i heard karen stirring around 7am this morning, on her last in cambridge. i thought she was going to sleep late. i woke up around 10am to find karen in her room working. i thought she was already finished with her thesis. turns out she spent a good part of the day proofreading her paper before submitting it to her academic advisor back in mexico.

i left the house at 10:30am to dig up some milkweed from my old plot. so imagine my surprise to find the city work crew having already dug up that entire area and in the process of installing a new fence. there was nothing left of my old plants besides a pile of dirt. i should've dug them up late yesterday afternoon when i had the chance, but i didn't think the city would be working on the path so soon, when all their efforts have been spent terraforming the playground area. i did some watering and weeding, took some 3D photos of some garden flowers, then returned home.

i asked karen what her food plans were for the day. if she didn't want to finish leftovers, i told her i'd treat her to rf o'sullivan's burgers for lunch. she said yes, and suggest 1pm. i was ready to eat now but figured i could hold off for 2 more hours. i also showed her the zongzi my mother made and she asked to try out, which i then microwaved. she saw it as chinese tamales and thought it was delicious, although no tamales would ever have rice as an ingredient.

the place i really wanted to go for lunch was gyu-kaku in harvard square, the japanese barbecue place. they have some cheap lunch specials and i was pretty sure karen had never experienced japanese/korean barbecue before. but in the end i decided on burgers because it was more convenient, and the one place karen hasn't gone yet. i will do gyu-kaku on my own time some day soon.

when 1pm came around i had to remind karen it was time for lunch. she asked for an additional 20 minutes as she showered and got dressed, while i milled around the living room starving to death.

even though it was the middle of the afternoon, there was still a handful of people at rf o'sullivan's, including a few sitting at the bar (whether they were drinking or not i couldn't tell). the few eating at tables were senior citizens. be both ordered the black and blue burgers with half-and-half fries and onion rings. karen got a summer samuel adams while i got a 20 oz. magners irish cider (luckily i wasn't going to work afterwards because i was slightly drunk afterwards). the bill came out to $43 including taxes and tips.

back at the house karen continued proofreading her thesis, all the while doing laundry. she must've washed 4 loads, the final load being the bedsheets and towels. she also vacuumed, including the kitchen and the bathroom. once she was done with her thesis, she finished packing up her things.

i rain-x'ed the upper panes of the northeastern and northwestern windows. even though i don't often look through the upper panes, i figured i'd give them a good cleaning as they were pretty dirty. i figured eventually i'll get around to cleaning all my windows this way, although the living room windows are the most important as they're the ones i look from the most often.

in the early evening we walked down to harvard square to get some milkshakes at the shake shack. we first stopped by the donation bin by the former gulf gas station so she could drop off two large bags of winter clothes she didn't want anymore. i was tempted to ask her to leave them with me so i could let my mother and sister take a peek at some of the stuff, but figured donating them was a better cause. her flight was at 11:30pm and she planned on leaving at around 8:30pm. her mexican friend who picked her up from the airport 4 months ago also volunteered to drive her back. he called around 7:30pm to tell karen he was already in front of the house. we were just arriving at the shake shack, so we quickly bought our shakes (vanilla, karen treated) and hurried home.

her friend came in the house to drink his shake while we all chatted a bit. finally by around 8:30pm karen left. and just like that, 4 months of living with a roommate was over. i wonder how long it's going to take me to adjust to single living again?

i turned on the television to catch game 1 of the NBA finals between the cavaliers and the warriors. during halftime i went to take a shower. that lunchtime burger was pretty filling, but i felt a little hungry and ate some of the leftover rotisserie chicken karen had left in the fridge. i didn't finish watching the game, golden state was up by 20 points with just minutes left in the game. i'm rooting for cleveland, there's just too much talent on that warriors team.