 4/20 around the corner, a lot of online vape dealers were having sales. if i was to ever buy a vaporizer, it'd be the XMAX starry 4 from POTV ($79). i realize i enjoy comparison shopping for things i have no interests in buying, just to know what the best product is for whatever category.

i spent the rest of the day catching up on a backlog shows and movies. the new season of the last of us started this past weekend, i still haven't seen the first episode yet. i've kind of lost interest in the show, especially since i know about the shocking plot twist that will happen this season. zombie survival shows are just too depressing. i watched the latest episode (7) of celtics city, about the death of reggie lewis and the rick pitino years. episode 10 of the hunting party only because eliza coupe (of happy endings) guest stars as this week's serial killer.

as for movies, i started watching lucio fulci's 1987 horror aenigma. set in fictional st.mary's college in boston, it's the classic tale of mean girls preying on a fellow student causing her to be in a coma. the girl's mother works at the school as the custodian, and either she has supernatural powers or/and her daughter has them as well, systemically killing those responsible. the film seems to be shot in english but dubbed in italian then redubbed back into english. the acting is pretty terrible, but i love all the 80's references, from the posters in the girls' dorm rooms to the many swatches adorning wrists.

i'm also watching all the right noises (1971), about a married father who has an affair with an actress at the theater company where he works as a lighting technician. it's later revealed she's only 15 years old. it stars olivia hussey, famous for her underage performance in zeffirelli's romeo and juliet (1968), once again playing an underaged character (she may in fact still be underage when this film was made).

finally last night i started watching the new japanese anime series dan da dan. i'd heard about it when it first came out, but didn't seem that interesting. then i saw a t-shirt with a maneki-neko giving the middle finger, which led me down a rabbit hole until i discovered it was a character in dan da dan. after watching some positive youtube reviews, i decided to watch the show, and it's actually surprisingly good. hard to explain the premise, but there are ghosts and aliens, a hot grandmother who's also an exorcist, a girl with telekinetic and psychic abilities, and a boy possessed by an evil spirit who stole his manhood (literally).

i started making the quiche close to 7pm. according to my records, the last time i made quiche was back in august 2022, so almost 3 years ago. not sure why the long hiatus, but i feel like my record is wrong and i made quiche earlier than that. the ham i was using was better than readymade cubed ham because it was smoked and had more flavor. as far as recipes go, this one is fairly easy. the hard part is waiting 40 minutes to bake then letting it settle and solidify for another half hour.

when the quiche was done, it was still very gooey in the middle. by that point - close to 9pm - i was so hungry i didn't care anymore. i had two slices, all that cheese and ham and eggs and spinach was so filling i didn't do any snacking afterwards.

i woke up early so i could ride to the porter square post office and drop off my state tax returns. the forecast said nothing about rain but the ominous sky said otherwise, though it was dry for now. i thought the line would be snaking out the door on tax day, but there were just a handful of customers inside. i put my envelope in the mail slot, where there was a note saying all letters dropped would be timestamped for today.

i had some spare time, so instead of heading to the cafe, i went to star market next door to get some weekly special 99¢/lbs. smoked ham. i found what i was looking for and went to pay.

when i stepped outside, everything was wet. big fat drops were falling from the sky. i had no choice but to press forward, hoping it'd clear up soon. it ended up doing the exact opposite, becoming a torrential downpour. during the summer i could probably take shelter underneath a tree, but in early spring, with none of the trees leaving out yet, there was no place to hide. my pants, my jacket, were entirely soaked by the time i made it to the cafe.

at first i thought i could work through wet clothes, but i was thoroughly soaked, down to my shoes and underwear. i waited for my parents to arrive before i borrowed the car and drove back to my place to change into some dry clothes before returning to the cafe.

earlier when my parents first arrived at the cafe, my father brought his laptop. i opened up the H&R block taxing software and checked the status of my sister's tax returns. she supposed to get a confirmation e-mail yesterday, but she didn't get anything. either something went wrong, or she typed in the wrong e-mail. thankfully when i checked the status in the software, it said both federal and state had been accepted. and just like that, we survived another tax season.

business was slow today. our regular late morning customer allen didn't show up, and by afternoon we still hadn't made our daily average yet, though the usual early evening bump would probably put us over. my sister's godmother showed up in the afternoon to pick up the woozoo fan we bought for her from costco. my mother and her then walked down to the fresh pond mall, didn't come back until 1-1/2 hours later.

