1/2/2019: Got up at 7:35. Attached the 4 extension boards, applied water seal afterward.
Disassemble the front door of the toaster oven and cleaned it up real nice (with Oven Easy Off). Attached the four stringers to the extension boards - front and back, had to crawl to be able to work on the back side.
1/3/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:17. Swung by Marina Grocery and got one bottle 750ml Er Guo Tou, one dozen XX Larger, two packN Pin noodle, one bottle Hazelnut powder creamer, 2 bags spicy peanuts, two packs thick bean curd, one pack duck wings, one head Napa cabbage, one bag dried julienned seaweed, and one pack dried Shitake mushroom. Leveled the 4 stringers with a common lumber near the bottom, surround the base with lumbers and bricks to form a make shift concrete pouring frame, Added nearly two full bags of concrete mix into the frame before adding water to secure it, added some more mix to make sure the bottom of the strings were covered.
1/4/2019: Got up at 7:40. Purchased two 9x12 tarps from Harbor Freight Tools on Story, discovered that even though they have exactly the same size/label/brand, their attaching holes have different distance even on the same tarp, this made making the into a large single piece very challenging, after some pondering I came up with a solution, attach the edges of the tarp with masking tape and staples and masking tape again, this seem to make the seam/juncture OK, just not sure if they can withstand strong wind. Connect the lattice on the planter box next to the Cherry tree to the Cherry tree to better resist swaying tarps. Moved mobile table saw, Miter saw and work bench to the garage.
1/5/2019: Got up at 7:20. Strong wind started around 8:30, tried but in vein to secure the tarps from moving by adding more bricks to hold them, finally decided to cut the new ones from the original when the rain stopped around 11:00, move the 2 new pieces (now stabled together) lying down on the first layer deck, this made the covering a bit stable. Received Anita's Medicare card, this is after 3 different request (one call, one web request, and the last online chat), 6 months after she qualified.
1/6/2019: Got up at 7:35. Juiced the oranges fro our Philippine neighbor, boy, was it sour. Had 15 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Just discovered that Picasa could no longer upload photos to Google Photo drive, after some search on Picasa, I was able to export photos to a local drive with number attached, I think I can possibly upload them from Google Photo app after exporting all the photos I wanted.
1/7/2019: Got up at 7:25. Watched "Mary Poppins Returns" with Anita at Great Mall Century, 9:45am, actual start time was 10:05 after all previews. Made component pieces (4) for one step of the new stairs, discovered that the Chicago Miter Saw 45° cuts are not precise, left and right angle cuts presented some difference, that made joining angle cuts more challenging, in some cases not pretty.
Installed one new access point (which also has router and repeater functions) from ASUS, SSID ssc1746asus not broadcasted, WPA2 personal AES key xxxxacyyyy, system unpw: admin/xxxxacyyyy.
1/8/2019: Got up at 7:25. Adjusted the tarps covering the deck, rain water still flow down the deck floor because the edges of the tarp weren't tilted to guide water to proper locations. Made another step components, still not perfect but at least I knew how to make them better now. Moved the Miter saw under the tarp so that I could still use it even if there's light rain.
Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Stopped by Costco, got one Cranberry Walnut Round, one case canned Modelo, two dozen organic eggs, one box cheese poppers, one box Jimmy Dean delight muffin, one box Pierre Signature Angus cheese burger, 5 MoveFree (for KwangHue), one pack (x2) Olay, and one bunch bananas. Uploaded 2018 Mexico Discovery photos to Google Photo, none of the photo descriptions I made on Picasa got relayed, I'll have to edit on Google Photos instead, need to remember to use Picasa to edit and export photos only. Backed up 2018 Mexico Discovery photos to Seagate drive.
1/9/2019: Got up at 7:27. I should be able to do some stairs work this afternoon as the sun came back just after 11:00. No table tennis today, looks like Stephanie's hands are full as Teresa came back from her trip. Made 4 (each with 2 pieces of boards) new stairs support boards from leftover old deck stairs, this is different from the approach I took for the first stairs, this approach I learned from Youtube should be a better and more stable support for new steps.
1/10/2019: Got up at 7:20. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:20. There's a pressconference upstairs starting at 10:00, and folk dance at 12:00. Swung by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml Er Guo Tou, one pack fried shrimp cake, one pack beef tendon ball, one pack fish ball, 4 bags spicy peanut, one pack preserved turnip, 3 Daikon, one head cauliflower, two pack bamboo shoot, one pack mussel meat, one bag black fungus, and two bag black fungus thread. Applied water seal to the stair step support boards. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Attached the support boards to stringers, with the help of impact driver (now I know how to use it), I was able to do the task in one hour.
1/11/2019: Got up at 7:25. During the process attaching steps to the stringers, discovered that the support boards I secured yesterday were causing some problems (as I worried at the time) since the screws securing them happened to be at the locations I planned to insert screws to secure the composite boards, had to relocation half of the screws used to make room for step screws. Half of the screws to secure composite steps had problem going in all the way, still do not know why though, for now they will sit with head extended above the surface, damn! Finished securing all remaining pieces except, of course, the unsettling screws.
1/12/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 12 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, Alex, Ching, Ming, the other Ming, Steve/Cindy (the new couple), Jason, and myself. Helped Jason install Line for his new Moto phone on my drive way, but he wasn't able to login with his two mail addresses, he'll work on it after he got home. Placed two used long lumbers at the base of the second stairs to make walking a bit easier.
1/12/2019: Got up at 7:10. Made 6 pieces cross beams for second layer deck phase 2, will apply water seal this afternoon.
Applied water seal to the 6 cross beams.
Decided not to spent more time on the deck today as I was getting tired for some reason, put everything back for rain protection mode.
1/14/2019: Got up at 7:30. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one Cranberry Walnut Round, one tub cream cheese, one tub plain Greek Yogurt, one AREDS2, one pack Charmin bathroom tissue, and one jar Grape oil. No table tennis today. Stopped by Trader Joes, got one bag roasted but unsalted almonds, one bag candied pecans, one bag raw Brazil nuts, and one bag coconut strips. Swung by Target but did not find any 32oz Hazelnut creamer, instead bought several bottles Barefoot wine (Riesling, Cabernet Sauvignon), and several bottles Yellowtail Moscato. Finally got in Marshall to look for candy, coffee, and clothes for the ladies, unfortunately they did not have any of those, Anit got a set of chocolates as well as one flat 82% dark chocolate. Called Mom at 6:00 for 30 minutes. Had a cold since coming back from Costco, still have running nose at 10:27.
1/15/2019: Got up at 7:25. No work could be done it rain/shower frequently. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie.
1/16/2019: Got up at 7:28. Reenforced the steel trellis to the planter box with two conduit holders, hope this would hold the tarp without toppling the trellis. Added several zip ties to the wall, as the other tie down holes appeared on the brink of failing. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie.
Stopped by Costco but did not go in as the parking lot was pretty full, instead added about 8 gallons Octane 89 gasoline to RX300-had to do it manually as the sensor on the pump kept sending false signals, ended up one gallon short. Swung by GBC and withdrew $600, $500 for me to take back to Taiwan, $100 for Francisco'd January service. Received the Tactical Flashlight 2 Pack from Amazon, they require AAA batteries which I do not have many, need to get some.
1/17/2019: Got up at 7:08. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:14, waited until 9:20 before getting in. Swung by Marina Grocery and got one pack fried fish cake, two bags spicy peanuts, one can iodized salt, one bag fried tofu puff, one Taiwanese cabbage, one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml Er Guo Tou, one bag mung bean sprouts, and one pack (x4) Neoguri spicy seafood noodle, also got one pan fried buns and one order stir fried rice noodle. Stopped by Target on Landers and purchased 3 jug 32oz Hazelnut creamer. Had 10 minutes MB with RM, EJ, not bad.
1/18/2019: Got up at 7:25. Visited Costco intending to see if anything around $100 available as gift, no luck, instead purchased one can Honey roasted nuts, one can unsalted mixed nuts, and three 27 gal storage containers (to be used as rain water collector). The LS400 almost failed to start when leaving the house, I need to remember to disconnect the battery before I head back to Taipei. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, she's going back to Taiwan on the 28th-with Alan. Made a support beam drill hole marker to make hardware screw location more accurate and easier. Finished 5 of 6 beam supports, ran out of hardware for the last beam, not all screws were attached since 'll need to make other adjustments.
