i left the house by 8:40am after seeing a local news broadcast of the parade route and people already sitting by the barricades. even though my bike was covered, the torrential rain last night soaked the seat, so i covered it up with a rare plastic shopping bag.
i was only riding for about a minute before my phone started ringing. i didn't recognize the number, but i'd been waiting for a call from the appliance repair man. so i answered. sure enough it was luis, said he was going to the cafe now, would get there in about 25 minutes. i called my father to let him know, not realizing my parents were already at the cafe. luis wasn't supposed to arrive until 1-3pm, but if he can show up early, that's even better, get it out of the way.
this time of the morning there are bicycle jams, just like there are regular car traffic jams. the bike lane is only wide enough for one bike, so either all the bikes travel in an unanticipated convoy, or people pass one another. then there are the traffic lights. as a cyclists, do you run a red when there are no oncoming cars, or do you play it by the book, wait for the light to green like the cars? i usually run the red if it's safe, but today i followed the law, mostly because stopping at the lights gave me a chance to rest. passing by portland street on hampshire, there were a bunch of cop cars. i thought a saw a man lying on the sidewalk, maybe a passed out drug user. but so many police? later i learned that at 8:20am this morning, a 24-year old cambridge woman biking to work was killed when a truck hit her while making a right turn.
i cut through boston common. there were a large group of park rangers dressed in brown, and another group of motorcycle cops. the city would need all the help it could get, as a million fans descended onto boston to watch the celtics victory parade. it wasn't just boston, or massachusetts, or even new england. i keep hearing about people from elsewhere in the country flying/driving into the city to catch the parade. the common was starting to fill up with fans arriving to claim a spot to watch the procession. there was no real good place to lock my bike so i secured it to the wrought iron fence around the central burying ground.
my parade watching spot is the corner of tremont and bolyston street. corners are great because you essentially catch the parade from two streets. but that choice spot was already filled up, so i found a position against the barricade on boylston street, across the street from emerson college and tatte bakery. a mother and her tween age son sitting in folding chairs were on my left, to my right were a trio of quiet college-age kids. i spoke with the mother, asked if she saw the last celtics parade, wasn't quite sure how old she was. she said yes, also said she saw the red sox 2004 parade when they broke the curse. however she's never been to a patriots parade, on the account that it only happens during the winter (too cold). i asked when they got here, she said since 7am.
it was 9am and i had 2 more hours to wait before the parade began. realistically, these things never start on time, so it'll probably be closer to noontime before we'd see duck boats. my phone rang again, it was luis, asking to be let into the cafe. i called my father to let him know (my mother actually let him in). after just a few minutes, my father texted me with a photo of an evaporator fan motor for $167.94. i figured the repairman decided that needed to be replaced to fix the freezer. my father then called me. luis took a look at the freezer and decided the problem was a broken fan motor. he even showed my father the part to get online. he told him that he could fix it as an official GE technician, but at the GE retail price of $300+ for the part, plus whatever labor cost. we're probably looking at a $600+ fix. my father said luis probably took pity on us, being that we're a small business, our meager freezing needs cobbled together from a mishmash of various units. luis left without even charging up the $120 for the visit. i couldn't believe it. how often do you meet an ethical repairman, who not only not charge for the visit, but tells you how to fix the problem yourself for cheaper? we really lucked out.
more and more people started showing up. on the other side of the street, people were standing 7 rows deep. folks with access to nearby buildings had the best views, as i saw them with their windows opened, phone cameras ready. the tween standing next to me was curious about my dSLR and i let him take a few photos with it. he seemed really awestruck by the zoom lens, and even afterwards, kept asking me to take photos of distance objects. his mother, being the diplomat, told him that was enough.
around 11:45am finally something started to happen. we could hear the roar of the crowd further up the street, motorcycle cops clearing the route, and the chopping of helicopters overhead meant the duck boats were near.
i quickly attached my insta360 camera to one of the vertical slates of the metal barricade and extended the tripod, getting it as high as 7-1/2 ft. it looked pretty awkward, but the duck boats were coming, so people nearby were more focused on that than my trick camera.
the first to arrive where the confetti trucks, shooting canons of green and white confetti into the air (i mistakenly thought the confetti would come from the buildings above, because during our wait bits of confetti would stream down from the sky). the first celtics i saw i thought was oshae brissett, but turns out it was just a rando lookalike sitting on one of the confetti trucks. the first celtics was actually coach mazzulla. he was without the larry o'brien trophy, which he briefly had when he took it down to the north end a few days ago when he went to dinner with his family. he was facing the other way so i only got a glimpse of him. the first real celtics player was al horford. he was wearing a cowboy hat and i'd later find out he was also sporting a custom t-shirt with a photo of drunk brady being escorted by one of his celebrating buccaneer teammates. i also saw horford's father standing besides him. i didn't see al's beautiful wife though, former miss universe amelia vega. i spotted brad stevens wearing a green polo. next was porzingis, i had a really good look at him, close enough i could almost touch him. he had a large latvian flag draped around his neck and was wearing a faux golden wrestling-style championship belt. with his arms outstretched, he could probably reach 10-11ft easily.