my father was busy cutting up the nearly 60 lbs. of beef shank we bought from restaurant depot yesterday. even though we got a whole case, it'd only last us for 3 batches of beef noodle soup before we need to buy more, so like about a month's supply.

i went to my sister's backyard to check out the barbecue grill in her shed. it's weber genesis E-310, first generation (2007-2010), with control knobs on the right side instead of in front of the grill. i like that even though the grill is nearly 2 decades old, weber still manufactures a lot of replacement parts. i thought the grill was brand new but i could see it's been used before. for example, chunks of paint inside the lid were peeling off. nevertheless, it still looks to be in pretty good shape. my father and i plan on moving it back to belmont after work on saturday, making grill a few things to test it out.

in the late afternoon i made smoked white fish bagel sandwiches for my parents and myself.

we started to get busy again by 5pm. thankfully my sister was there, marinating her salmon, and was able to help my father with the drinks while my mother and i worked the back kitchen. it was busier than lunchtime. my mother sold some knitwear, to a return customer who bought from her before. today turned out to the be busiest single day this month so far.

other than the freak downpour this morning (i was unlucky enough to get caught in), the weather today was pretty nice, a mixture of sun and clouds with temperature in the mid 60's. but starting at 5pm the sky darkened and it began to rain again. such that when it came closing time, i couldn't leave the cafe until it stopped raining. my parents had already left while i stayed behind, watching the doppler radar. i finally left when it tapered down to a drizzle. i wasn't going to get soaked for a second time today!

i brought home some meigancai with pork on rice for dinner. since i had a bagel sandwich before leaving work, i wasn't very hungry, and didn't eat until after 9pm.

there was a hawks-magic game tonight. the winner would face the celtics, while the loser would go on to another game in the play-in with the winner of that game facing the cavs. i still don't like the play-in tournament. it's confusing, and forces lower ranked teams to play extra games before they can compete in a playoff series, thus giving an additional advantage to higher ranked teams. there are reasons why the NBA does this and i can sort of understand but i still don't like it.

woke up at 9am, left around 9:30am, biking to belmont for a supply run. i got there by 10am, we were ready to go, but my father wanted to send the honda to the mechanic first because one of the tire was leaking. so i drove my mother and i to the car shop to pick up my father. but he called and told us the mechanic was going to fix the tire right away, so we went back to the house to wait for him. he didn't come back until 11am. we ended up taking the honda as it has a bigger cargo space and we were planning on buying a lot of things.

cutting through watertown center to get to needham, i spotted a new popeye's restaurant right next to thai amarin. the closest popeye's to me so far have been either in revere (on the parkway) or roxbury (on MLK boulevard), both hard to get to. but a popeye's in neighboring watertown? (technically netwon) that's very good news! a search online revealed they opened just 4 month ago (probably the start of 2025). a bike ride from my house would take half an hour, but by car/motorcycle it'd just be 18 minutes, and from my parents' place only 10 minutes. i haven't had a good place to get fast & cheap fried chicken in ages, i've since resorted to the porter square fried chicken to get my fix. there's also bonchon in harvard square, but despite being delicious they're notoriously expensive.

first stop was the needham heights restaurant depot (RD). my parents went to the everett restaurant depot last sunday but they didn't have everything in stock. fortunately that was not the case here in needham. we bought a 60lbs. box of beef shank (for making beef noodle soup) as well as half a dozen 3-compartment hinged containers (8x8x3) for our bentos. they also had the mini tin cans of pineapple juice we use for single-serving smoothies. RD also had cases of eggs, $82.76 for 15 dozen, which comes out to 46¢/egg. cheaper than what it was a month ago, but still expensive. we opted for eggs elsewhere.

we bought so much at restaurant depot, we nearly filled up the car (thankfully we had the honda, we would never be able to carry everything in the toyota sedan), and we still had two other places to visit.

second stop was the waltham market basket which requires some highway driving. here we source our pork. we've bought pork in bulk, but the disadvantage is not being able to inspect all the meat beforehand, and we're liable to get some bad cuts. we prefer pork butts with a lot of marbling, which makes for the best charsiu pork. the butcher department will also grind the pork for us into two different consistency, depending on what we're making (minced pork or zhajiang sauce). of course we come to market basket for our weekly groceries as well. i went to return several bags of deposit cans and bottles first before finding my parents in the supermarket.

