a grubhub delivery order came in this morning. we started preparing it and was nearly finished when i realized it was delayed order and wasn't until 12:30pm. a bit later another grubhub order came in. we knew it was trouble by how long the ticket was when it printed out. it was a company in watertown that'd ordered before. they're especially difficult because each item has different combinations of utensils and sauces and they also ask us to put their names on everything. they ordered 12 things but grubhub typically only gives us 15 minutes to prepare everything. luckily its algorithm knew it was a big order and gave up the option of adding more time. we asked for 50 minutes. of course grubhub failed to tell the driver, so he arrived 20 minutes early, and seemed to be annoyed that we didn't have the order ready yet. once the order finally went out, we'd already earned a good chunk of our daily profit. of course it wouldn't show up in our point-of-sale tracking since square and grubhub aren't compatible.

i made ham-egg-cheese english muffin sandwiches this morning (my mother helped me fry the eggs), but it got so busy, i didn't have my sandwich until 3pm. wrapped in aluminum foil, it was still pretty good.

the tenant renting the middle commercial space on our block had contractors come in today and do some preliminary work (putting down papers). i heard it's going to be a korean bakery.

my sister kept bringing esmei around the cafe, and kept coming inside. the kitchen is off limit to dogs, so we tied esmei to the railing of the parking lot deck, where she seems to enjoy watching all the commotions: cars driving by, planes in the air, people walking on the sidewalk. she never barks (or show much canine emotion for that matter), but did happily greet a complete stranger who came up to pet her.

my mother finished the patriotic pussy hat. it's a little oversized, so she's knitting a new one that's smaller and doesn't cover up your entire head. speaking of knitting, somebody came in the afternoon and bought some of my mother's knitwear. i thought maybe it was the new pussy hat but it was something else.

we started using the backup batch of tea eggs. usually when that happens, i made a new backup batch. however we didn't have enough eggs. yes we could buy new eggs, but fresh eggs make for bad tea eggs, since they're harder to peel. the best eggs are old eggs, so i'm going to bring all of mine from home and asked me parents to bring their old eggs from belmont. this current batch i used the store bought tea egg spice packet, since we still have so much but i haven't touch them ever since i started making my own spice packets.

another big surprise from yesterday: that case of linguine noodles we got from restaurant depot on monday? turns out instead of individual packets, it was just two large packets, each 10 lbs. worth of noodles. so apparently these linguine noodles come in two varieties. it's not like we can't use them, but it's a bit of hassle to parcel out individual 1 lbs. portions of linguine.

i ordered another pair of baseus earbuds that arrived yesterday. my father took home the first pair, but he still seemed to be struggling with the ones he has at the cafe, so i gave him the second pair. he really likes how good they sound, especially with the active noise cancelling feature, as well as multipoint capacity paired to both the laptop and the phone. when my aunt showed up in the late afternoon, he let her try them and she was sold on their quality immediately. she asked me to buy her a pair. on amazon they were selling for $40 but there was a 50% off coupon which reduced the price to $20.

my original plan was to go try spotting comet tsuchinshan-altas after sunset, with today being the first day in the northern hemisphere that we can see it in the evening. however it was very low to the horizon (just 3° i read, below venus even which is typically low on the twilight horizon anyway), and i couldn't find a place where i could get an unobstructed view of the western sky. so i decided tomorrow would be a better day, despite the fact that i brought all my equipment (telephoto lens, tripod, binoculars) with me.

after we closed, my mother heated up some leftover beef noodle soup broth and our personal stash of beef tendons (the parts we don't serve to customers). my parents at at the cafe while i took my portion home.

i showered when i got back home. i didn't reheat the beef noodle soup until 9:30pm. i was feeling kind of cold earlier, but a nice bowl of beef noodle soup warmed me up quick. maybe that's why it's been such a big hit this week: we exhausted our supply and made a new batch yesterday. this weekend we're out searching for beef shank, which is what we use in the recipe. because we use our personal stash of beef, the amount of meat is triple what we'd normally offer customers, so it's pretty decadent if you're a meat lover.

i ate while watching the series finale between the padres and dodgers. it was a low scoring affair, with former red sox player kike hernandez's solo homerun in the second inning was more than enough to win the game. neither shohei ohtani or mookie betts had a hit. dodgers scored another solo homerun in the 7th inning for insurance. san diego had zero runners. the final score was 0-2. in the post-game interview, kike asked if he was live before dropping an f-bomb on national television.

two more signs of transitioning to winter mode: i switch to my heavyweight winter comforter. it was such a game changer when i bought it last november, i regret not buying it sooner but instead suffering needlessly in my cold bed with my light comforter. i like that it keeps me warm at night when i'm sleeping, but i also like that it's slightly heavy, so that it's almost like a weighted blanket. i got the same comforter for the guest bedroom in a twin size (due to arrive next week). the second thing i did tonight was bust out my fleece sweat pants. i've gotten used to traipsing inside the house in my boxers, but now that the temperature has dropped, i can't do that anymore. regular pants are too constricting, that where the sweat pants come in.

it felt a little chilly in the house this morning. cold enough that i went out on the back porch and brought in all my plants, didn't want the cold weather to damage them. the temperature tonight will drop into the lower 40's.