1/19/2019: Got up at 7:32. Picked up additional beam support hardware (x14) from Lowes, stopped by Sprouts, got some Sumatra coffee beans. We've had problems with networks in recent months, suspected causes had always been the switches connecting other devices downstairs, but more problems (Vonage call/answer, Sling TV connection issues) during the last few days indicating something else, after some head scratching and experiments, it was decided that the old AT&T network router (which I used it as an AP) had been the culprit, put the switch back in use and connected the new ASUS router/AP on the coffee table and route Vonage through it, setup iPad to connect to it as well, left Sling TV and Brother printer connection as is-did not want to change everything at the same time.
There's a problem with upload speed when I tried to send one file to Google drive, several try and error, I found out the switch may be the cause for this problem, put every connections (wire from upstairs and AT&T AP) to ASUS router/AP and shut off the switch, this seemed to correct the problem, continue watching. Installed (not fully) the 6th beam support with the new hardware.
Covered the deck and put away the tools, will continue deck build work after returning from Taipei.
1/20/2019: Got up at 7:45. Decided to clean up the bench, moved all tools and junk from the bench, took about an hour.
1/21/2019: Got up at 7:24. Adjusted the tarp covering the deck and its ground floor as rain water kept filling the gap between beams which added extra weight for the tarp. Decided not to play table tennis today. Decided to take the black bag along as it has more pockets to house passports, credit card, cell phone... Will put this MacBook Pro in master room closet (top of the cabinets) after finishing writing this.
2019 trip to Taipei
1/22/2019-1/23/2019: Got up at 6:00. Left the house at 8:10, got to SJC at 8:35. Got Pre TSA and went through the check point quickly except my backpack, it was hold for inspection because of the two Mexican chocolate packs. Got to gate 15 at 8:53. The plane arrived at 9:03. Flight NH171 took off at 10:50, 5 minutes ahead of schedule. We landed at NRT at 2:05, one hour and 5 minutes ahead of schedule. Called Anita right after passing through the connecting flight check point, with her reminder, I was able to sit in United Club with mobile pass until it was time to board, the gate, surprisingly, was 42 and fairly close to the United Club. After 2 cups of beer and 2 cups of liquor, I left United Club and headed to gate 42, gate has been changed to 38 again. Flight NH823 took off at 7:15, 30 minutes behind schedule. Arriving Taoyuan airport at 10:08, w minutes ahead of schedule, took only 3 minutes to go through passport and security check, the long line talks may be for specific flights that have extra risks. Waited nearly 20 minutes for my luggage. Peilee and Tina were waiting just outside the exit gate, got to Neihu at 12:00.
1/24/2019: Got up at 5:50. Call KwangHua at 10:05, Called Anita at 1:10. Got one Boston gas permeable hard contact lens cleaner from the eyeglass store downstairs, got one roast duck bento from 新東陽, not as tasty but OK for $NT95. Felt sleepy in the afternoon, turned in around 10:00pm.
1/25/2018: Woke up at 2:00, wasn’t able to sleep much afterward, searched shoulder pain online, confirmed what I have is “五十肩”, I’ll start the exercises recommended and see if it improves. Got up at 6:25. Ahfen took me to the physical therapy clinic (成功復健) and went through the necessary steps getting examined by the doctor (on the second floor) and 4-stage (infrared ray heat, electric shock, physical manipulating, and laser) therapy (on the third floor), a total of 20+20+15+10=65 minutes, also got some prescription drug for muscle relaxation as well as pain relief/anti-inflammatory. Mom’s TV set’s having some issue where the remote control could turn it off but could only turn it on one out of maybe 3 or 4 times, suspecting the TV control function is malfunction get as all other remote control features appeared to work, the only possible solution was to power cycle the TV and try to turn it on again, went and got a 3-to-2 prone adapter to connect a individual switch controlled power strip and place it on top of the TV stand so that Mom can turn it off/on easily.
Visited the Post Office and got NT50000 after serval failed tries- for some reason I wasn’t able to login with my SSN until the third time and the way the amount is requested was not intuitive, oh well. Mom’s TV problem seemed to get worse, the remote seemed to fail most of the time after power cycle, the only conclusion was that the TV is failing badly, but after pondering it for a while I decided to change the remote batteries, luckily I was able to find 2 from one of the entertainment cabinet drawers, AND voila, it worked 100% of the time, but the symptom simply did not explain fully why only the ON function failed, will remove the added power strip and adapter once we are sure it is truly the cause.
1/26/2019: Woke up at 3:15, got up at 5:40. Visited Chungking Therapy at 8:00 as they open, I was #6 in line. The therapy procedures today included microwave (20 minutes), laser (10 minutes), and electric shock (20 minutes), no hand manipulation. Costco is always crowded, no exception today, it took Peilee qt minutes circling the parking lot to find a space, I managed to purchase 4 bottles 750ml Kingman Kaoliang, 3 large pack of rice cracker. Had dinner at Sushi Express Neihu (爭鮮迴轉壽司), not bad, only the quantity was small-$NT30 each plate, we had 19 in total. Turned in at 10:30.
1/27/2019: Woke up at 3:50, got up at 6:30. Paid a visit to PX Mart, got 4 packs pea crackers (2 Wasabi, and 2 Basil flavor), one pack cucumbers, 2 bags Almond&Fish Snack Mix, 2 bags Almond Strips&Fish, one Miso paste (found out later that it was not flavorful enough plus there already one in the refrigerator), and one today’s Apple Times. Picked up one Benton (crisp skin pork) from 新東陽, pretty tasty. Cleaned the two range hood filters, the ones with one year accumulated grease, took me over an hour, got cramps on fingers of both hands at the end.
Sister and Tigerlet came over at 9:00, provided them with Mexican chocolate and Olay.
1/28/2019: Got up at 6:00. Went through another physical therapy at Chengkong Clinic, the same procedures as last time-20 minutes microwave/heat, 10 minutes laser, and 20 minutes electric shock. Cleaned dinning room floor, removed one old rug from the foyer (the back of the rug totally transferred and glued to the floor, took some Ingenuity to get rid off them, also mopped the foyer floor. Withdraw $NT500p from the post office, hiked one circle around Beehu, it was too hot and my Achilles’ tendon challenged leg acted up a bit. Refilled Anita’s T-Mobile account for $10.00 with my Explorer card, next refill notice set to 1/24/2020, changed T-Mobile account password to xxxxMonica.
1/29/2019: Got up at 6:20. Physical therapy at 8:00, I was number 3 for a change, the same procedures as yesterday, finished at 8:53. Got BBQ pork plus oil chicken from 新東陽 for lunch, their BBQ pork was terrible, remember not to order again-so is roast duck. Got some plastic cover from 百利金, fixed top layer of the rice cooker shelf with it, also fixed the stove wall protection panel with similar cover. Picked one roll double sided tape, one roll cloth masking tape, and one pack (x4) small containers (for snacks) from 旺旺. Strengthened the new cover for the rice cooker shelf with double sided tape, taped down the rug corners just outside the kitchen.
1/30/2019: Woke up at 2:30, got up at 6:30. I was number 4 in line for my physical therapy today, finished 20 minutes microwave, 20 minutes electric shock, and 10 minutes laser, left at 8:55. Picked up an Apple Times at PX Mart.
Called Anita at 10:00. Picked up two packs Neoguri seafood ramen, one head cabbage, one flat bacon, and one bunch bananas from PX Mart. Resurfaced second lay of the rice cooker shelf, still not perfect, problably just OK.
Could not keep awake, turned in at 8:30.
1/31/2019: Woke up at 2:30, got up at 6:25. Physical therapy at 8:00, same routine as yesterday, I was number 3 in line. There were few than 6 people during my stay. Stopped by the post office and transferred $NT3000 to Caroline (任玉明) on behalf of Tzuchi Foundation. Visited PX Mart, purchased 4 cans Taiwan beer, an Apple Times, two cans High Mountain Oolong tea and one bag cashew nuts. Peilee decided to take Friday off and came home unexpected. Turned in at 9:10.
2/1/2019: Woke up at 2:30, got up at 6:30. Decided not to see Physical therapy doctor for more therapies, Will instead do more by myself. Cleaned outside of the front door, removed some OLD sticky stuff to make it shinny. Visited PX Mart, got one gift pack of sparrow’s nest drink (for Anita’s Mom), one Daikon, one Dioscorea (山藥), one pack bamboo shoots, one pack mushroom, one pack 秀珍菇, and one pack corn shoots.
2/2/2019: Woke up at 4:14, got up at 6:20. 讓媽媽有一些可以做的事, 即使你認為自己來就好-切記!!!!!! Took care of the rug just outside Mom’s room, exactly the same condition as the one I worked on a couple of days ago, only this one is even harder because it is larger and several tapes were used to make it stick to the floor, finished it in one hour and 30 minutes. Got one pair feet support silicone, one haircut/dye cover, one pack in-between-tooth brush.
