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to harvard square i went in the early afternoon. on wendell street i spotted some yarn bombing on a tree; perhaps the work of crafty lesley students living in nearby reed house? first stop was the harvard coop to check out some travel books. it's been a long time since i've been in a bookstore, the smell alone made me feel nostalgic for simpler times before the internet. they had the latest edition of lonely planet guide to china, it looked good enough that i'll buy it from amazon.

next stop was 241 optical, the eyewear store my sister's friend michael runs with his sister. i've need new glasses for a while now. my current frames were a birthday present from 5 years ago. i had the lenses replaced on one of them (the one i wear daily) when i scratched them after dumping my honda shadow spirit bike. since then, i've snapped the frame more times than i can count and it's barely held in place with superglue.

michael wasn't there but his sister julia was (whom i never met before). i didn't tell her i knew michael because i didn't want to curry any special treatment, i just wanted to be a regular customer. sometimes i can be a creature of habit, and when it comes to my glasses, i've been wearing the same style for close to a decade now. so naturally i wanted the same. julia found me a frame that was nearly identical. for my second pair (this is, after all, 2-for-1), julia showed me a pair of thick horn rim style that i really liked so i picked those (i may end up wearing them as my everyday glasses). when i gave her my new prescription form, she saw my name and recognized who i was. she told me the glasses would be ready by friday, which is kind of amazingly fast, since i was expecting a few weeks at least. i also asked her the price and she told me it was just $200 for the 2 pairs, which is also crazy inexpensive (somehow in my mind i was expecting it to cost more).

with that task done, i returned home. the weather was nice but bit chilly and breezy enough (temperature in the low 60's) that i wore a light jacket. i got my bicycle from the basement and left for belmont.

when my parents returned from work, we had a discussion of when i should i leave for asia. we all agreed that july 8th is a good date, early enough that i could stay a few extra days in taiwan if i wanted to. but before i could buy the one-way plane ticket, i had to make sure i had enough HBP pills for the 2 months i'll be gone. i had a pending prescription at my online RX dealer, but the order wouldn't go through because the reup date wasn't until next month. not only was that cutting it tight, but i switch to a different health insurance in july, so i'd have to transfer the prescription to a new online drugstore, and go through all that prior authorization paperwork. so i made some frantic calls, first to the insurance, then to my doctor (something about a "vacation override"), and finally the online drugstore. i should've called the store first, because they told me the prescription (3 month supply) would be filled in a few more days, so i was all set.

with my drug order in place, it was finally time to buy the plane ticket. i bought a passage with delta, with 2 stops (detroit and tokyo). only the boston-detroit flight was i able to get a window seat; all subsequent flights i could only get the middle seat. the 17 hour trip from detroit to tokyo will be especially painful sitting in the middle. either bring some good books or learn to love sleeping in uncomfortable positions.

before dinner my father and i were back outside doing more gardening work. he was busy collecting the arugula leaves while i planted some more seedlings (sweet basil, thai basil, kung-pao peppers). for me it's kind of fruitless since i won't be able to see the results of all my hard work. but at least i won't get any of that contact dermatitis from whatever plants i seem to be allergic to in the gardens. it began to and i quickly finished my planting and went back inside.

we had zongzi for dinner and some cooked icelandic smoked lamb my aunt gave my parents. the rain had stopped and the parts of the sky seemed to be clearing up by the time i biked home. however i must've been riding towards the rain clouds because midway through it began to drizzle again. it never went beyond that and i made it home relatively dry.

i watched game 1 of the stanley cup final between chicago and boston. it was a painful game that went into triple overtime (like having 2 hockey games in one) and ended with the bruins losing even though in the third period they were up 3-1 over the blackhawks.

also today i started contacting various interested parties about my departure, particularly clients who would want to know about my availability (or inavailability as the case may be).