it was so busy today at the cafe, i didn't eat or drink anything. the moment i arrived until the time we closed, i was busy non-stop. in the morning we were making preparations, like making new batches of beef noodle soup, chinese sausages, tea eggs, and boba pearls. i brought leftover food from yesterday but there was no time to do anything with them. once the customers started showing up, it was just a slog. normally we have breaks when things slow down but not today. it definitely made the day go by faster, as exhausting as it was.

we unboxed the vevor meat grinder for the very first time because my father wanted to try grinding some leftover fatty pork. i washed all the equipment and had everything set up to grind for the very first time, but we got busy and eventually i put the grinder away for another day. it came with a manual but the directions were confusing, with mixed translation from english to french, and the syntax was very much chinglish. it took us the longest time to figure out how to insert the grinder attachment into the motor.

replacement pre-filters and main filters for the levoit IQ40 vacuum arrived last week. today i finally got around to replacing them. it made a dramatic difference: the vacuum seemed to be losing suction power for a while, and would slow down frequently saying it was clogged when it wasn't. with new filters, it was like a brand new vacuum, it picked up everything. i used it for so long the battery ran out of juice.

my mother started on the patriotic pussy hat. she'll probably either finish it tonight or tomorrow. there's enough yarn to make at least another one if not more. i think it'll be a hit with customers, especially weeks away from election day. i'm pushing my mother to knit a few more.

the kitchen can be a dangerous place: in the flurry of activities, i managed to burn my thumb on the side of a heating pot that was probably 450 degrees. the burn actually left an indentation on my skin which i'd never seen before. i rinsed it immediately under cold water then kept a bag of ice on it until the ice melted. that seemed to do the trick because i can't even see where i got burned.

we sold over a dozen bento boxes today of every variety as well as close to a dozen beef noodle soup. good thing we made a batch today because we went from 40+ servings last week down to single digits today. while ladeling the soup into containers, my mother spilled the broth all over the table. it took plenty of paper towels to clean up the mess followed by some mopping.

i left with a spicy tofu bento box that my mother had made for dinner. i ate as soon as i got home, washed it down with two glasses of polar orange dry soda.

there was a thursday night football game on amazon prime between the 49ers and seahawks. i only watched the first half, it looked like san francisco was going to run away with the game, scoring 16-3 at the half. there was also a baseball playoff game between the yankees and royals. new york won, advancing to the ALCS final.

i heard reports of possible aurora action tonight, but i hear those all the time. i even checked the aurora forecast map, and it didn't look like it was going to reach massachusetts. however later in the evening when i looked on reddit, i started seeing a bunch of aurora photos from around boston. around 7:30pm seemed to be when there was a spike in aurora activity. so i went outside (10:30pm) and casually took a photo of the sky in the very light polluted residential landscape with the horizon mostly blocked off by building. there seemed to be a magenta smudge in the sky. at first i thought maybe it was just glare from the street lights, but i took a few more photos and the magenta seemed to be fixed in the sky. aurora! i walked down the street taking sky photos, and every one had a magenta smudge. excitedly i called my sister to let her know, but she couldn't be bothered to witness a rare celestial event here in new england. i went as far as the star market parking lot, where i had a better view of the sky. i could faintly make out what seemed to be a grey foggy area in the sky, but using the camera phone, it appeared as a magenta colored cloud.

i went back home to grab my dSLR, but by the time i came back out, the aurora had already started to fade. i got better photos using the camera phone than i did with the digital camera. back at the star market parking lot, there was another guy there - nate - who brought his tripod and his camera. he showed me photos his family took from rhode island that had a deep magenta colored sky. using my phone i could still capture the aurora, but it was getting fainter.

i think i just got very lucky, because i read postings of people who went outside to look for the aurora and didn't see anything. supposedly tomorrow we might have another chance to see it but on the news the local meteorologist said chances were slim, and that tonight was the peak. apparently people as far as mexico might be able to see the aurora tonight.

i didn't get out of bed until 9:45am, the few days where i don't have to wake up early. i used the bathroom and changed into my running clothes before leaving the house by 10:30am. temperature was a little chilly - in the 50's - but it was ideal running weather as it felt plenty warm in the sun. the utility company hired tree trimmers to trim the sidewalk trees on my street in preparation for the winter so weak branches don't break off and snap the power lines. i listened to pod save america ("billionaire personality disorder") before switching over to my robert moses powerbroker podcast. i haven't ran since last wednesday, and there's a good chance today will be my only run this week. coming back i bumped into bruce. we chatted about the upcoming election and the slew of southern hurricanes. we made tentative plans one of these wednesdays to get some middlesex fells action.

i was already dry by the time i got home i didn't bother taking a shower. i called the gift card number to figure out why my parents' visa reward cards didn't work when i tried to use them on amazon. the operator i spoke with - martha (though she sounded very indian) - said the cards had some restrictions with she removed and that i could try them again after 24 hours. for lunch i had an instant cup of spicy korean noodles.

after lunch i went out to run errands. so my original plan was to ride out to the malden 88 supermarket to get some yellow pickled daikon radishes. if i did that it'd mean we wouldn't have to go to baifu/foodpak this weekend for a supply run. i could also stop by dom's sausage next door and pick up some subs, then get some chinese sausages from bianco & sons on my way back. however when i called my mother to ask if she needed anything else, she told me to get the daikon from reliable market in union square, which is a lot closer. it might cost more, but it'd save me a trip to malden.

