my father had already fertilized the front lawn by the time i got there. i remember reading the instructions which said not to fertilize if it's going to rain soon, and it was definitely going to be raining today. i also noticed he fertilized the strip of grass along the sidewalk, which i told him not to because the fertilizer we're using - scotts turf builder - also contain the pesticide pendimenthalin which is deadly poisonous to fishes if it gets into the storm drain and out to the charles river. finally, the 25 lbs. of fertilizer was intended to cover 7500 square feet, but just treating the front lawn my father had used up most of it, which meant he used way too much fertilizer. i helped him fertilize the back lawn, using up the rest of the yellow fertilizing/pesticide pellets.

next we mounted one of the solar-powered motion-detecting flood light to the eastern side of the house where it gets very dark at nights. we purchased them april 2017 and finally got around to installing it now 1-1/2 years later. we put the solar panel itself facing south, mounted temporarily in the roof gutter. at some point we're going to mount it from the side of the house, since putting it in the gutter risks drowning the panel.

across the street the neighbors continued demolition on their house, razing the foundation. it sounded like we were living next to a construction site, and every so often the excavator would hit something so hard the whole neighborhood shook as if there was an earthquake.

there was a bowl of cold buttercup squash oatmeal waiting for me for lunch. it look me a long time to finish, i kept getting distracted with other activities.

my sister stopped by belmont after walking hailey with a bag full of wild mushrooms that she thought were chanterelles. she found 3 different kinds: one bolete (with characteristic spongey underside), and 2 types of gilled mushrooms. i knew chanterelles had gills that attach to the stem, so one group was definitely not chanterelles. the other ones had attached gills, but they didn't have that characteristic vase-shape, though they could just be immature. these possible chanterelles also had tiny black scales on the cap which are missing from the other mushrooms. after she left, i strung up the mushrooms with a needle and thread and hung them up to dry. i'll do some more research to see if those are really chanterelles or not.

the repaired apple magsafe charger was finally ready to use. we could've clamped it together even tighter, there was still a tiny gap, but nothing that would affect the charger performance. i used it with my new macbook pro, using the magsafe 1 to magsafe 2 adapter. it worked flawlessly, a $10 replacement cord was able to salvage a broken apple charger.

it was still raining a little bit when i rode home, but i was hoping it would let up. i gambled wrong as i rode home in the rain, my pant legs and the arms of my jacket soaked, water dripping from the brim of my helmet, rain coating my glasses and windshield. but with the new lower windshield i coat at least see for a time being, before there was just too much water on my glasses. i rode carefully and made it home in one piece.

i unexpectedly received a new citizens bank debit card. i almost never use it, it's my backup card. i used to use it when i had to deposit a check, but now i deposit them online using the app. i love the translucent green design. this new card finally has an upgraded security chip.

also in the mail was my BME280 humidity/temperature/pressure sensor ($3.69). i ordered it back on september 6th, it's taken 4 weeks but it finally arrived. the thing is tiny, and when i was feeling the envelope for what was inside i thought the package was empty. it comes with straight header pins which need to be soldered; good thing we got some practice, but i think i will also replace them with 90° bent pins for better breadboard placement.

i watched the latest episode (S04E09) of better call saul in bed. jimmy and kim pull a little scam, lalo meets gus, jimmy doesn't get reinstated at the license review board, and werner flees the guarded superlab construction site.