my father called me around 11:00 while i was still sleeping, asking if he could borrow the ice mutt and that he was already outside. i got out of bed so i could also give him one of my empty suitcases, a carton of macaroons, and the 1in socket i got yesterday.
it began to rain in the early afternoon, after what seemed to be some clearing and a glint of sunshine. my father came to get me sometime after 2:00, returning to the cafe to pick up my mother and hailey. in belmont i was able to confirm my suspicion that the 3/8" 1in socket i got yesterday was just not deep enough for plumbing work. fortunately i'd already ordered a 1/2" drive socket last night, should get here next week.
temperature was in the upper 50's and the rain came down as steady downpours at certain points. it helped to melt the snow and also to create a thick fog that covered the landscape. i'd seen parts of the backyard i haven't seen since we started getting our record breaking snowfall this season. most of the raised beds are free now, hopefully there will continue to be enough thaw so that i can begin working the soil and planting some early season vegetables like lettuce. the backyard looked like a soaking mess but in a few months things will be different. i had an abbreviated gardening experience back in the summer of 2013, so i haven't gardened in almost 2 seasons. i'm looking forward to getting my grow on.
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my sister adjusted our family shared verizon contract yesterday. our new plan allows for 2 data phones, which works out because she has a spare iphone 5s. my sister is known for notoriously losing her iphone or damaging them. the spare had a cracked screen which she managed to get repaired at a discount ($100?). 
but because of her, both my mother and aunt are currently still under a 2 year contract, which means we still can't leave verizon. my parents wanted me to upgrade to the iphone, but i want to use my own phone, like the oneplus one i'd been carrying around and using it solely on wifi because the phone isn't compatible with verizon. you will not find a person who resisted as much as i did when given the option of upgrading to a free iphone. reluctantly i took the phone, more so i could just play with it, since i'm very happy with my verizon LG clamshell phone at the moment.
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the rain began to pour again when i got a ride home. it was interesting to see the effects of the fog on driving conditions. lower elevation and dips in the road filled up with fog, while higher elevation areas were relatively clear. back in cambridge, i wiped the iphone so i could start fresh (it'd already been wiped after the repair).
the thing with the iphone i noticed right away before i even had a chance to use it was how small it was. the iphone has a 4in screen. the ZTE phone i used in china had a 5in, and my upgraded one plus one has a 5.5in. even apple has conceded that the current market is leaning towards bigger screens (at the expense of not being able to operate the phone with just one hand or not being able to easily carry it around in a pants pocket) with the 5.5in screen of their flagship iphone 6 plus.
the battle between iOS and android reminds me a lot of the clashes between mac and pc users. i am a mac user (starting in 1986 with the mac plus) but i don't toe the line when it comes to apple products and i prefer android over iOS. true, like the pc market, android phones come in all sorts of configurations and flavors, and the OS experience is different when you switch to different phones, and yeah, it probably crashes more than iOS due to incompatibility issues, but android is so much better when it comes to file transfers. whether it be transferring photos, movies, books, documents - it's just a simple matter of connecting it to my pc and copy and paste like a hard drive. with iphones, the experience is so contained, everything is controlled (for notably security reasons) and files not only have to go through the itunes app on the computer but what goes in and out are also tightly restricted.
i don't like that there's just one button on the iphone. in android, i'm used to having 3 buttons (menu, home, back). the button on the iphone serves as a home button, but what if i want to go back? or what if i want to see my options via a menu button? the minimalist approach is perhaps aesthetically pleasing, but functionality wise, it feels lacking. but the home button on the iphone 5s? it's an fingerprint id reader! that was something i knew about but still unexpected. i don't know how it works but it's very cool and almost like magic. i don't know if it's enough to make me a convert, but it's a fun thing to have.
i filled up the iphone with commonly used apps (qq chat, qzone, google translate, chrome, netflix, nest, google map). within the apps, the user experience is the same, regardless of platform. just that on the iphone i have to strain a little bit more on the 4in 1136x640px screen, compared to the 1920x1080px resolution of my 5.5in one plus one.
i feel there's more to play with when it comes to android. the user interface, i can customize it however i want, changing icons and replacing the launcher and organizing apps however i want and adding useful widgets to the different pages and changing the fonts. and when i do get sick of the OS, i can replace it with a different flavored OS, thereby changing the whole user experience again. with iOS, it's just that. some might call it stability, but i call it boring.
anyway, i'm sure i'll have more things to gripe about. if i do replace my flip phone with the iphone, i'm going to end up carrying 2 smart phones with me where ever i go like a crazy person.
tonight i figured out how to use meta viewport to correctly size my blog postings on phone and tablet screens.