so i agreed but took the motorcycle anyway, in case i couldn't find the daikon and would still need to go to malden 88. reliable market did have what i wanted, though natural $2-3 more expensive. i noticed they further expanded their alcohol beverage selection, so now it feels like a liquor store that just happens to sell asian groceries. two old korean ladies worked behind the counter. i noticed they upgraded their payment system to clover, i just chipped my card, they didn't even give me a receipt so i had no idea how much i actually paid.

coming back, i went to market basket for some groceries. originally i was hankering for some old-fashion spaghetti with meat sauce, but there was a sale on pepper ham so i got a pound from the deli and some english muffins to make little ham/egg/cheese sandwiches for dinner.

i got back home by 2pm. i also got a loaf of baguette along with a wheel of brie, and ate half of it for a snack while watching the howard stern kamala harris interview on youtube. i finally had some time to do some retroactive blog updates. i worked on the day where i visited frances and her family in new york city in october 2022. that's how far behind i am, that i still need to update posts from 2 years ago. it's just plugging in the photos, but it takes a long time. i also had to clear up some space on my laptop, and backed up 15GB worth of used data before i cleared it from my computer. i wasn't able to add the photos yet, but i did process about 100 photos for that particular post.

i did three things today that are signs i'm transitioning to winter mode. first, i started treating hot teas again instead of ice water. i even brought out my thermos so i could keep a bottle of hot water in standby whenever i need tea. second, i used my space heater for the first time this season. i was in the bathroom where the temperature was in the lower 60's and it was just too cold so i blasted the space heater until the room was a toasty 70 degrees before it turned off. finally, i went online and bought a heavyweight winter comforter for the guest bedroom. that bedroom has been using a queen size comforter for the longest time, just folded over to make it thicker and warmer. not only did i get the same maple & stone feather down heavyweight comforter i have in the master bedroom (just in a smaller twin size, $45), but i also got a damask stripe duvet cover ($17, burgundy). i used to sleep in the guest bedroom during the winter because it warmer than the larger master bedroom (with its three windows), but ever since i got a new heavyweight comforter for the queen size bed, i like sleeping in the master bedroom during the winter now.

in the early evening i noticed a convoy of planes flying across the sky. some of them were very close to the point where i could hear them roaring overhead and see the planes close enough to know what airlines. i opened up the flight24 website and tracked the planes that were currently leaving logan airport. for some reason they were all departing from runway 33L today. lots of deltas and americans, saw one air france, one aer lingus (ireland), a few jetblues, at least one united, and even a japan airline that was coming in in the background right when a plane was taking off. there were also some small private planes that were flying to other parts of new england (new hampshire, bar harbor, cape cod) but they didn't fly over my area so i didn't see them.

for dinner i made my ham/egg/cheese english muffin sandwich. i discovered that deli ham is not a good meat for english muffin sandwiches. the best meat are thick cuts of smoked ham that gets grilled until they caramelize and turn crispy. deli ham is cold which makes for a weird hot-cold sandwich with the fried egg and toasted english muffins. i'll bring the ingredients to the cafe so my parents can try some, i've already outgrown them.

a bunch of baseball playoff games were happening tonight. i saw the mets beat the phillies to advance to the NLCS final. yankees beat the royals, leading the series 2-1. i didn't realize there was a dodgers-padres game, otherwise i would've watched it. dodgers won 8-0, series tied 2-2. what's really hurts about watching the playoffs is seeing so many former red sox players on other teams. alex verdugo went to the yankees, all clean-shaven i hardly recognized him. mookie betts is on the dodgers, as well as kike hernandez. mets have jd martinez. xander bogaerts is on the padres. phillies have kyle schwarber.

the halogen lightbulb above my bathroom sink winked out tonight. can't remember the last time i replaced it, so it lived for a long time it seems. the bulb is a GY6.35 LED 50W 12v xenon gas halogen. it's the only light in the house that hasn't been replaced with an LED equivalent. when i was first looking for one many years ago, the technology hasn't caught up and no GY6.35 LED was bright up to replace a halogen. but in 2024 there are now viable options. instead of using 50W, i can just use 5W with an LED. unfortunately all the ones i saw are too long to fit in the fixture. finally i came across some that would fit. they have a compact T3 bulb shape. amazon sells them by the pack but i only need one, so i'll probably source it from aliexpress. in the meantime, i have plenty of spare GY6.35 50W 12v halogen bulbs, bought a bunch from ebay a while back, before we even had LED bulbs.

it was so busy today that the day went by quickly, we didn't even realize it was closing time. i was still washing dishes when my mother said it was time to go home and closed the lights. my father today was cutting up the 40 lbs. of boneless chicken thighs he bought from restaurant depot. when he wasn't doing that, he was cutting up pork butts for making charsiu pork.