the third place we went to was the nearby waltham costco. by that point we had barely any space left in the car. we got our eggs here, $7.69 for 2 dozen large whites, with a limit of 3 per customer. we still have eggs from when my parents bought a case from restaurant depot, but we got some more here just in case we run out. costco also finally had their large bag of miracle-gro potting soil, but i already planted my seeds. we still need a bag (or two) to repot our plants, but with no space in the car, we'll come back for potting soil next weekend.

we got back on the highway and returned to the cafe. getting off the route 2 exit ramp, we stopped by the fresh pond trader joe's. my mother was searching for these tote bags so saw on xiaohongshu. i didn't believe her, but they had them, as well as these larger stiffer tote boxes she said she wanted to use to store her yarn.

it was almost 2pm by the time we made it to the cafe. it took us half an hour to unload all the supplies before we left for belmont.

for a late lunch we had some baguette with brie. we also had ingredients for making smoked white fish bagel sandwiches, but we were already full from the bread so decided to do bagel sandwiches tomorrow at the cafe.

i sat down to finally my tax returns, with the deadline just tomorrow. i put money into a fidelity roth IRA then submitted my federal tax returns via e-file. for state i'm going to send it via mail, drop off the letter at the post office tomorrow morning. i know they say to get it certified, but i've never certified my tax returns, they always get there okay. i figured dropping it off at the post office will at the very least get it postmarked by tomorrow, which is all i care about.

my sister didn't show up until the late afternoon. i helped her finish her taxes yesterday, but she didn't have a check to do the bank transaction until today. she filed both her federal (free) and state ($20) electronically, i didn't bother complaining to her that she'd save money if she just sent her state via mail (like i'm doing).

the weather today was nice for a change, warm 68° and dry. i was watering the plants in the grow room before my sister showed up. afterwards i was out in the backyard with esmei. wholly disobedient, esmei does come when called. the only way to attract her attention was to wave a large stick so she'd try to grab it out of my hand so she could play tug.

my father was going to replace the crossover tubes in our barbecue grill. earlier i replaced the thermometer, even though it wasn't the one that was shown in the amazon ad. i suggested we give the grill some light cleaning before installing the new tubes. that's when saw that the bottom of the grill had corroded completely, where the hot burning food grease could potentially drip onto the propane tank and cause an explosion. the grill was no longer safe to use. after so many years (we bought this charbroil in june 2012), and several parts replaced, it's finally time to retire this grill. there's a stainless steel weber grill in my sister's backyard shed that belongs to alex. every year my father says he wants to move it to belmont so we could use it, but i've always said no because it doesn't belong to us. i don't know if alex will ever use it, so the meantime we're going to "borrow" it. i'm thinking maybe i move it to my parents' backyard on wednesday, so we can try out the new grill this weekend. the only bad thing about the weber is it doesn't have a side burner. i saw a stainless steel nexgrill-brand (never heard of them before) grill selling at home depot for $350 that does have a side burner. that may be the grill we get if we decide to buy a new one.

tonight was one of these rare times when after dinner i was able to make my own way home, since i biked here to belmont. unfortunately i experienced some hemorrhoidal flare-ups this morning, so the ride back was unpleasant. i couldn't wait to get home so i could rest my ass.

after a shower, i printed out my state tax returns and stuffed it inside an envelope along with a check. i put two forever stamps on it, which should be enough.

today was chang-shifu's funeral. i wasn't planning on going, and when my father called me last yesterday asking if i was going to go, i confirmed i wasn't. but i felt bad not going. this was the last time i'd get to say good bye. i'm not good at funerals anyway, but i thought i should've gone out of respect. the service started at 11am and didn't end until 1pm. besides my parents, my sister went as well, which i thought unusual, since she didn't really know chang-shifu all that well.

so i slept late this sunday morning, didn't wake up until 10am. after a shower, i waited for my parents to get in touch with me so i could get a ride to belmont. i waited a long time and it was my sister who called, offering me a ride when she returned to cambridge to pick up her dog.

during that time i walked a few blocks to drop off my community garden dues ($15). coming back, there was an open house on my street that i checked out. it's probably the only single family home in the neighborhood, a 3-story house with a parking spot for $2.4 million, which i honestly thought was a steal (i thought it'd be $3 million). the original owner bought the property next door and turned it into a private garden. the house has 5 bedrooms, a gas fireplace, a 2nd floor street facing porch, a private backyard, and solar panels. the real estate agent confided in me that she didn't think it'd go for the asking price, and there'd probably be a bidding war to buy the property.

