i went to star market this morning to look for boneless chicken thighs; once again they didn't have any in stock. i then cycled out to the UPS store to return some floral wires, and whole foods as well to return an ipad case. from there i double backed - not before admiring a fragrant paulownia tree growing in the parking lot of wine & cheese cask - and went to market basket to get some groceries (thinking about making blue cheese burgers this memorial day weekend), including cafe items (baby cucumbers, carrots, sausage ground pork). i then rode directly to the cafe to drop them off by 11am.

i had some daikon & pork broth at the cafe. i got an e-mail alert saying we had an online order but neither of the printers printed out any order tickets. turns out the order wasn't until 1:20pm, one of those upcoming orders. later - around 1pm - it'd print out the order tickets.

i also spotted my very first dobson fly, a female. they're large - like dragonflies - but they're terrible fliers. why a dobson fly was found so far away from the waters is a mystery (though fresh pond is less than a mile away); they don't live very long, just a week, long enough to mate and die.

i got back home by 12:30pm but went out a half hour later to the community garden to water my plants. the only other gardener there was lynn. afterwards we chatted gardening, and went around to admire the various plots. once she left (she said she didn't have lunch yet), i watered my own plot before going around the garden again, taking photos of all the blooming spring flowers.

i returned home by 2:30pm and made myself a pitcher (2 quarts) of 4C half & half lemonade ice tea mix. i got myself a large can of instant ice tea powder, supposedly enough to make 20 quarts. i've never used instant powder mix before, i've only used the flavor water, and they're about the same price, even though the flavor water is sugar-free, but i'm sure this instant powder is mostly sugar. it tasted okay, but lemons are so plentiful, i could very easily make my own lemonade instead, and it'd be more natural, despite the heaps of sugar involved.

i left again at 3pm, to the porter square star market, to look for boneless chicken thighs. they had plenty in stock, i got 2 packs, then rode to the cafe to drop them off. my mother wasn't there - she took my 2nd aunt to the bank to put some things in her safety deposit box. returning home, i went to star market again to get another 2 pack of boneless chicken thighs. i also noticed they were having a sale on smoked hickory ham. i bought a nearly 10 lbs. chunk of ham for only $6. even the cashier was shocked when she rang me up.

i sliced up some blood oranges when i got back home. harvard had its graduation today, so all day long all over cambridge i saw people dressed up in graduation gowns. living so close to harvard university, it's surprising and not so surprising to realize just how many harvard students are living amongst us. this of course also marks the annual exodus of students going home for the summer, where the population of cambridge and surrounding neighborhoods drop for the next few months.

later in the early evening i remembered i had some smoke gouda cheese in the fridge. i ate them with pepperonis, which just seem like thin-sliced salami. around 9pm i reheated the last of my congee for dinner. afterwards i sliced up some cara cara oranges. these oranges and the blood oranges i had earlier, both of them weren't that sweet. i'm kind of disappointed with the citrus crop this season, i don't think i've had a sweet orange in a while. maybe when i go to haymarket tomorrow i'll get lucky.

i ate while watching game 5 of the mavericks-warriors series. warriors dominated, but mavericks came back to get within single digits in the 3rd quarter. but all this was happening with steph curry on the bench. once he returned to the court, their offensive kicked in and they padded their lead enough that by the final 2 minutes dallas tossed in the towel and subbed in all their bench players. warriors win the western conference championship, now just awaiting the victors of the heat-celtics series.