2/3/2019: Got up at 6:15. Got 4 buns from I Jy Shing (一之軒) for Mom and myself, Peilee and family went to BanChao for ritual observation for Ahfen’s passing father. Visited PX Mart and got one China Times Daily, one small jar Wasabi sauce, one can instant coffee, 6 cans Taiwan beer, one bunch bananas, one pack squid fish balls, and 3 Fuji apples. Had one of the last over buns for lunch-with instant coffee (taste bad). Stopped by 旺旺and purchased 2 pack red envelopes, one nail clipper, and one hard plastic shell water bottle.
2/4/2019: Year of the Pig eve, got up at 6:30. Took Metro and visited 慈恩園, Had lunch there with the food used for the rituals. Made two dishes and plates two more from ready made material.
2/5/2019: Got up at 7:20. Cut up Nian Gao of both kind (Daikon and stick rice with red beans) for frying, and did the actual frying all by myself. Toured the less crowded visitation points near Culture University in the morning, had lunch in Miramar (美麗華) foodcourt in the basement floor.
2/6/2019: Got up at 7:15. Going to YungHo today, due to some soap dish accident, we were delayed by 15 minutes. Got to KwangHua/KwangHuei’s house at 10:30 (I pressed the wrong floor again-should be 5F instead of 4F), only KwangHue couple and KwangJade were there, had lunch (mostly good with liquor) with a good amount of Kingman Kaoliang. Stopped by KwangYao’s house around 4:30, setup his Amazon Echo, Had dinner at a restaurant in YungHo, I did not have much as the lunch was still lingering in my stomach. Arriving home after swung by 博愛街, Anita’s Mom had been talking about her past throughout the day, it’s hard not to lose patience after a while.
2/7/2019: Got up at 7:20. Cooked Nian Gao prepared by Peilee. Edited one version of Alexa command list for KwangHua and KwangYao. Did not leave the house the whole day. A near disaster when I took off my one and only contact lens for cleaning, I lost it with it hitting the sink once and disappeared, I looked and looked , it’s not in the bucket, not in the sink, not on the floor near the sink base, I even took off the sink pipe assembly and flash water down to see if it’s in it, no luck at all, as I was going to give up but peeked once more into the narrow gap between a pipe and the wall with phone flash light, there it was, hiding right there, with the help of a tooth pick, I was able to get it out safely, thank God. I’ll start closing the sink drainer from now on.
2/8/2019: Got up at 7:15. Called Anita at 10:03, shared my contact lens incident with her. Swung by PX Mart with Peilee and purchased two pairs of socks (one short and one hidden), one pack bacons, 4 Taiwan classic beer, one bottle Yellowtail Moscato (about $11), one Neoguri spicy seafood, one pack fast noodle (出前一丁), and one bunch bananas.
2/9/2019: Got up at 7:10. Peilee and family went to BangChao for Ahfen father’s ritual. Stopped by PX Mart, got two pairs socks (the same as yesterday-one pair short and one pair hidden), one China Times Daily, several bean curd snacks, and 2 cans Taiwan Classic beer. Stopped by 一之軒 with their membership card, picked up 6 pastries, it averaged over $NT32 a piece even with member discount, there wasn’t anything below $NT30.
2/10/2019: Got up at 7:10. Read the story about 2017 Navy destroyer Fitzgerald disaster, how it happened, why it happened, this along with another destroyer accident later on implied that US Navy has many many serious problem-training and personnel shortage, the weakening of the empire can be seen. Stopped by 新東陽 and picked up some crispy skin roast pork, swung by 香麥bakery and purchased 5 pastries for breakfast tomorrow. Had 10 minutes MB, EJ-no pleasure at all.
2/11/2019: Got up at 7:15. Stopped by the Post Office and tried fund transfer again, same result, got number 188 and waited 20 minutes before speaking to a teller, found out my ATM card did not have fund transfer capability, got back home and grabbed my ID card, my stamp, along with my passbook and ATM card, went back to the Post Office, got number 244 (they were serving 211 at the time) and waited half an hour before getting fund transfer capability added, did the transfer right after and, voila, it worked. Visited PX Mart, picked up one bunch bananas, one can Ahleeshan tea, one bag Balocco Cacao wafers, and one set small cleaning brush set, swung by E.Chime (楓采烘焙屋) and purchased 6 breakfast pastries, this store did have items below $NT30.
*(目前郵局尚有$NT52133)
2/12/2019: Got up at 7:20. Called Anita at 10:00, will call her again tomorrow before leaving the house. ANA flights NH824 (TPE to NRT) and NH172 (NRT to SJC) have been automatically checked in at 10:22, made copies of boarding passes on the Pixel just in case. Peilee came home at 6:50. Sis and Tigerlet stopped by, as always, with my birthday cake and one pack Almond biscuits and one pack dry Sakura shrimp, I could only bring along some of the biscuits plus the dry shrimp.
2/13/2019: Got up at 6:00. Finished putting away the stuff I am taking with me and the stuff leaving behind. Got to Taoyuan airport at 7:50. Surprisingly, unlike the previous several times, there wasn’t a crowd at the airport even though the freeways were filled with vehicles, I was able to go through luggage drop off, security check, and passport control areas in just 20 minutes, but the boarding gate D10 was the farthest from the passport control but I had plenty of time to check it out and went back to get a hot coffee ($NT95) 5 minutes from the gate, had breakfast (hot steamed bun) with it. Got an e-mail from ANA, flight NH172 from NRT to SJC will be delayed (change of plane) by 3 minutes, meaning I will be arriving San Jose at 9:45. Boarded flight 824 (a 767-300) at 9:58. I got three seats (38D, F, and G) to myself while my front row had 3 passengers, thank God. Was informed the flight would be 2 hours and 30 minutes, this’s 30 minutes faster than scheduled, will see. Flight NH 824 took off at 10:54, 24 minutes behind schedule. Arriving NRT at 2:23, got to gate 32 at 1:33. My next flight NH172 will be at gate 43, checked it out by actually walking there from United Club entrance, about 10 minutes walk, need to leave United Club around 4:45 for boarding around 5:00. Had one Santori beer at the food stand on the right side after entering United Club. Had another beer Asahi from the other side of the Club, also had several sushi, United Club is the economic lounge as far as amenities go, for the general public who does not buy business or first class tickets, the alcoholic beverages in United Club was OK. The flight was further delayed to 5:40, I was boarded at 5:25. Lucky me again, I got to enjoy/stretch my legs with 3 seats (31D, F, and G), thank God again. Flight 172 took off at 6:02, 62 minutes behind schedule. Landed at SJC at 9:51 am. Got to gate at 9:58, but we had to wait in the plane, for some unknown reasons, until 10:15 to get to ICE check point, exit at 10:59, the longest wait so far. Anita picked me up at 11:15. Finished unpacking around 4:30. Turned in at 8:20.
2/14/2019: Got up at 2:15, went back to bed at 3:20. Got up at 7:55. Visited Costco with Anita, took passport photo there but dI need to come back tomorrow to pick it up because their printer isn't working at the time, purchased two dozen organic eggs, one Organic Cherry Almond salad kit, one bag organic pine nuts, two boxes Bibigo steamed dumplings, one pack Pineapple sausage, one LaughingCow cheese, one plate organic Edamame, and one pack mushroom. Dropped off Anita's Medicare Plan B payment for March/April/May at the Post Office. Completed passport application online and printed (2 pages on required one-sided printing, for some reason I wasn't able to print from my MacBook Pro, PDF file may be the reason but I had no problem printing it from the iMac), need to check with the Post Office to see if the old envelope could still be used (with additional postage of course) since it already had an addressee label glued.
2/15/2019: Got up at 4:55, went back to bed at 5:30. Got up at 7:15. Picked up my passport photo from Costco, purchased one bunch bananas and one Cranberry Walnut Round before swing by the Post Office to verify the validity of the old Priority Mail Express envelope-only need to get enough postage and new mailing label. Cleaned up (not 100% due to wet and sticky ground) leftover garden waste in the street-as always I was cleaning for collective wastes from all nearby neighbors. Finished all necessary documents including current passport, renewal application, $110 check, and photo, sealed the envelope and filled a new address label, stopped by the Post Office again and mailed the application, an additional postage of $1.75 was added to the old postage of $23.75 to make current cost of $25.50, delivery date was scheduled for 2/19/2019- it's hard to imagine this is called priority express.
