the time my parents told me to come pick them up. i actually managed to get there earlier than expected, around 8:20am, as i fumbled with my phone calling to let my parents know i'd be arriving soon while also trying to navigate traffic. not only was the traffic manageable, but black falcon terminal wasn't very crowded either. lines of taxis were waiting on one side, while i parked on the other side along with other cars waiting to pick up passengers. i thought my parents would simply show up the moment i called, but it actually took them a while waiting in line to get off the cruise ship. when i finally saw them, i pulled up by the entrance so they could load their luggage into the car and we drove back to cambridge.
we stopped off at the cafe first, where my father dropped my mother cafe. my 2nd aunt was working today, so the shop was already open. afterwards my father gave me a ride back to my place, along with a few containers of cruise boat breakfast food they managed to smuggled out. i had a muffin along with a miniature croissant.
worried that my parents didn't have the key to their house, i rode to belmont a bit before noontime to unlock the door. i was surprised to see my parents arriving back at their place as well; my 2nd aunt apparently told them she'd work the cafe the rest of the day so they could go home and rest. i stayed long enough to help my father assemble the DBJ-1 antenna. unfortunately he didn't have a working feed cable nor the SWR meter so we couldn't really test the antenna.
i returned home, but not before stopping by the cafe to write my aunt a sign saying the place would be closed labor day weekend. i also grabbed the SWR meter while i was at it. back at home, i found my coil of coaxial feed cable along with the hose clamps. 
i then rode back to belmont to drop them off so my father wouldn't have to wait until tomorrow to test the DBJ-1 antenna. i'd seen a faux leather sofa chair opposite glacken field earlier, and stopped to snap a photo and check it out. when i got to belmont, i told my parents about it and my father and i drove out to pick it up. it was in pretty good condition, not a style i like, but sits comfortably. my mother's been searching for a decent living room chair after the cushions on her own chair have sagged to the point where it needed replacing. she tried the new chair but didn't like it, sits too high, she can't even put her feet on the ground. so the search continues.
my father hooked up the SWR meter with the length of working coaxial cable to test out the DBJ-1 antenna. SWR is good (1.0) on the low end of the UHF and VHF spectrum, but gets as high as 2.0 on the upper end. reception wasn't that good, we could barely hit many of the local repeaters that we can receive with ease with our DIY ground plane antenna. i think one problem might be the location of the DBJ-1 antenna, which is just above the gutter, while the homemade ground plane sits high on the chimney. to properly test it we'll need to mount the DBJ-1 higher, but we'll need a longer feed cable.
i finally went home for good around 3:30pm. i went to the dollar store to collect some snacks and saw my 2nd uncle waiting in line to pay at the lone cashier. i got his attention to say hello, he has a full beard now, makes him look more like a homeless person.
by noontime today we already broke the 1 MWh milestone for august. that was close; if it wasn't for the high production this past week with the sunny (but hot) weather, we would've never reach this milestone, given how low the production was during the middle of the month.
the only souvenirs my parents brought back for me were some bermuda money. the bermudan $2 features the bluebird, which is not actually native to bermuda, but so many of bermuda's natural wildlife were destroyed centuries ago, so now the introduced bluebird is considered a native species.
i didn't realize how tired i was but while surfing the web on the couch (with the laptop on my stomach) i fell asleep around 5pm and didn't wake up until 9pm. i made myself one final reuben sandwich with the last of my corned beef. i watched the new jack ryan series on amazon prime, saw the first episode, it's actually pretty good. it's very nuanced and i found myself rooting for the "terrorists" more than i did the americans.