the baseus earbuds (bowie MA10, $20) i got for my father arrived today. it was sent to my sister's place, i went to pick it up this morning when we ran out of baby cucumbers and she'd taken them all home for safe keeping. i got those earbuds for one very important function: multipoint connection. that way my father could use the same pair of earbuds to listen to audio on both his computer and his phone. one thing i didn't like before i bought them was there was no capacity display other than 4 LED dots. but i think that's fine, you just need to recharge the case before the dots are entirely depleted. the case itself has some heft, don't know the battery size but it supposedly has a 140H capacity. the earbuds themselves are well designed, fit in the ear nicely, and have a rubber seal around the perimeter for better hold and sound sealing. they feature active noise cancelling (versus environmental noise cancellation), so when my father wore both of them, he couldn't hear us when we were calling him. we tried the multipoint feature, connecting both his laptop and his phone. it worked well, pausing the audio on one device while playing on the other, and vice versa. one thing it doesn't do is allow both audios to play, but i don't think any earbuds/headphones can do that. they also have better range: my father went to the bathroom and was still able to hear the audio from his laptop, while his old earbuds could never do that. it worked better on his phone, he managed to walk out to the center of the parking lot and still hear the phone audio. for $20 it's a pretty good deal. later when i went home i ordered another pair for the same price, some prime deal.

for breakfast my father pan-fried the leftover chinese dumplings from last night. i ate some using my homemade hot sauce, the one with the chili oil. i didn't realize how spicy it was. i added some vietnamese garlic hot sauce to give it more flavor.

i replaced the power cord for our deep fryer. the new cord is exactly the same - except it's about a foot longer for some reason.

my sister went to the dog park with esmei and somebody there told her to leave because she didn't want her dogs to get heartworms too. that's not how heartworms spread, but the woman didn't seem to care. that's too bad because esmei only had a few more days where she can be active before she starts her heartworm treatment and has to reduce her physical activities to allow the medication to kill off the adult worms and not have their dead body parts circulating into her lungs.

in the afternoon i went to the porter square michaels to look for red-white-blue yarn so my mother could knit a patriotic pussy hat, which i think would sell very well at the cafe. they were having a sale on all yarn - buy one, get one 50% off. it works out to 25% off on all yarn. i got two different sets of yarn, one a very basic variety, the other a shiny yarn. michaels got rid of all their cashiers so now it's all self check-out, even though there's an employee there who's job is to watch you pay to make sure you're not stealing anything. i always feel really self-conscious when self-checking, i try to be as conspicuous as possible, so as to not cause any suspicions. i open my bag to show i'm not trying to steal anything, and i put all my items out so nothing is hidden.

my sister was at the cafe making a batch of pulled pork. she seems to be working more at the cafe, trying to earn money for esmei's heartworm treatment is the most obvious answer. only because she was there did i feel safe enough to take a quick trip to the nearby crafts store. when i got back they were getting busy again and i immediately started helping out.

kathy called in the late afternoon, ordered two bento boxes for her grandsons. of course she wanted all sorts of substitutions and combinations we normally would never give to any other customers. we hadn't seen them since the spring, when kathy told us the school wouldn't allow lunchtime food deliveries anymore (parents were complaining). it was also along that same time one of her grandson was found to have all sorts of food allergies. before we even saw kathy, her grandson marked right through the kitchen and into the bathroom like he owned the place.

i left with a red roasted beef over rice bento box. saved me from a eating frozen pizza again, though i wouldn't complain if i did. i brought out all the trash cans after i stashed my bike in the alleyway. i had dinner right away, while the food was still hot. there was nothing good on television other than game 3 between the dodgers and padres. san diego won 5-6, and now lead the series 2-1 (best out of 5). can shohei pull out a win in game 4?

while i slept through the rain that was falling this morning, my parents woke up early and left for a needham-waltham supply run around 8:30am. i followed their progress on the map, which helped me to figure out when i should get out of bed. first they went to restaurant depot (RD) before heading to market basket. i got out of bed around 10am. it was grey and rainy outside. my mother called me at 11am, said they were unloading supplies at the cafe. they didn't have any beef shank at RD but we still have enough to make another batch this week. she said they could swing by and give me a ride as it was still raining. heading to belmont, the rain started to pour.

we got to my parents' place a bit before noontime. the reason why my father wanted to get the supply run done early was an akian plumbling consultant was coming by the house to give us an estimate about heat pump installation. dan showed up right around noontime. he put on some booties before coming in the house because it was wet outside. he talked to us, figured out what we wanted to do, and checked out the house including the unfinished attic space. he then used the camera on his ipad and captured a 3D floorplan of the house to figure out how to size the indoor heat pump units. he then went back to his car to work on the estimate.

40 minutes later dan knocked on the door again. he gave us 5 options: 2 ceiling mounted slim cassette units (with or without extended warranty), 2 wall mounted units (with or without extended warranty), and 1 using traditional ducted central air (1 zone) with heat pump. cost? about $50K before rebates. he said we could take advantage of masssave rebates, but everything i read online said that was impossible. turns out it only works if you have gas heating (which is serviced by national grid, not belmont light), which we don't. all we have are the measly belmont rebates (up to $2000) and a $2000 federal tax credit.

one more catch: most likely our ancient 100A electrical panel (installed back in the 1950's) needs to be upgraded to 200A. because we have buried lines, it's a little more involved than overhead lines. dan didn't know how much it'd cost, but he told us upfront that he's seen it go as high as $20K to do the upgrade, depending on if the town needs to dig up the street. we did our own research, and more likely it's around $6000, which involves digging a new trench for the buried conduit line and replacing the panel.