i didn't get to belmont until 2:30pm. my parents brought back some food from the funeral. i had a spicy noodle dish (kathy said it was chang-shifu's favorite) with beef tendons. my mother said there were a lot of people at the service, so much so there was hardly any place to sit. so it was a good thing i didn't go after all.

my sister came to belmont so she could finish working on her taxes, but esmei was crying during the whole car ride, so my sister took her out for a hike first before coming back to do her taxes.

i worked on my own tax returns. i still don't understand why i don't see any deductions when i add a traditional IRA to my taxes for 2024. i did log into my fidelity account and create a new account for a roth IRA. at the very least i should put some money away for retirement. i still have a few days to think about it. with the market volatility, now doesn't seem like a good time to do any sort of investments.

otherwise this sunday was pretty boring. it was raining outside intermittently, wet and cold. when my sister finally got back, she worked on adding some charitable contributions to her tax returns, while i took esmei outside. my sister didn't have enough contributions, so even after all that work, her tax payments didn't change at all.

after dinner my father gave me a ride back to cambridge. i'm supposed to come back tomorrow morning so we can do a needham-waltham supply run.

i thought the cold rain would stop by the time i started heading out to the cafe but it kept on raining. so i put on my rain gear and took the bike. here and there i spotted snow on cars and on garden beds. elsewhere in massachusetts with high elevation i heard some towns got up to 9 inches of snow.

for the first two hours that we were opened, the only business we got was from the next door hairdresser who ordered some food ahead of time. it was starting to look bleak.

i did have time to replace the prefilter on the levoit vacuum cleaner. you're supposed to replace it every 6 months. i did notice the vacuum was starting to smell a little bit, all that dust clogged in the prefilter. i also cleaned out the vacuum while i was at it.

i made some smoked white fish salad bagel sandwiches for my 2nd aunt to try. this after we introduced her to smoked sprats last week (she in turn introduced it to all her senior center friends). white fish salad is easier to work with and the best thing is you can buy it in most supermarkets.

beginning at 1pm we started to get a few more customers. a group of half dozen friends came in for brunch, that really saved up. in our final hour we didn't see anymore customers and started cleaning up early.

it wasn't raining when i went home at 4pm, but there was a mist in the air that dampened everything. i put back on my rain gear only because i didn't have anywhere else to put it and my bike seat was wet anyway.

relaxing back at home, i started rewatching game of thrones again. i began in season 6 with episode "oathbreaker". jon snow's resurrection and daenerys goes to vas dothrak to retire in the dosh khaleen. i haven't seen GOT since it's first run, forgot how great it was.

i did two loads of laundry, then spent some time folding everything while listening to spotify in my bedroom.

for dinner i heated up a hungry-man frozen dinner. i grew up on frozen and canned meals, and i haven't had hungry-man in decades. this was a hungry-man selects meal, which is there more high brow option. i had the spicy classic fried chicken. it took 50 minutes to heat up in the oven. it was kind of awful. the mashed potato was bland, more like eating hot paste. the mixed vegetables were rubbery. the chicken tasted like shake & bake, not fried at all. and the dessert was this warm apple jelly with a few chunks of apple. i have another hungry-man in the freezer but i'm afraid to eat it now.

i've been getting good quality sleep the past few weeks, especially ever since i got a cold. i figured i needed all the recovery time i could get, going to bed around 11pm, falling asleep by midnight, getting some good 8 hours of sleep. unfortunately last night was not one of those nights. i stayed up late planting indoor seeds, didn't finish until 12:30am. i was in bed by 1am, but watched videos in bed until 2am, so only managed 6 hours of sleep.

i went to star market this morning before working. 99¢ sale on ham, but of course they were all out. instead i got some shaved steak and two large but unripe cantaloupes.

today was another busy day, in a week where we've had nothing but busy days despite the sometimes bad (cold, rainy) weather. i made some banchan with old bean sprouts. i had some tripes. more tong hao in chicken soup with tofu over rice. the two potted jasmines both suffered pest infestations: not only mealybugs but what appears to be spider mites as well. i sprayed with alcohol and my father cut off a bunch of the stems, but i think the only real way to cure these plants of pest is to spray them with bifenthrin. i did that with most of our grow room plants, and not a single one of them have mealybugs or spider mites. of course that means these jasmines can't go outside for the next few months, and will have to be houseplants for the time being.