2/16/2019: Got up at 4:50, discovered the light next to my recliner did not work, tried the bulb on another light fixture got no light, was wondering why a LED light could have died so fast, but
2/14/2019: Got up at 2:15, went back to bed at 3:20. Got up at 7:55. Visited Costco with Anita, took passport photo there but dI need to come back tomorrow to pick it up because their printer isn't working at the time, purchased two dozen organic eggs, one Organic Cherry Almond salad kit, one bag organic pine nuts, two boxes Bibigo steamed dumplings, one pack Pineapple sausage, one LaughingCow cheese, one plate organic Edamame, and one pack mushroom. Dropped off Anita's Medicare Plan B payment for March/April/May at the Post Office. Completed passport application online and printed (2 pages on required one-sided printing, for some reason I wasn't able to print from my MacBook Pro, PDF file may be the reason but I had no problem printing it from the iMac), need to check with the Post Office to see if the old envelope could still be used (with additional postage of course) since it already had an addressee label glued.
2/15/2019: Got up at 4:55, went back to bed at 5:30. Got up at 7:15. Picked up my passport photo from Costco, purchased one bunch bananas and one Cranberry Walnut Round before swing by the Post Office to verify the validity of the old Priority Mail Express envelope-only need to get enough postage and new mailing label. Cleaned up (not 100% due to wet and sticky ground) leftover garden waste in the street-as always I was cleaning for collective wastes from all nearby neighbors. Finished all necessary documents including current passport, renewal application, $110 check, and photo, sealed the envelope and filled a new address label, stopped by the Post Office again and mailed the application, an additional postage of $1.75 was added to the old postage of $23.75 to make current cost of $25.50, delivery date was scheduled for 2/19/2019- it's hard to imagine this is called priority express.
2/16/2019: Got up at 4:50, discovered the light next to my recliner did not work, tried the bulb on another light fixture got no light, was wondering why a LED light could have died so fast, but
maneuvered it on its original base and somehow got the light back on, still don't know why but will keep an eye on it. Went back to bed at 6:20, got up at 8:15. Stopped by Marukai by myself and purchased one Pacific Snapper Fillet, one Shime Samma 3 pieces (Mackerel Sashimi), one Salmon Shioyaki bento, one Sashimi Moriawase, one Bara Chirashi, one Shrimp Roll. Replaced the clay light tower light bulb. The replacement bulb from the can was too dark for the living room, used the portable garage light bulb (the same as the one that's broken) instead and put the supposedly broken one in the portable, it seemed to work better there, nice.
2/17/2019: Got up at 4:05, went back to sleep at 5:45. Got up at 9:30, my blood pressure was 127/78, much better than the last few days, maybe I did not have enough sleep which caused high measurements. rolled up the tarps for continuation of deck work.
Drilled 4 holes in the wall to attach the beam support hardware but used only the upper ones (x2) as I did not see the need for all 4 since the purpose of the hardware was to hold the beam from falling toward the backyard, and since the beam was supported by 3 vertical posts, the weight of the beam won't be on the hardware/wall anyway, secured the hardware with two 3-1/2" nails, secured the beam to the hardware with two 1-1/4" screws, also cut off portion of the beam supporting wall hardware so that cross beam support hardware could be reattached (see the third photo below).
Made 2 square boards to serve as the covers for two of the 5 gallon soy sauce buckets, water sealed them, also applied some transparent flex seal to the edges to fill small cracks.
2/18/2019: Woke up at 4:05, went back to sleep at 5:00. Got up at 8:15. Secured the new beam to its supporting posts with 3" screws. Cleaned and water sealed one 3 ft lumber to enhance the cross-beam next to the wall, glued and screw secured the 3 ft lumber to the cross-beam closest to the wall so that the picture frame piece has enough support. Installed and secured that cross-beam (with additional lumber attached).
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Decided not to secure the remaining 5 cross-beams for now, will, instead, apply sand and scrap lumbers on the floor first as access to the area will be almost impossible after installing the beams and deck.
2/19/2019: Got up at 7:30. Outside temperature actually reached 0°C.
Picked 2 bags sweet rice ball for the Lantern Festival from 99 Ranch Market. Dump the 2 bag of sand onto the deck floor, only 4 to 5 square ft was covered, looks like I'll need at least 12 more bags to cover the whole deck floor.
Dry cleaned both cars in the garage.
Played 50 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 30 minutes with Kung.
2/20/2019: Got up at 7:35. Scrap the idea of going to Lowes in the morning by myself, will ride with Anita when she visit City Sports instead, I'll drop by Lowes to pick up several bags playground sand. No table tennis today, as Kung is not in the office and Stephanie had to go to Teresa's house. Drove Anita to City Sports while I visited Lowes and purchased 8 bags 50 lbs general purpose sand. Spread 4 of them on the uncovered second layer deck floor, need to decide which area to cover next as the remaining 4 bags won't be able to do the remaining uncovered deck floor. Jason sent a Line message, I need to call him tomorrow.
2/21/2019: Got up at 7:33. CCC volunteer day, intentionally left the house at 8:50 to get a head start, but unfortunately there was a big traffic accident just before Landess exit, took me 30 minutes to get there. Swung by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one pack fried fish cake, one pack beef tendon balls, one pack Hokin pork balls (貢丸), one pack big scallops, 4 bags spicy peanuts, 2 red onions, one pack Coco bread, one pack tofu puffs, one cabbage, two green peppers, 3 packs thick bean curd, one bag Bamboo Shoots, one Daikon, one bag duck liver sausages, one pack thick bacons, and one pack (x2) beef shanks. Set the remaining 4 bags general purpose sand under the finished decks, will need at least 6 more to complete the job.
2/22/2019: Got up at 7:40. Removed the mini blind in the kitchen, the retracting wires had lost their ability to pull/release the blind, I created a make-shift replacements over 20 years ago when the originals failed, it's time to repeat the task, finished one wire, will do the other this afternoon as my eyes are pretty tired. Dropped off Anita at City Sports before stopping by Lowes, got 6 All-Purpose sand. With some challenge, but I finished replacing the weaken strings on the mini blind, works fine.
2/23/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive, Jason came over at 7:55. There were 7 people in the group: Ching, Steve, the other Ming, Wayne, Alex, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Shimesaba Kaburazuke, one Special Bara Chirashi, one Sashimi Moriawase, one Pacific Snapper Fillet, one Nigiri Combo 10pc, one today's special bento, and one California Roll (middle row: Saturday lunch, top row: Saturday dinner, bottom row right side item: Sunday lunch, bottom row left item: Sunday dinner).
Applied 3 more bags of General-Purpose sand to the deck floor, that pretty much covered 90% of the whole are I wanted to spread, moved 7 old deck lumbers on top of the sand, some small areas not covered by the lumbers will have to wait a bit.
2/24/2019: Got up at 7:40. Started Anita's Social Security Benefits application.
Will try to revisit it after 3/8/2019.
2/25/2019: Got up at 7:30. Had a new idea and boarded the sand area with lumbers in between concrete blocks, this made the containment easier to manage plus more consistent. Covered the entire deck with hanging tarps getting ready for the incoming rain. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, Kung had to go to a Chinese Calligraphy class. Stopped by Costco and purchased one Honey roasted cashew nuts (incorrect purchase, Anita wanted Almond instead, my bad), one bag organic pine nuts, two Cranberry Walnut Round, 2 salad kit (one sweet Kale, one Mediterranean), and one bottle 1.7L Red Label Johnny Walker, one tub cream cheese, one pack Laughing Cow cheese, one pack (x4) organic tofu, filled up RX300 before heading home. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Called Mom at 6:00, Ahfen answered the phone, Mom's resting because she's not feeling well, I'll call her a little later. Called several times but no one answered, so I tried Ahfen and Peilee with Line, got no answer either, called several more time and finally got Mom to answer, she's sounded weak, complaining about dizziness and such but appeared to be normal.
2/26/2019: Got up at 7:25. Stopped by Costco but could not find Honey Roasted Almond Anita desired, ended up getting a small bag of Seaweed Almond thins after checking with Anita. Got $30 worth 91 Octane gas for LS400 before heading home. Had a haircut by Ahyui around 10:00, Anita got a dye and hair trim for $20, tip included. No table tennis today, Stephanie was busy with errands and Kung's out sick with flu again.
2/27/2019: Got up at 6:20, Anita's trip to Taiwan starts today. Dropped off Anita at the security check point before visiting Lowes to check on composite deck boards, surprised to find out the very boards were on clearance and they only had 5 left, purchased the 5 available and pondered how am I going to continue the project if no more could be found in other Lowes stores, after painful search, the only available natural brown ones are in Union city and they were 16-ft, after careful evaluation, I decided to order 8 of them with truck-delivery service, since they were half price ($14x8=$112, the money I saved more than cover the delivery charge of $90, a total of $220.69 including $20.69 sales tax, hopefully this solve the problem.