so when it's all over, it looks like it might cost close to $60k to do a full heat pump install with 4 indoor units. that's more than double what my father originally estimated. he said he'd try contacting our HVAC guy xiaowu to see if he can give us an estimate. doing the installation with him most likely means we won't get any extended warranty, but if he can do it, it'll be magnitudes cheaper.

dan finally left a bit after 2pm. my mother reheated the lobster corn chowder from yesterday and both my father and i had some (my mother had already ate earlier).

with night time temperatures dropping into the 40's this week and a few places possibly getting frost, in the late afternoon i started bringing in our tender plants. all the jasmines and the osmanthus can live outside for now. but all the pileas (so many pileas), the rubber plant, the gardenia, the orchids, the spiderworts, the holiday cactuses, jade plant, pennyworts, i moved them all to the sunroom. one strange thing i noticed is at least one of the moth orchids seem to be forming new buds on the old flower spike. could it be in the process of flowering again? normally they don't flower until late winter into early spring.

for dinner my parents made chinese dumplings with the garlic chives i got from chinatown on friday. i wasn't very hungry (since not that long ago i had a big bowl of chowder), so i only ate 15 dumplings. my mother saved the rest, said she'd pan-fry them tomorrow at the cafe.

my father gave me a ride home afterwards.

the cambridge fall classic 5K road race was happening this morning at 9:30am in central square. i marked it on my calendar as something i might want to go to, but decided sleep was more important. besides, it was just a normal road race. cambridge used to have a special costumed halloween run, but that hasn't happened for a while or if ever (i want to say since the pandemic started, but i vaguely remember they stop having them even before then).

there was however something else happening today: the annual honk parade from davis square to harvard square, culminating at the octoberfest celebration. it wasn't until noontime, so i had some time to kill this morning before it started. taking my cues from last year, i opted to walk to davis square. the weather was similar to last year as well, sunny with temperature in the 50/60's. i left by 11:20am, taking just my 55-250mm lens and the fuji 3D camera.

photographing the honk parade is fairly routine at this point. i survey the procession and pick out the most noteworthy individuals to focus on. i shot in manual mode, using my new technique of f/8 aperture and 1600 sec shutter speed with a variable ISO. occasionally - if i remember to do it - i'll switch to my 3D camera, though i probably only took a dozen 3D photos at most. i will also occasionally use my phone camera if i need a wide shot (my telephoto lens prevents me from doing that).

i noticed there seemed to be a watermelon theme for some reason, before realizing it was being used as a symbol of palestinian solidarity (as the watermelon has similar colors with the palestinian flag). last year there was zero palestinian protest, as the parade happened the day after the hamas attacks on israel. this year - a day before the anniversary of the hamas attack - there was definitely a large pro-palestinian group. social justice has always been a big part of the honkfest parade. there's also a pro-tibetan group that marches every year. that makes me wonder if there could be a taiwanese group as well, a population of 20 million people ostracized on the international stage with no ability to claim official statehood due to chinese interference.

after most of the procession had gone through davis square, i followed behind them until i got to mass ave, where i stop to take more photos. i continued walking towards harvard square, stopping once more near my house to take some more photos. the procession doesn't move all that fast, but i can only usually reshoot the back half of the parade as the front half is too far gone for me to catch up. by the time i went home around 1pm, i'd shot about 900 photos.

once i got home, i grabbed my things and left for belmont. my father wanted to make a needham restaurant depot (RD) supply run this afternoon. unfortunately by the time i got to my parents' place around 1:30pm, my mother told me RD closes at 2pm on sundays so it was already too late to go. my mother made some fried eggs and kielbasa sausage which i had some, as well as leftover fried chicken bones from last night.

both my parents were still recovering from their vaccinations yesterday. neither of them seemed to have any side effects, except for some arm soreness. my mother with her incessant crocheting was in better shape since she was "exercising" her arm a lot more.

i went into the backyard in the late afternoon when i noticed the hose was still out on the lawn. while putting it back into storage, i also watered the plants and some grass patches.

around 3:30pm i started making my lobster corn chowder. i seem to be on a chowder kick recently, having made new england clam chowder for my californian relatives which was a real hit. for the lobster chowder i was following an ina garten's recipe. she used 6 cooked lobsters but we only had 2 frozen leftover ones so i scaled back the ingredients by 1/3. my father helped me clean the lobsters by extracting the meat, which is a messy and smelly job (ironic that i'd be making lobster chowder when i can't stand the smell of lobsters). the amount of meat was surprisingly little given how big the two lobsters were. the recipe also called for removing the kernels from ears of corn, which i'd never done before (i usually just buy frozen or canned corn).

to make the stock, i first sautéed some chopped onion in butter before adding all the liquids: 1/4 cup of creamy sherry, 4 cups of whole milk, 2 cups of half & half, and 1 cup of white wine. original recipe called for cream but i used half & half so i could have some semblance of making a healthier chowder. recipe also called for paprika which i didn't have at my parents' place. to the liquid went all the lobster shells and corncobs. covered, i left it all to simmer on low heat for 30 minutes. i was told never to boil milk because its easy to scorch and impart a burnt taste. it was my first time tasting sherry. i love all kinds of sweet wine, from japanese choya umeshu wine, to any kind of moscato. sherry actually reminds me of umeshu wine, it has a very viscous texture and very sweet. it has a surprisingly high alcohol content of 18% and i could already feel a little buzzed just after one sip.