i continue to manage my cold symptoms. surprisingly, i'm symptom free when i wake up in the morning. i think some mouth breathing because of my snoring dries up my throat, with the side effect of temporarily clearing up my post-nasal drip. but the moment i get to the cafe my symptoms kick in. the bit of labor from the bike ride ends in a serious coughing fit. now i'm starting to wonder if some of it isn't spring allergy symptoms thrown into the mix. i had a zantac but it didn't seem to do anything. cough i control through cough drops. periodically i blow my nose, thick viscous discharge.

we had zero customers in the final 1-1/2 hours. that's typical of a friday, a lot of people have weekend plans that don't involve a visit to our cafe first. the weather was still cold when we left, more winter than spring. at least it wasn't raining, which won't be the case this weekend where once more it's expected to be wet. despite all the winter snow and spring rain, much of eastern MA is still in a drought stage, the aftermath of the dry summer we had last year.

i had the last of my leftover gyudon for dinner. i'm getting better at assembling everything, from heating up the gyudon and rice in the microwave, to chopping up the scallions, to making a poached egg on the stovetop. it was okay but i'm pretty gyudon'ed out. i look forward to eating something else.

hornets played the celtics tonight. boston had everyone available except jaylen brown. charlotte led for much of the first half, though only by single digits, so boston was always within striking distance. i think the celtics were just pacing themselves. in the second half the celtics flipped a switch and not only regained the lead but continued to expand upon it. 4th quarter was played with bench players, and in the final minutes it was the bench bench players. celtics win 94-130.

i made smoked white fish salad bagel sandwiches in the morning. when asked, both my parents prefer the smoked white fish versus the smoked sprats. smoked sprats are oily and hard to eat in a sandwich, while the smoked white fish salad goes on the bagels like a savory spread with no oils.

i had some tong hao. my family isn't big on tong hao, it's more common with cantonese cuisine. my father blanched it in some chicken soup. it shrank in size like spinach, and has a similar mouthfeel to spinach, but with a more fragrant pungent flavor. the leaves reminded me of chrysanthemums, so i wasn't surprised when i looked up tung hao and found it is a type of edible chrysanthemum.

in the afternoon i helped my father deep fry two boxes of marinated salt & pepper chicken after we nearly ran out. while he fried, i breaded the chicken in coarse potato starch. we cooked with the kitchen door closed like last night, it helps to keep the fry oil smell from getting to the rest of the cafe. afterwards we fried some frozen vegetarian spring rolls.

it was another busy day, we made above our average profit. we were busier in the late afternoon than we were during lunchtime. bentos were the most popular, we sold more than a dozen. we were light on our beef noodle soup sale, just a few.

i heard noises from upstairs when i got home. i checked my webcam and sure enough, i saw my upstairs neighbors returning home in the afternoon. they were supposed to be gone for 6 weeks, they left on march 2nd, so i wasn't expecting them back until mid-april. i'm sorry that my peace and quiet has been cut short. i wonder if something happened and they came home early?

for dinner i had some left gyudon. there was no celtics game on tonight, so instead i watched the cavaliers-pacers game. i was rooting for indiana. even though cleveland clinched the number one seed last night, a pacers victory could potentially push indiana into the 3rd seed. plus i just like seeing cleveland lose. pacers won 112-114.

the main event of the day - the thing i've been thinking about all day, perhaps all month - is to finally start some seeds indoors. i wasn't entirely procrastinating, earlier i'd already picked out the seeds i wanted to plant. so my strategy this year is to not start so many seeds indoors. blue beans and long beans, i plan on growing them indirectly in the raised beds. when i started them indoors, they'd get so leggy, that by the time i transplanted them into the garden, they weren't in very good shape.

i didn't start planting until 10pm. i'm mostly reusing old plastic cup containers from last year. i few of them were cracked so i tossed those out, but they were good for the most part. i figured out how many pots i needed, filled them up with miracle-gro soil, then watered them in a bucket in the sink before planting my seeds. i got the miracle-gro potting soil from home depot, and they're kind of coarse, not as high quality as the potting soil i typically get from costco (so far unavailable).