Had 15 minutes MB with RMs, no EJ- need new images and videos for a more enjoyable experience. Got e-mail and phone notification that my Lowes composite deck board order will be delivered tomorrow while I am at CCC, since they will call 30 minutes before arrival, I set up a SimulRing on Vonage which will also ring my cell phone when someone call out home number, this way I can come home after I receive the call and not missing much of the CCC volunteer time. Jason called at 7:30, excusing himself from going hiking Saturday beginning this week as he'll be working at a restaurant Friday and Saturday morning, guess I'll try to go by myself. Anita's flight NH171 landed at NRT at 9:45pm our time (2:45pm Japan time).
2/28/2019: Got up at 7:15. CCC volunteer day, left the house at 8:42, go there at 9:05. Call from Lowes delivery did not come while I was there, got home at 1:40. Not sure if this had something to do with the fact that I did not click the "Confirm" button on their delivery notification e-mail until 10:45 this morning, maybe they did not load the boards simply because I did not confirm the delivery?!?!?! Call from DSI Logistics Inc at 3:10, saying they are coming from Union city Lowes, should get here in half an hour-that's outside their "delivery window". Truck arrived at 3:40, the guy used a 3 wheel forklift to move the composite deck boards to the side of the driveway, I had to carry them to the backyard one by one, almost broke my back/shoulder.
Checked my passport application status, 4-6 weeks as it repeated online.
3/1/2019: Got up at 7:30. Uncovered the deck area and secured all cross-beams with 1-1/4" wood screws. Trimmed off front yard dead branches. Recovered deck area with tarps. Jason called confirming that he could still hike on Saturday since his restaurant work is for every Tuesday-Friday morning. Had 40 minutes (2400 counts) MB with RM, EJ, not bad.
3/2/2019: Got up at 7:45. Decided not to go to Harbor Freight Tools and/or Marukai as it rained big for safe driving. Checked and added spare tires on both LS400 and RX300, inflated them from ~20 to 30 lbs. Moved remaining 2 bags of All-Purpose sand to deck stair base so that I may use its original location for ground level Miter Saw placement, moved the Miter Saw to first layer deck and covered it up with plastic sheets.
Had 25 minutes MB with RMs (triangular style invented), no EJ. Called Anita on her iPad at 5:00.
3/3/2019: Got up at 7:20. Went to Harbor freight Tools and got one pack (x3) superglue, one 30' (I thought I was getting a 25' one) tape measure, one 18"x12" wood mover's dolly and one pack (x2) cleaning gloves, swung by Marukai and got one tonkatsu, Shrimp Roll, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, and one bunch bananas, stopped by Daiso, purchased one pack (x3) small plastic containers, one silicone folding cup, one pack (x70) Tempura Paper Sheet, and one soft plastic ice tray, Daiso now accept credit card payment without minimal purchase requirement. Had one hour MB with RMs, no EJ-could not feel anything after 40 minutes. Prepared to start deck work as the forecast and sky view indicating a cloudy but no rain afternoon, but by the time I got ready with waist guard, jacket and scarf necessary gadgets (pencil, black ink marker, and newly purchased measure tape plus writing pad) and walked out to the backyard, it started raining, I had no choice instead started working on the second layer deck drawing.
3/4/2019: Got up at 7:30. Started working the deck at 9:20. Took sometime to get in the working mood, made 2 66-7/8" boards for layer 2 phase II frame boarder perpendicular to the wall and 2 67-1/2" boards parallel to the wall. Before making the two parallel ones I had to be sure the 10 boards to be placed within the frame fit well, turned out with the spacer I currently have, right side frame boarder would not be able to reach its designated location so I had to build thicker spacers to accommodate. Took lunch break for one hour. made some trimmings on the frame boards to fir better, added one side lumber (to the cross-beam farthest from the wall) for additional planter box side frame board support, after more pondering on frame board support, I discovered that I need additional cross-beams (or something to that effect) to support center boards since their long ends simply do not have anything to hold on to, need to get a couple of 6' 4x4 and hardware to accomplish, will go to Lowes tomorrow for that. Cleaned up and put away tools and covered the deck, ready for the rain.
Called Anita at 5:00, she's been up since 6:00 and finished all major activities. Called Mom at 6:00. Paid LS400 registration renewal fee $163 online.
3/5/2018: Got up at 7:37. Broke the USB cable connector that was charging the Amazon tablet, replaced it with a spare one. Stopped by Lowes, purchased two 4"x4"x7' treated lumber, two 2"x6"x8' lumber, four 4x4 support hardware, and one box (x75) 1-1/2" wood screws.
Had 30 minutes MB with RMs, EJ. Need to get rid off some RMs. Tried to check in NCL for our May cruise, Anita's was done but since I do not have my new passport yet, I'll have to wait several weeks before attempting to check in again. Called Anita at 5:03. Power went out (likely caused by strong wind) at 9:20, came back at 9:50. Power failure occurred a couple more times during the night.
3/6/2019: Got up at 7:10. The ATT wireless router 2W510 wasn't working, it could not initialize to stable operation condition so I unplug the power, will try it later. Swung by Costco and purchased 2 Jockeys (one large black and one medium grey, no small size at all), one bottle 1.75L Kirkland Tequila, one Asian Cashew salad kit, one pack (x6) Romaine lettuce, two dozen organic egg, and one pack large shrimp. After trying them on, I felt comfortable in the large size but seemed only ok in the medium one, maybe Anita can use the medium one when she gets back. Plugged in the ATT router 2W510, the power indicator din't even come up, tried different outlets, no luck, searched my study and found a Dell power adapter with similar rating (~5V and ~2A) plus matching plug, replace it with the original and voila, it came back on, internet access test was OK. Cleaned up the windows facing the front yard, they hadn't been touched for many many years and they looked really dirty, 50 minutes later they looked like this:
No table tennis today as Kung had to go home taking care of leak roof and some other issues.
3/7/2018: Got up at 7:15. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:05. The new janitor let me in. It was extremely busy morning, people came in for youth culture training info/application, phone calls seemed to come every minute, JP had to leave around 11:30, I stayed off the restroom until 1:00 when she came back. Cynthia provided some breads for us to take home-I had 3 of them. Stopped by Marina Grocery and picked up one fried fish cake, one pack beef tendon ball, one pound lean ground pork, 4 bags 210g spicy peanuts, one Daikon, one pack thick bean curd, and one bag 5 lbs Thai Jasmine rice. Received Amazon delivery of the 2-1/2" screws at 2:54. Called Anita at 5:00 for 18 minutes. Called Mom at 6:00 for 25 minutes. Had 15 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Tested front yard solar light, light's dim, most likely due to the lack of sun light recently.
3/8/2019: Got up at 7:10. Started working on the deck at 9:00 until 11:40, the two additional cross-beams provided another challenge, in order to lay down these two pieces I had to remove the adjoining cross-beams so that I have enough space to work with, the insertion of supporting hardware also presented a bit more fun in which I had to attach the hardware to the cross-beams first before attaching them to the beams, leveling them was yet another challenge, finished the aforementioned tasks, will attach the new cross-beams this afternoon. Prepared another addition to the cross-beam closest to the planter box to make the frame board more stable and secure, applied water seal to them (2 pieces combination). Attached the two new cross-beams (with make shift support posts to level and flash with beams), completed the cross-beam expansion and secured it to its original location. Checked the frame board settings and discovered that I need to trim a couple of mm off the boards closest to the wall and the one closest to the brick platform to provide a better fit for center boards.
3/9/2019: Got up at 7:20. Swung by Harbor Freight Tools and got one set Masonry drills, one 10" 40T saw blade, four 2" paint brush, one pack (x2) cleaning gloves, and one pair Latex work gloves, it rained pretty hard on my trip back home. Changed the ties to the hanging tarp, it now relays on the Cherry tree branch instead of the planter box trellis to stay secure against the wind-the trellis can now stand straight without being pull over by the tarp. Started working on the power line for the porch Arlo camera, took one Masonry, one 12" wood, and one Ryobi flat bottom wood drills to drill one hole through the upper right outside corner of the porch window, was able to pass the 15' USB cable through and tested with the Arlo Pro camera there, but upon connecting the camera back to its original siting place under the eavesdrop, the USB connector could not be reinserted because it is partially blocked by the stick mount hardware knob, I'll have to think it over, worst case would be to use the magnetic mount. Called Anita at 5:01.
3/10/2019: Day Light Saving starts today-Spring forward. Got up at 7:45. Started Arlo camera power supply line installation, tested magnetic mount at several different locations but the best one was next to its original mounting point, attached and tested the result, appeared to be OK, secured the wire and covered it with plastic cable management channel, both inside and outside.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 26 minutes.
3/11/2019: Got up at 8:30. Resumed deck work at 10:00. Secured the frame boards with clamps, not perfect but OK formation as long as the center boards line up nicely-with even spaces. Trimmed off excess from the two frame boards. Made 10 center boards (65-3/4") from the 16ft boards.