once the stock finished cooking, my father helped me drain the liquid into another pot. everything else - shells, corncobs - we tossed out. it didn't seem like we had enough stock, but since we still needed to add all sorts of additional ingredients, the final chowder would no doubt double in size. i tasted the stock: it had a very good flavor, very milky, but also sweet, which i guess is from the corncobs and lobster shells. just the stock alone tasted like very rich clam chowder, the kind you'd pay an obscene amount at a fancy new england seafood restaurant.

next came the actual chowder ingredients. i first cooked an entire package of hickory smoked thick cut bacon. it was an obscene amount of bacon, rendering an obscene amount of delicious yet fattening bacon grease. once the bacon finished cooking, i scooped them out and cooked the vegetable ingredients in the bacon grease: potatoes, onion, corn. i probably should've cooked them longer just to soften them up some more, but i was impatient so i added the stock. this i left simmering on low-medium heat for 15 minutes. somewhere in the middle i added the bacon and the lobster meat which i chopped up into smaller bits. 15 minutes wasn't enough as the corn and potato still wasn't tender yet, so we left it simmering for another 10 minutes.

the final lobster corn chowder was so hearty, we didn't need to yet another else for dinner. it's surprisingly sweet. sweetness from the corn, from the milk, from the sherry, from the lobster shells. one way to cut back the sweetness is to not have any corn, but the corn adds a nice texture. i also added way too much bacon. it should be a called a bacon corn chowder instead. in the future, less bacon, or at the very least cook them until they're shrunken and crispy. the lobster meat is kind of like a little surprise whenever you get a bite. the flesh was still very tender and breaks up easily. the lobster chowder would be even more delicious if i followed the recipe and used 6 lobsters instead. the chowder itself was a little thin, not thick like a typical chowder, despite having so much additional ingredients added. i think that's because i normally use potato starch to thicken the soup, but since potatoes were added to this recipe much later, there wasn't enough time for the starch to dissolve. overall, it was still pretty good. the next time i make chowder, i want to try making a salt cod chowder, which i imagine would be pretty tasty.

it wasn't yet 6pm by the time we finished our chowder dinner. i could've gone home but i waited until after 7pm because there was a block party happening on my street and i didn't want to go. when i got back home everyone had already cleared out, but my neighbor franz caught me putting the cover over my motorcycle. "we missed you at the block party," he told me. there's a block party every year but i've only gone one time, and that was at the tail end. i've never gone again since then.

sunday night football was delayed by 1-1/2 hours due to thunderstorms. the game was in pittsburgh, between the cowboys and steelers. it was a low scoring affair until the 2nd half, and more importantly the 4th quarter, when dallas scored 2 touchdowns to win the game after pittsburgh scored their own touchdown but left too much time on the clock. the game didn't end until almost 1am, 20-17. oh yeah, there was a dolphins-patriots game but not worth discussing other than new england losing to a garbage depleted team they should've beaten.

even though on saturdays i have an extra 1-1/2 hours before i need to be at work, it still never seems to be enough time. i was surprised to see it was raining this morning. just a brief stray shower, but enough to wet the streets. had i known i would've stopped the automated sprinkler in belmont from going off this morning.

i went to market basket at 10am to get a few things: milk, oyster crackers, isopropyl alcohol. returning home, i got a text reminder that my prescription was ready for pickup so i detoured to walgreens to go get it. i stopped back at the house to get my things then left for the cafe.

we got a couple of big orders early on that made saturday worthwhile right from the start. the busiest time wasn't noontime but actually around 2pm. not only did we beat last saturday in terms of profit, but this whole week was better than last week.

my 2nd aunt went to union square this morning to visit her shanghai friend. she was looking for the saturday farmer's market but didn't see it. her bus never came so she walked nearly 10,000 steps from union square to the cafe. she went to market basket as well, picking up some lobster rolls for everyone. later i told her there was a farmer's market today in union square (with 33 vendors), she just didn't walk far enough to see it.

after we closed today, i left first for belmont, while my parents gave my 2nd aunt a ride home. we've been watering the front lawn twice daily (8am, 3pm) at 10 minute intervals and all the grass seeds have sprouted. honestly, growing grass isn't that hard, but you need to have a regimented watering schedule. hopefully the grass can get a bit thicker before the end of october early november when the lawn goes dormant. we'll also need to fertilize the lawn at some point, so nutrients will be available when the grass starts growing again in the spring.

my parents returned home and waited for their 5pm covid/flu vaccination appointment at the watertown CVS. afterwards they picked up some thai chicken rice from what da chick for dinner.

there was reports of possible aurora activity tonight. once it got dark, i went outside and took a few photos of the northern sky but i saw nothing. i returned home afterwards.

not much to watch on television tonight unless you're into college football. i watched some youtube videos, that was about the extent of it. i might turn in early tonight, catch up on some sleep.