here is the breakdown:

plant	quantity	notes
tomato 'independence day'	12	2 seeds per pot. i don't plan on growing a dozen tomatoes, i'll give away some of them.
kabocha 'ebay'	5	bought these off of ebay last year.
kabocha 'haymarket'	7	harvested from a sweet kabocha squash i bought from haymarket last year. we saved the seeds, not sure if they'll germinated. 2 seeds per pot.
hyacinth beans	12	harvested from beans we grew last year. don't plan on raising all of them, will give some away. 2 seeds per pot.
peppers 'corkscrew long horn'	6	these are seeds i purchased from ebay back in 2024. i grew them successfully last year. i overwintered some of the plants, but not sure if they'll all survive. growing a few more from seeds just in case.
thai basil	6	i grow thai basil every year, even though i hardly use them. they're just easy to grow, pest resistant, and i like having some around.
bitter melon	16	seeds harvested from last year's crop. i'm germinating them first on wet paper towels because i had a hard time growing them directly from soil last spring.
luffa 'ebay'	9	purchased them off of ebay last year. grew them successfully, but had some leftover seeds i decided to germinate. sprouting them in wet paper towels like the bitter melons, just so i could make sure the seeds are alive before i plant them.
luffa 2024	10	we managed to harvest some luffa seeds last year, but can't sure if the seeds are viable, so i'm germinating them in wet paper towels first. if none of these sprouts, i still have a few more leftover ebay seeds i can grow.
lavender	12	i think i tried last year and none of them germinate. i don't think these old seeds are viable anymore. growing them in a dozen starter cells.
foxgloves	12	foxglove seeds are like dust and very difficult to sprout and keep alive. i'm growing them in starter cells so i can keep an eye on them if they do germinate.
snapdragon 'fordhook'	12	tiny seeds as well, starting in starter cells to keep better track of them.
snapdragon 'tall rust-resistant'	12	i got these seeds from the dollar store last year at 4 pack for $1. not even sure if they're viable, growing them in starter cells for fun.

i put all the potted plants in the guest bedroom. i wrote "4-11" as the date on all of them when it's actually 4-10. the wet paper towel seeds require heat, so i put them next to the heating vent, but i may plug in my seed starter mat just to help them sprout successfully.

i didn't finish until 12:30am. i quickly flushed, took my drugs, and got ready for bed.

i went to market basket this morning to get a few supplies for the cafe. once again a surprisingly cold day, temperature 35 degrees. i wore my wool thermal underwear, the first time in weeks. after i finished i biked directly to the cafe, getting there around 11:30am.

my mother told me esmei ran away this morning. a nearby security guard grabbed ahold of her, said she almost got hit by traffic. he brought esmei to jeanna the dog groomer, who recognized esmei (she wasn't even wearing her tags) and called my sister. my sister had her phone turned off so jeanna called the cafe, told my parents she had esmei. my mother didn't believe her at first, until she went and looked and saw esmei there.

my 2nd aunt was working at the cafe today and i made smoked sprat bagel sandwiches for everyone. before we could eat however, we started getting busy, so i ended up staying and helping out. i didn't leave until after noontime.

i took the car and drove to the watertown home depot to get some supplies. earlier i discovered i didn't have my phone with me (left it at home), so i borrowed my mother's phone. i got some silicone caulk ($9) to plug the leaking rain barrel, a bag of caladiums on sale ($5), and a bundle of wooden furring strips for our portable bean pole project (15 strips at about $2 each).

i got to my parents' place around 1pm. despite the temperature, the sun was out, and after working in the backyard, i took off my jacket. i fixed the leaking rain barrel. it wasn't just one barrel, but three barrels had tiny spigot leaks. i applied silicone caulk on all three. i planted some foxglove and lupine seeds behind the garage and some more lupine seeds near the rain barrel next to the basement entrance (with the asters). i tilled RB0 and sowed some radish seeds in 1/3 of the bed. i also tilled the back ends of all the other remaining raised beds and planted peas - some to eat while others purely ornamental and fragrant. i finally got the daffodil bulbs out of the glass vase and replanted them along the western edge of the backyard.

i finished around 3pm and returned to the cafe. on the radio i heard the news that trump has put a 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs with the exception of china where trump is further increasing tariffs. by now his shtick is getting old, i've seen this play multiple times already. i left the car and rode my bike back home. around 4pm i returned to market basket to get a few more things. in particular, i was craving some hot & sweet pickles.

the other big thing i had to do today was plant some seeds indoors. i kept pushing it off, looks like today will not be the day. i'm already late with my planting by 2 weeks.

for dinner i made some gyudon. it's not the most complicated recipe, but it still took a little time to prepare. i pulled out a package of shaved steak from the freezer, must've been a year old, not the freshest meat. i used an older recipe that halved all the liquid ingredients but i still had plenty of sauce left because of ice crystal melting from the shaved steak.

there was a celtics-magics game, but boston only used their bench players, so naturally celtics lost 76-96. boston has just two more games left in the regular season, both against the hornets at home, friday and sunday.