Played 50 minutes table tennis with Kung, sweat the first time since early February. Got an e-mail from passport service, I should be expecting it around 3/17, great! Resumed deck work at 2:30. Discovered the work I did this morning-trimming off excess (I thought) was a mistake after I tried to put everything together, had make two additional frame boards (alongside the wall and the one parallel on the outside), luckily the two being replaced could still be used on the third layer deck, the second phase second layer deck looked better now even though I still need to examine the center board boundaries to make sure they appeared evenly when screwed in, will take that on tomorrow.
Received the two fanny bags I ordered from Amazon, looked nice but it could not house the Pixcel XL or iPhone 6L, will still keep them since there were ~$10 each, need to find out how to make use of them though. Called Anita at 6:00, she's going out for lunch with friends so we didn't talk long. Called Mom at 7:00, she's going out for a walk as the weather was nice so we only chatted for 15 minutes.
3/12/2019: Got up at 8:00. Started deck work around 9:20. Adjusting and readjusting in between board gaps (wide, depth, as well diagonal), except for the frame board nearest the wall requires some leveling adjustment, a close to satisfaction phase 2 second layer materialized.
Leveled the frame board nearest the wall, some uneven appearance still persist, some more adjustment may be needed but that have to wait. Carefully secured all four frame boards with screws, looked nice. Started drilling holes and secure the center boards beginning on the planter box side, this is to make sure the gap next to the frame board are even, made 2 lines of attachment, a total of 6 are planned, need to get more screws to continue.
Called Anita at 6:00, since she just got up (too tired from yesterday's friend gathering), will call her back in 30 minutes.
3/13/2019: Got up at 7:26. Stopped by Costco and got one Cranberry Walnut Round and one box Baby Spinach. Swung by Lowes, purchased one box (~75) 10 x 2-1/2" composite deck screws. Started deck work at 10:30, finished the remaining 4 lines of screw drilling as well securing with 10x2-1/2" screws, will wrap this phase of the second layer deck this afternoon.
Cut off the low bending Oleander branch that was blown over by the gusty wind last week, had thought about getting rid of it long ago, opportunity was given for a reason. Covered the rain water contains without lid with old tarps and held them secure with leftover composite boards. Added several more screws to the frame boards to compensate the uneven appearances, and the result was very satisfactory. Removed and put away the tarps covering phase 2 second layer deck.
3/14/2019: Got up at 7:25. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:07, got in right away as Yolanda was just a few steps ahead of me. It was a terribly busy morning, not only were there numerous calls and foot traffic, I was asked to translte a newspaper article which contained nothing but jargons which I rarely paid attention, it's killing me having to come up with proper words/sentence for them. Sent what I've done at 1:30 to JP, she'll ask her daughter to do the second phase. Swung by Marina Grocery, purchased one pack Vermicelli, one bag beef tendon ball, one bag meat ball, two bags spicy peanut, 4 Romaine tomatoes, one pack tofu puff, one bunch bananas, one bottle Wasabi sauce, one head Taiwanese cabbage, and one bottle Siracha chili sauce. Presented $70 to Francisco for March payment. Received my new USA passport, a slight relief.
Checked in NCL after providing new passport info, but the resulting status for me was New Guest, not sure why but it's bothering me for a while because the onboard benefits for Platinum member (at least for Anita) was almost all gone. Updated Gate 1 passport info. Called Anita at 6:00 for 25 minutes. Called Mom at 7:00 for 31 minutes. Finally finished reading/listening "What the Wind Knows".
3/15/2019: Got up at 7:20. Removed some of the bricks next to the old deck stair base, took out the concrete at the bottom of several of these bricks, then moved excess sand from the 3rd layer deck floor to the brick floor base. Made 3 supporting posts for the 3rd layer deck.
Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung. Swung by Lowes and purchased four 8' 2x4, four 4"x4" brackets, and one box 10 2-1/2" brown composite screws. Made 6 posts (fairly short ones ~3" to 4") and 2 make shift beams (from two of the new 2x4 and several old 4x4).
Water sealed all necessary support boards for the 3rd layer deck, should be able to secured them tomorrow and ready for composite board installation.
3/16/2019: Got up at 6:30, hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 8 people in the group: Jerry, Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Wayne, the other Ming, Jason, and myself. Adjusted the last three concrete blocks locations (about 2 inches to the right) so that the deck boards (decided 5 would be the best number) will be able to sit well and the base of the blocks won't interfere with lattice installation (has to be flash with). Made two beams as planned, will use screws to secure them after the glue dried.
3/17/2019: Got up at 7:28. Readjust the beams again several times, finally secured the posts to their respective concrete block base.
The decision to make it a 5-board 3rd layer deck still had a problem, the exposed concrete block bases were 2" beyond the deck which made covering it up with lattice impossible, but adding one more board to extend the edge also create another problem, the board could not be supported by existing beams, this meant I'll have to extend the beam somehow, so far that seemed to be the only solution. Partially attached support hardware to the beams, will secure them all once the cross-beams are in place and in satisfactory condition.
Secured the edge beam to the posts, it looked like the better approach in the edge support adding one more composite deck board was to attach 3 extended post to the existing ones, and secure one 2x6 full length lumber on the top of it which flash with the edge beam, hope this is strong enough. Called Anita at 6:00. Need to remember Anita will call me tomorrow instead because she'll be out around 6:00. Had 15 minutes MB with RM, EJ.
3/18/2019: Got up at 7:06. Made 5 cross-beams from newly purchased 2x6 and one from old stair step because I need to keep most of the second 2x6 for extension, had to trim off the 5 cross-beams about 1/8" at both end of the bottoms as the measurement I made was with aged 2x6 which had reduced their width, made 3 4x4 blocks to be used as extension support. Will apply water seal in the afternoon.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Water sealed all wood pieces. Continuing with Anita's Social Security application but had to stop because of the direct deposit info issue-need to check with Anita. Finished Anita's Social Security benefit application-bank routing info and account type was resolved.
3/19/2019: Got up at 7:04. Secured the three extension support with 4" screws (they were glued to the beam yesterday), decided to add two additional supports, glue them first. Put all water sealed cross-beams back to their respective brackets.
Securing the cross-beams turned out to be more challenging than I anticipated, finished only 4 of the 8 in the morning. Played 35 minutes table tennis, 10 minutes with Kung (I forgot to come at 12:00 as he had class at one, sorry), and 25 minutes with Stephanie. Resumed deck work at 1:30, completed extension support additions, should be strong enough to hold people sitting at the edge of layer 3 deck, secured the remaining 4 cross-beams, placed remnant composite boards to see how well the support base felt, looked OK, the only concern was that the space between the edge of layer 3 deck and rose may not be adequate enough for Anita, will sent her photos to examine.
Called Anita at 6:01 for 17 minutes, she's going to enjoy hot spring and lunch with Jamie Tang later.
3/20/2019: Got up at 7:26. Cleaned the greasy spots in the garage near the side door with steel brash and sponge after applying general purpose cleaner, looked much better now, moved the mobile table saw back to the garage where it is now cleaned. Looked like I'll be able to do some composite deck work this afternoon as the rain had subsided. Still having problem logging on to Arlo, not sure if this my Arlo system issue or simply an Arlo community problem. Played 50 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 30 minutes with Kung. Stephanie had no problem login in her Arlo, what's up with mine?????? Started deck work at 1:30, made 2 identical and shorter frame boards but ended up trimming/adjusting 3 of the 4 frame boards as they did not appear coordinating, cut 4 center boards after a couple of more trimmings, just discovered the Miter saw did not have perfect 90° cut, I have long suspected the 45° cuts were different for the right and left swing but 90°, this is only noticeable when several boards with 90° cut were lined up side by side, I guess you get what you pay for.
Couldn't figure out what's going on with our Arlo system, it appeared that I could not access anything Arlo related site, router firewall??????
3/21/2019: Got up at 7:14. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:10. Waited about 5 minutes before Yolanda arriving and allowed my entry. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased 18 can Miller Draft beer, one Daikon, one pack beef shank, 2 packs thick bean curd, and one bunch bananas. Resumed deck work at 2:30, made 4 triangle shaped wood pieces as additional edge supports, applied water seal to them, attached them to their intended locations, but because of the extension board wasn't lined up perfectly, the 4 triangle shaped supports were not installed as nicely as I wanted, but better than nothing. Just as I suspected, the newly purchased 16-ft composite board IS about 3mm wider than the old one, since I used the old ones to measure frame dimensions, the outcome was as expected-terrible looking, I made new spacers to compensate but the result wasn't good enough, need to increase the spacer width a bit, cleaned up and put away tools as rain is in the forecast.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 29 minutes. Called Mom at 7:00 for 35 minutes. Entered payment info for my Explorer, my CapitalOne, and Anita's CapitalOne on Fidelity, not yet submitted, Anita's Explorer statement should be available on the 26th, and PG&E should be coming soon.