i woke up at 7:45am this morning to get ready to ride down to chinatown for a supply run. i didn't leave the house until 8:20am. cutting across boston common, i saw people setting up for the jimmy fund walk this sunday. i went to c-mart first to see if they had anything interesting, but left empty-handed, before heading to ming's market.

i bought $70 worth of groceries, including 5 heads of cabbage and 8 containers of butane ($10). it took me a while to pack everything into my rear baskets and my large cardboard box. i used the 3-strap bungie cord to hold the box in place; it worked well and much easier than using bungie netting. i left chinatown by 9:25am and headed home.

i got back a bit before 10am. i had enough time to use the bathroom and take a quick shower before i left by 10:15am, heading to the cafe to work. my parents made a fried egg with kielbasa and swiss cheese sandwich and left me one for breakfast.

i started making my taiwanese paocai at 11am. after weighing the 5 cabbages, i found i barely had 19 lbs. total (normally i like to make 20 lbs. or more). these cabbages were more on the light side than the ones i got last time (though these were on sale for 49¢/lbs, about $9 total). i added 18 tbsp of salt to reduce the cabbage. i don't really need that much salt, but the more salt i use the faster it reduces. i left it to reduce for about 2 hours, mixing it with gloved hands to distribute the salt. i then emptied the reduced cabbage into a strainer bowl and rinsed it in cold water a few times. i then squeezed double-fistful of cabbage to get rid of the excess water before adding the squeezed cabbage back into the large mixing bowl. i also added the shredded reduced carrots. to all of that i added 8 cups of sugar with 8 cups of white vinegar. 3 chopped up thai chili peppers and a tbsp of sichuan peppercorn. mixed everything with gloves hands and portioned out 10 32 oz. soup containers of taiwanese paocai. this should last us for a month.

my father cleaned the drain of the deep fryer tub this morning before i arrived. he tried using the waterpik but the hose broke. he ended up using a misting spray bottle that had just enough force to dislodge the crumb debris. the filter is now good as new, ready for the next time we need to deep fry.

my sister was working at the cafe today during our busy stretch, totally unprompted. we didn't ask why, but i have a good guess: she needs money for esmei's heartworm treatment, and needs to work some shifts to earn some dough.

in the late afternoon my father cooked up the taiwanese pompano soup kit we had in the freezer (just to clear up some storage space). we'd had it before, the soup is pretty good. it also comes with a large pompano fish that you're supposed to throw into the soup but my father baked it separately and we ate it as-is. that was enough food so that i didn't need to eat dinner when i go home.

it was a busy day in that it was the most profitable day this week, but it never got crazy, so i didn't feel that busy. customers came in during the busy lunch period and throughout the day. a customer even called at 6:15pm: "i know you guys are closed at 6:30pm, but how long can i dine in?" he asked. "we close at 6:30pm. you can always get takeout," i told him, but he was determined to eat here, even after i told him we close in 15 minutes. this is not a bar where the kitchen closes early but you can stay and enjoy your drink for a bit longer. my mother thought it might be that large chinese family who came to the cafe last saturday right around closing time, and stayed for nearly an hour before my father told them we were closing.

my aunt stopped by in the afternoon.

my mother was in a rush to leave so she could catch the colorful sunset. weeks ago i signed up to attend a zoom lecture titled: "The Archaeology of Tenochtitlan: An Overview." it started at 6pm so i was already watching the lecture before we closed the cafe. i continued watching it on my phone as i moseyed my way back home in the dark. it's interesting that present mexico city is built over the ruins of tenochtitlan, and whenever they do any sort of construction project, there's always the chance of discovering parts of the ancient aztec city.

my pair of dickies mens relaxed fit straight leg flex work pants arrived from ebay. the inseam is a little long but it gives me a sewing machine hemming project to work on. it was only $9, the kind of pants i wouldn't mind getting dirty or damaged. it's got a 65% polyester/35% cotton blend fabric, but it had a really weird smell (almost fishy) so i'll definitely wash it before wearing.

even though i didn't have dinner, i ended up snacking like crazy: leftover dorito chips (just some crumbs), double salted licorice, watermelon seeds, fruit candy, popcorn, dried tofu snacks, and tonic soda. completely unhealthy, i probably undid any health-related gains i made this week. i watched some celtics vs. nugget exhibition game in abu dhabi.

i donated 4 white porcelain ikea cereal bowls to the cafe. they're to replace the at least two bowls i threw out: one because i smashed it into the table while i was turning, another because there was a big crack and the bowl was about to split apart. these ikea bowls i had in my basement for a while, i found them on the sidewalk a few years back. i already have bowls so i didn't need them.

we used the new 14G 25ft extension cord (rated for 15A) with our t-fal deep fryer. we noticed the difference immediately, the cord was no longer hot like it used to. unfortunately the short magnetic cord that came with the fryer had already melted slightly because we used the wrong extension cord. my father asked me to find a replacement online.

one weird thing about the deep fryer was it wouldn't drain properly. it drained a little bit, but then seemed clogged. my father and i ended up draining the fry oil manually with a grease strainer pot. we looked at the filter at the bottom of the fry pot and noticed dried crumb and oil residue that won't wash out with water. that's what's probably causing it from not draining properly. my father suggested using a waterpik to dislodge the obstruction. in the meantime we'll soak it with boiling water overnight to see if might not soften the crumbs.

