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today was a grey and cold day, so i figured it wouldn't be too busy. when i arrived, my father and sister were fulfilling a grubhub order, our first official grubhub order, not counting the time my sister's korean friend ordered something to test last week. the delivery guy arrived early, which added to the pressure. grubhub ordered are marked up slightly (since grubhub takes 7% and credit card takes another 3%), and we don't get paid daily (like square) but rather weekly.

it did get busy right before noontime, especially when somebody phoned in a large 4-serving order, so i was prepared for it to be that busy the rest of the day, but then it sort of tapered off.

we tested the sur la table air fryer. the grubhub order had a piece of fried chicken my father reheated using the air fryer, but it didn't seem to toast correctly. that's because he had the chicken on a plate inside of the fryer, so it wasn't able to get proper air circulation. so later we did a test, a piece of bread on a plate, and a piece of bread on the perforated tray. the one on the tray was crispy on both sides, while the plated bread was crispy on one side and slightly soggy on the other. so we determined that using a plate was not the proper way. then another order came in that required a small piece of char siu pork. my father toasted it in the fryer on a piece of special air fryer liner parchment paper, but the paper was fluttering all about due to the air circulation. when he toasted it again with the char siu just on the tray, it worked much better, crispy on both sides.

i had a few pieces of my aldi's lemon cake for lunch. it's essentially a yellow-covered pound cake, i didn't really taste any lemons. but i always remember lemon cakes from game of thrones, because it as sansa's favorite food, which struck me as old. did they have lemon cakes in medieval times? why do lemon cakes even exist? when thinking about flavoring cakes, lemon doesn't immediately spring to mind.

in the afternoon i was in the basement putting together an ikea stig chair, because i wanted something to sit on while in the back kitchen. it took me about 25 minutes to fully assemble the chair. having done it once, i think i could probably put together another one in less than 10 minutes. these chairs are interesting in that even though they're considered tall chairs (like bar stools), they're still low enough to be pushed underneath a table.

we're thinking about getting a new work table to replace the 5ft one we have now which is essentially a stainless steel work table propped up on two circular table bottoms. we'd get a work table with two undershelves, so we can put all our pots and pans, which are currently just haphazardly strew underneath tables or sitting in corners.

even though it wasn't busy, i was doing so many other things that i lost track of time, and i didn't leave until 4:15pm, which some impending rainstorms soon to arrive. i got back home with packages waiting for me on the doorsteps: 2 sets of barrina led strip lights and a package of 10 seed starter trays.

i opened the lights right away, and installed 3 into my grow closet, giving each shelf 3 strips of lights, or 72W of lighting (3 x 24W) per shelf. i turned off my heat mats, because with all these lights, the grow closet already gets pretty warm. finally, i wrapped two poster boards with reflective mylar film to be used as "doors" for my grow closet shelves; this way the plants are surrounded on all 4 sides with reflective mylar.

the seed starter trays are pretty good, much sturdier than i'd imagined. for a pack of 10, they were $11 on sale (now they're back to $20). not only do they include the trays, but all the cells and clear tray cover with adjustable humidity vents. the cells (12-each) are clear, which i've never seen before, and supposedly reusable. i don't know what i'd grow in these, probably some flower seeds. best part is they're compact enough that i can give some to my sister once the seedlings emerge, so she can plant them in her garden.

i got a $100 check from the MA cookie settlement fund. i have no idea what it's for, but i vaguely remember signing up for it when i heard about it. the check looked legit enough, and i was able to deposit it electronically no problem. this settlement check will cover the cost of my led strip lights upgrade!

i caught up with episodes of 5 and 6 of tokyo vice. with only one episode remaining left in the series (assuming they don't do a season 2), there's zero way they're going to tie up all the various story lines. which kind of sucks, because either finish the story, or add more episodes to properly finish the story.

i didn't have dinner until late, a few braised drumsticks my father gave me at the cafe, and a piece of banana nut bread.