3/22/2019: Got up at 7:15. Called NCL at 1-866-234-7350 and spoke to a representative within 5 minutes, she helped resolve my name issue (LIN, PEICHEN instead of LIN, PEI CHEN), I login and checked in again and got a new eDocs with correct name and PLATINUM status. Swung by Costco and got one tub cream cheese, one bag Bibigo mini Wonton, one pack Top Sirloin, and one tub Organic Greek Yogurt. Looks like I would not be able to work on the deck today even though the rain wasn't big but kind of non stop though. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Still sprinkle every now and then. Received my Old USA passport, still useful since the Brazilian Visa on it won't expire until 2027. Adjusted the Arlo camera in the front yard, hopefully it will not be recording cars moving in the street-and allow the Arlo camera outside the front room to do that instead. Called Anita at 6:00 for 23 minutes.
3/23/2019: Got up at 7:00, hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Wayne, Ming, Cindy, Steve (Cindy's husband), Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and got one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Volcano Roll, and one Special Benton. Chipped off more wall concrete to allow a better fit for the frame that's next to the wall. Applied wall paint to the exposed part. Clamped down three corners of the 3rd layer deck ready for attachment.
Started 3rd layer deck attachment process at 3:30. Finished at 5:10.
Called Anita at 6:00, she's taking a group trip to YuenNan LeeJang for 7 days (2/24-2/30).
3/24/2019: Anita called at 6:44 from her hotel. Got up at 7:31. Contemplating ideas on ground level design, the easiest way is to dump plenty of sand and cover it with bricks, but, will need to sleep on it before plunging into. Decided not to make power line connections for Tip's Arlo camera, instead will handover the charging cable and charger plus two batteries.
3/25/2019: Got up at 7:20. Spread two bags of all-purpose sand on the soil between the planter box under the fake Cherry tree and the back fence facing stairs, put 3 3-ft lumber over the sand for comfortable walking, will need at least 4 more for this area to level with the to-be-made extension step. a total of maybe 20 bags more are needed. Cleaned up weeds in between bricks in the backyard. Stopped by Lowes and picked up 6 bags 50 lbs All Purpose Sand, even with the aid of the newly acquired moving roller, still one energy demanding task. Played 55 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Stephanie, 30 minutes with Kung.
3/26/2019: Got up at 7:23. Pulled weeds from the ground underneath the two Oak trees, almost like a full lawn, took me over one hour but finished not even half of it.
After breaking two metal reciprocating saw blades, I finally removed 90% of the remnant deck faucet pipe.
Will try to cover it up with cement and paint this afternoon. Played 60 minutes table tennis, 35 minutes with Kung, 25 minutes with Stephanie. Spent another hour pulling weeds in the front yard, remaining 1/3 was on our neighbor side, will get to it when I have time, need to decide what to do with the three flower bunches that were cleaned out by Francisco but started coming back but looked ugly, either I remove all of them or keep only a few smaller spots for keeps. Applied matching wall paint to the pipe opening and adjacent area.
3/27/2019: Got up at 7:18. Added Anita's Explorer credit payment info ($217.75 due on 4/23/2019), submitted it along with two other payments already on pending list: my Explorer credit card ($1807.85 due on 4/11/2019) and Anita's CapitalOne ($754.72 due on 4/11/2019) to Fidelity BillPay. Need to take care of my CapitalOne and PG&E later. Added my CapitalOne payment info ($30 due 4/23/2019) and submitted it on Fidelity BillPay. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Took me one hour and 30 minutes to dig out one of the three bushes under the Oak tree, sweat like hell. Will work on the other two some other day.
3/28/2019: Got up at 7:08. CCC volunteer day, got there at 8:57, called deputy director to let me in. Swung by Marina Grocery and got one fried fish cake, 2 bag pin rice noodle, two bags (210g each) spicy peanuts, one red onion, a pack garlic, and one bunch bananas, with accumulated coupon of $7, also got 4 fried chicken legs plus 2 fried spring rolls. Once again forgot to stop by Target for creamer. Painted the bottom of the deck counter and the wall beneath it, had to go through the bottom twice as it's been too long without any protection and it absorbed the first layer paint.
Called Mom at 7:00 for 30 minutes.
3/29/2019: Got up at 7:08. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, pulled/removed weeds on the ground. Forgot to move garbage and recycle bins out last night, fortunately they weren't loaded. Stopped by Lowes and purchased two 60 lbs concrete mix and 4 50 lbs all purpose sand, appeared to be easier to move around this time around. Dug and placed several bricks near the fake Cherry tree at the edge of the center walkway, Anita would be happy for this.
Found out the optometrist I visited in recent years was Dr. Jennifer Kao & Associates. Originally agreed to play some table tennis, only had to cancel it even though I was already there waiting since Teresa gave Stephanie new assignment during her lunch hour, so no table tennis today. The Meow Mix ordered from Amazon was delivered at 1:59. The Fire 7 Tablet from Amazon was delivered at 2:37, no door bell was pressed neither time. Prepared concrete pouring containers for the deck floor, filled them all with newly purchased concrete mix, applied enough water for a solid result. Still need to do the same for the center stairs, I'd want to keep the sand base off the stair base - two retaining blocks are needed, one on each side of the stairs.
Anita called 3:29. Tried but failed to login PG&E with xxxxpge/monica, instead entered payment of $120 directly on Fidelity BillPay, since it was ~$120 last April.
3/30/2019: Got up at 7:00. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ching, Alex, Ming, the other Ming, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, and two Fish Ara (Salmon belly). Removed concrete wall barriers, they looked wet and kind of weak, not sure if it was because of not enough drying time or I did not pre-mix with water before applying , need to wait a couple of more days to find out, added water to the mix before applying them to make the remaining concrete walls beneath the stairs, will see if this made any difference.
Removed the remaining bushes under the Oak tree, these two seemed to be easier than the first one, it could be I had experience this time but it still took me one hour and 30 minutes.
Had 15 minutes MB with mini, EJ.
3/31/2019: Got up at 7:07. Picked up one Organic Mediterranean salad kit, two dozen organic eggs, one box (x54, 3 varieties) K-cup, and one pack Artisan hamburger buns - all these from 8:55 to 9:03. Beginning to scrap up the white pebbles near the first deck stairs, planning to dig a little deeper and cover part of the floor near the side stairs with sand before installing bricks on top to level with the concrete flaps. Called Anita at 6:00.
4/1/2019: Got up at 7:23. Made deck riser for layer two and layer three junction, for some reason (I made a mistake) the riser is not of the same height, it started at 5" and ended at 5-1/4" to the right, had make something special for that but worked out alright. Applied water seal to these two pieces.
Moved most of the white pebbles between the first stairs and the concrete pavement to brick platform, waiting to be cleaned, also prepare the vacated location for digging.
Played 50 minute table tennis, 25 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Went through all backyard roses and got rid off aphides beneath the leaves and on the stems. Pondering on the ideas of sand base boarder on the planter box, all of my current ideas appeared to be inadequate. Called Anita at 6:00 for 28 minutes. Called Mom at 7:00 for 27 minutes.
4/2/2019: Got up at 7:27. Started third stair step task, made 4 make-shift support beams to test leveling, seemed OK. The space between the first stairs and the concrete pavement is now one of the tough problems, after pondering more on existing material and possible design, I came up with a new idea: use seven 8-ft composite boards to cover the space seemed to be a good idea since there will be enough material to build in addition to the third step. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung.
Spent nearly two hours in the backyard pondering new ideas, after carefully calculating remaining composite boards, it appeared a long narrow walkway the size of 15" from second stairs to to brick platform plus this morning's design, we may be able to get things done-except that the morning design may have to be reduced to 6' instead of 8' (not going all the way to the wall), need to sleep on it.
4/3/2019: Got up at 7:20. Cleaned up mirror, countertop, and vanity glass shelf of Anita's bathroom, will clean tub and floor later. Spent one hour and 40 minutes (9:30-11:10) paving the brick platform opening.
Filled in the sidewalk extension on both sides.
Had 15 minutes MB, no EJ-joyless.