i spotted tillman wearing a black bucket hat. i caught sam casell on a duck boat with brian scalabrini. later i'd learn that particular boat had a few former players from the 2008 championship, including eddie house and paul pierce! jayson tatum was next, holding up the championship trophy, with celtics co-owner wyc grousbeck nearby. tatum seemed to be having the time of life, egging on the crowd. at one point he covered his face, still in disbelief that he won the NBA championship.
on the next boat was jaylen brown, but i didn't get a good look because he was facing the other way (which seems to be a common problem at these duck boat parades). on his vessel was celtics co-owner stephen pagliuca. following that was derrick white's craft. once again i didn't get a very good look, but it looks like he had time to visit a dentist to fix his teeth (temporarily at least). he shared a boat with svi mykhailiuk, the mysterious ukrainian shooting guard that not many people know anything about. people were throwing cans of beer at them, some they caught, most they missed, sailing onwards to who knows where. beer cans looked tiny in their big basketball hands.
payton pritchard had his own boat. he seemed pretty lit, i saw a friend/minder gently pull him down, afraid he might fall off the ride.
the lower tiered bench players all shared a boat: jaden springer, jd davison, drew peterson. kornet and jordan walsh were on the same boat. i wish i had a better look at kornet, he's one of my favorites, but alas, he was facing the other way. i spotted drew carter next to abby chin in the broadcaster boat. i think from later interviews i saw, mike gorman was probably also on that boat, but sitting on the other side.
the parade ended with one final duck boat with the 18th banner hanging from the back. everyone then dispersed after that.
i took down the insta360 camera but when i tried to review the footage, it said i had to shut itself off from overheating. luckily it managed to film nearly 19 minutes before finally cutting out, which was the bulk of the parade. one thing i realized afterwards was i was way too close to the duck boats. back in 2008, i was standing on the curb (or was it a rock wall?). this time i was standing out on the street, on the bike lane, behind the barricades. but that meant i was really close to the duck boats when they came by. it's good if the players are facing my direction, but i'm mostly looking up instead of looking across, so there was a lot i couldn't see. if i had to do it again, i'd stand further back, especially since i have telephoto lens. having said that, i did get some really good quality snapshots because i was so close. i was shooting in shutter priority mode 1/1600 second. another observation: so many random people on the duck boats! i'm sure some are friends and family of the players, but there are also owners, and staff, and all the people who worked behind the scene. i wouldn't be surprised if they invited the custodians as well. i came to see the players...not the randos! i did see most of the players, with the exception of jrue holiday, oshae brissett, and sam hauser. no neemias queta either! afterwards i spotted a DJI drone hovering in the air. i bet it got some really good shots. i'm tempted to bring my drone for next time, except i'm too afraid it might crash and hurt some people.
i walked my bike through boston common, there was just too many people to ride. once i got to charles street though, i could ride in the empty street. i made my way to the esplanade then across the longfellow back to cambridge.
by then it was around noontime. it took me nearly 40 minutes to ride 5 miles to the cafe. when i got there i was dead tired, sweaty, and my heart was beating so fast i could feel the blood pulsing in my temples. but i put on my apron and went to work. fortunately my sister was there helping out, so my parents were left to fend for themselves. they had already made a new batch of vegetarian buns and my father was in the middle of deep frying some salt & pepper chicken when i walked in.
later i went ahead and ordered the evaporator fan motor. $167.94 plus $25 for 2 day shipping, should arrive by tuesday. regular shipping was $11 but the part wouldn't arrive until tuesday-friday, so it was worth the extra money to fix the freezer sooner.
my aunt showed up in the late afternoon. she said rabbits had eaten all the rudbeckia plants i gave them. my sister came by with esmei. i haven't seen her dog since tuesday, she hasn't been walking esmei because it's been too hot and the parking lot asphalt was 147 degrees. esmei showed no interest in anyone unless she thinks she might have some treats for her.
around 4:30pm we started assembling the big order. ubereats printed out the ticket by 4:45pm, had the audacity to set the prep time for just 15 minutes, said the food could be ready by 5pm, when the customers themselves asked for a 5:30pm delivery. ubereats is really aggressive when it comes to pushing restaurants to fulfill orders. while square and grubhub gives us 15 minutes, ubereats defaults at just 8 minutes, and makes it difficult to change it. not only did we have to make 20 bentos, but around 5pm we got busy, and 3 more additional bento orders came in. it was pretty crazy. fortunately my sister showed up again to help out, and we had everything ready by 5:15pm, the driver already waiting (delivery to harvard so not far).
it wasn't busy after that. today was actually okay profit wise, not including the big order, which pushed us even further above average. it's been a slow week overall, other than tuesday when we were super busy. i stayed long enough to drain a batch of tapioca pearls and scooped them into separate containers. i left around 6:15pm, after the sky started to darken and rain was imminent.
i made it home before it started to rain. it was 82 degrees inside my house while it was 72 degrees outside. the rain wasn't as bad as yesterday, but i still had to close a few windows because the rain was blowing inside the house. after the rain stopped around 8pm, i opened the windows back up, trying to cool down the house.
i took a shower, desperately trying to wash off the sunblock. that stuff is hard to remove, oily, takes a few days for it to disappear on its own. worst part is because i sprayed in the bathtub, the tub was all oily. i tried to wash it off afterwards but sunblock is persistent.
i had ingredients for gyro but decided to take a break from the greek tonight. instead i went italian, threw a frozen thin crust buffalo chicken pizza in the oven.