i went to go see esmei in the afternoon because my sister wasn't home (out to lunch with a friend). esmei was sleeping in her indoor tent. i let her out into the backyard. she looked at a black squirrel up in a tree and listened to some neighbors talking. i made her come back inside. i gave her a treat before leaving.

my sister brought back a poke bowl for my mother. my mother ate half before i had some. i love poke but i've only had it once or twice in my life because i'm too afraid to order, with so many different ingredients i always feel clueless.

originally we made tentative plans to go on a supply run to baifu then chinatown this sunday. but we could wait another week before we needed to visit baifu. so i decided i'd go to chinatown by myself tomorrow morning to get some supplies. most importantly i need to get a bunch of chinese cabbage to make a new batch of taiwanese paocai. that means waking up early, strapping an empty box to the back of my rear rack, and following the convoy of morning cyclists heading into boston for work.

even though we were busy at the cafe today, it didn't feel busy. i made a batch of tea eggs in the morning. my parents made a batch of vegetable buns in the late afternoon. the work day had already ended and my mother didn't even realize it.

my mother packed me a leftover bento when we closed. i took a shower when i got home then ate dinner. i ate a peach, then microwaved some movie theater popcorn.

10:30am was when i left for my wednesday morning run. it took me just an hour and i didn't stop at the community garden to water the plants. for lunch i had some tonkotsu instant ramen bowl. i tried watching an episode of dream on on the roku channel, after reading this beloved comedy HBO series from the early 90's was now available. it worked fine, especially when watched on a browser with an ad block, which will remove all the commercials.

around 1pm i went out to run errands. i went to dollar tree to get some 70% isopropyl alcohol (IPA). i was also going to get some candy but their candy aisle was entirely empty. i noticed it was sort of empty the last time i came, and i figured they were just restocking, but they seemed to be going in the opposite direction. i also got some stretch gloves, which is my go-to winter hand protection. finally i picked up some furniture spray, which i seen online is the go-to choice for bike polish.

my sister texted me that esmei has heartworms and need to go on medication and can't do anything strenuous for a few weeks. heartworms are actually transmitted by mosquitoes, who pick up the parasite from another infected dog. my sister thinks esmei had it since she was a puppy living on the streets.

i continued walking to walgreens, where i used my 20% off $20+ purchase coupon that i got for getting a vaccine 2 weeks ago. one of the things i needed was 90%+ IPA: that carried it but one bottle costs $4.49 which i thought was too expensive. in the meantime i could just use 70% IPA. instead i got soaps, chocolates, candy, and pistachios.

i returned home to drop off everything, before taking the bike to the beacon street whole foods to look for reusable grocery bags. i was there last week and didn't see anything, but their website said they were available. once again i couldn't find them. instead i took a shortcut and went to market basket to get some ingredients for making lobster corn chowder this weekend. i looked at over half a dozen recipes, i think i have good idea how to make it. i discovered MB sell 91% IPA for just $2.29 a bottle.

i returned home again to drop off my purchase. i went to the poke shop and told one of the employees that they left the headlights on for their orange honda element. i then went out once more, this time to harvard square. i went to the TD bank to put some money in a CD account. my mother did the same a few weeks ago. but her CD had 5% interest while mine only had 4.5% because the federal reserve recently lowered the interest rate. the bank manager eric helped me out. he normally works at the central square branch, but TD has a program where they shuffle their managers to different banks for a few weeks. apparently i was supposed to make an appointment if i wanted to create a CD account, despite the fact that there were two additional tellers who didn't seem to be doing anything. the CD is for 6 months, after that i have a 10 day grace period to withdraw my money otherwise the money goes back into the CD for another 6 months at a lower interest rate.

from there i headed down to the river and over the JFK street bridge to get to the trader joe's. the lobster chowder recipe i saw called for sherry wine and i went to TJ's to get some.

i finally returned home by 4pm. i bumped into anne standing on the street corner and chatted with her briefly. now that the gardening season is coming to a close, i probably won't see her very much until next spring.

i was kind of hungry and couldn't help myself and ate a whole box of good & plenty licorice candy. i ended up baking a frozen pizza in the oven around 6:30pm.

i went ahead and turned the garden red habaneros into a hot sauce, before they go bad. the first time i made habanero hot sauce was october 2017. my most recent batch was made back in december using a combination of ghost peppers and trinidad scorpions. i had about close to 16 oz. worth of peppers this time. the hot sauce i was making is basically chopped up hot peppers and garlic mixed with salt, sugar, vinegar, and some baijiu. the salt reduces the peppers, the sugar feeds the bacteria and promotes fermentation, the vinegar adds acidity so the peppers won't get moldy, the baijiu is for flavor and also antiseptic properties.

it was like working with poison, i wore gloves so i wouldn't get any chili oil on my skin. the smell of the habaneros was so pungent, i was coughing and sneezing at the same time, and my nose was running. another weird thing was i was sweating profusely from the top of my head, like anxiety sweat. i taste tested a little bit but spit it out immediately because it so was hot. flavor-wise it's very good, but just too damn spicy for normal human consumption. i'll bring it to the cafe for those rare times when a customer will ask us for our hottest hot sauce.