4/4/2019: Got up at 7:07. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15, Sophia got me in when she arrived. Stopped by Marina Grocery and got one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, two bags 210g spicy peanuts, two packs big thick bean curd, one bunch green onion, one head Cauliflower, one bunch bananas, one can Kimbo Pork Sung, one pack small Gai Choy, one dozen DOS XX, and one dozen Michelob Ultra. Swung by Target got one bottle 64oz creamer (only one available), one pack (x2) UpUp paper towel, and one pack napkin. Dumped the trimming of the front bush into the street, boy were they heavy. Called Anita at 6:00 for 16 minutes. Called Mom at 7:00 for 21 minutes.
4/5/2019: Got up at 7:24. Recreated makeshift composite board walkway for a more sturdy support. Cleaned up leftover garden waste, pulled some weeds from under the peach tree, had to stop as it rained a bit too hard.
Had 15 minutes MB with legs, EJ-OK. Placed another 8 ft board alongside the 70" one to present the design better.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 20 minutes.
4/6/2019: Got up at 7:00. Hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 14 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ching, Alex, Alex's wife, Ming, Ming's friend couple, Wayne, Cindy/Steve, Jason, and myself. Swung by Marina Grocery and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Fish ARA trimming, one Today's Special Bento, and one Futomaki (Sushi Roll). Stopped by Lowes, found the 27 Gallon Tote but could not locate any matching lid, gave up and purchased 2 4x2 Birchwood boards and four 4x4x8 treated lumbers, again, loading and unloading were quite challenging-they were heavy. Called Anita at 6:00 for 26 minutes.
4/7/2019: Got up at 8:21. Cleaned up compost area dirt, Oleander leaves and weeds in between bricks throughout. Refilled T-Mobile (4082287009) account with $10.00, new expiration day will be 4/6/2020. Cleaned the four Tote lids, took nearly one hour. 4/23/2015 was the first time volunteering at CCC Milpitas. Called Anita at 6:00 for 28 minutes, she will be flying back home tomorrow, arriving Tuesday our time. Put away some of the tools on the bench as they were becoming an eyesore.
4/8/2019: Got up at 7:15. Picked up one bottle 1.75L Jose Cuervo Tequila, one bottle 1.75L Red Label Johnny Walker, and one pack Asian Cashew salad kit from Costco, filled up RX300 afterward, it's now $3.999/gal. Played 20 minutes table tennis with Kung. Called Anita at 2:00, her flight NH824 will depart at 8:40am. Anita called from Taoyuan airport at 5:04, flight NH824 is delayed for 6 minutes but estimated to arrive NRT 2 minutes ahead of schedule. Called Mom at 7:00 for 27 minutes, it started to rain while I was talking to Mom, luckily I covered the table saw in the afternoon, moved the plywood sheets away from the rain before they were destroyed, also filled lower layer water containers with rain water manually as they were not getting filled. Anita called from NRT at 9:19, she's on her way to United Club for a good time before boarding NH172 back to SJC.
4/9/2019: Got up at 7:10. Waited at Lowes before picking up Anita at SJC, got home at 11:25. Adjusting risers for the center stairs, the heights were not even and had to be trimmed carefully, bad job. Added a couple of small composite wedges to the side of the beam on the left side of the stairs to form a straight and flat base to attach the riser extension to cover up the hardware.
4/10/2019: Got up at 7:10. Redesigned top riser for the deck center stairs so that it flashes with others, reduced height of side cover boards so that lattice can be attached behind it, prepared 2/3 of the walkway composite boards (15"), will finish the rest this afternoon.
Played 50 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 30 minutes with Kung. Made 10 more walkway composite boards, this should cover the entire walkway, hopefully.
4/11/2019: Got up at 7:13. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one pack vermicelli, one pack fried tofu puff, 6 Romaine tomatoes, one bunch bananas, two pack spicy peanuts, and two pack preserved bamboo shoots. Made all necessary composite boards for a complete ground level covering.
4/12/2019: Got up at 7:05. Stopped by Costco and picked up one bag organic pine nuts, one plain Chobani yogurt, and one pack (x12) Artisan rolls, also added 6.01 gal gas for LS400. Changed feeder batteries and cleaned up before setting it up for normal operation, the time was 2 minutes behind true time but it worked. Disassembled the rain cover for the feeder but left one small piece cover just in case. Removed most white pebbles between the first deck stairs and the concrete walkway, preparing for deeper digging./
Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ.
4/13/2019: Got up at 6:40. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 7 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Wayne, Jerry, Alex, Jason, and myself, we all went to John's house and enjoyed coffee and snacks of many kinds afterward. Stopped by Marukai (which is only a couple minutes from John's house) and purchased one Shrimp roll, one Today's special Bento, and one Rainbow Poki Bowl. Trimmed fake Cherry roots to get a better fitting for the beams closest to the fake Cherry tree, tried everything, reciprocating saw, handsaw, and finally the drills with pin center did the job, not perfect yet since there's ~5° between the center stairs base and the concrete walkway, need some pondering.
4/14/2019: Got up at 7:50. Very tired-possibly due to 4:00am drinking before going back to sleep. Visited Trader Joes and purchased one bag small apples, two bags Brazil nuts, one bag roasted and unsalted cashew nuts, and one bottle Morgado Porto Ruby. Stopped by Target and got 3 bottle 64 oz Hazelnut creamer, two bottle 750ml Yellowtail Moscato, and one tub Strawberry flavor Chobani Greek Yogurt.
4/15/2019: Got up at 7:00. Covered up tools and most lumbers in the deck working area.
Dropped off tax returns at the Post Office on my way to Lowes, purchased four 4x4x8 lumbers and three 80 lbs (which I though was 50 lbs) concrete mix, loading and unloading were, again, a major challenge, had to be very careful not to hurt my back and waist during the process.
Played 30 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie could not play as she had to go run errands. The rain forecast was a flop, there was only about one centimeter of water in the collection bucket as opposed to the expected full bucket. Called Mom at 7:00 for 21 minutes.
4/16/2019: Got up at 7:10. Dug some trenches for the support beams, concrete blocks in the ground presented many obstacles, had to come up with solutions for this. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, Kung's busy preparing for his trip back to Taiwan. Dug more trenches for the support beams, due to many large cement blocks in the soil, I had to make shorter beams instead of single piece long ones, and on the part where cement blocks were present and close to the surface I need to use 2x4 instead, down side of this is the relatively weaker support, but there's nothing I could do unless I tear up the foundation and start over. the longest beam, closer to the brick walkway, was made up of three 4x4x8, two being full length, the center part being 59-3/8".
Cut all needed lumbers (even the short and thin ones I didn't think would work) for building support beams.
4/17/2019: Got up at 7:15. In the process of digging holes to buile concrete support for the beams, several fake Cherry tree roots had to be rid off, a couple of them were very challenging but was able to finish the task before 11:00. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Raised all short beams, especially the ones near the first stair, dug holes for cement housing for all of them as well, dug three holes for one of the beams near the center stair. Will dig three more holes (rectangular to cover both beams near the Cherry tree.
4/18/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15. Lots of calls in the morning. Got some green beans from Susan. Stopped by Marina Grocery and got two tube Wasabi, two bag spicy peanuts, two pack thick bean curd, one bunch (x7) large bananas, one large (small ones not available) Napa cabbage, one pack brown cane sugar, one pack baby BokChoy, one pack (x4) Neoguri spicy noodle, one bottle sesame oil, and one bag dried shrimp. Designed and made two bridges for the ground level support beams, this is possibly the best solution, water sealed all exposed surfaces and untreated lumbers.
Called Mom at 7:00 for 26 minutes.
4/19/2019: Got up at 7:10. Went to Costco and purchased one iPad 128G for $436.99 tax included, this is their last one for now. Dug 5 more cement base holes for the beams. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Re-leveled beams, still not perfect but......
4/20/2019: Got up at 6:57, hiking day, my turn to drive, there were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, the other Ming, Steve, Steve/Cindy, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased two pack fish Ara trimmings, one King Roll Whole, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Yakisoba set, and one Sashimi Moriawase. Attached the bridges and the end of stair extension (for the first stair) with hardware to at least make sure they do not shift/move, will add cement beneath them to strengthen. Added blocks (wood pieces, white pebbles, and bricks) to cement holes so that when pouring cement, it will not flow to unintended locations.
4/21/2019: Got up at 7:10. Placed all composite boards for deck ground level walkway, looking good, take a break before remove them, put cement boundaries back, mix cement, pour cement, dry for 24 hours, place boards with gap spacer, nail down...
Received Amozon delivery, but the contents was incorrect, I remembered examining the description several times before placing the order, it turned out on the same page when you select an optional item the main description stayed the same, that's why I made the mistake, went on Amazon.com and processed the return, luckily they have a UPS Drop off location in the same plaza as City Sports, I printed the return code, which UPS will scan and box the item to be returned and that's that, done. Ordered 2 bottle Avalon toner (8.5 oz each) without Vitamin C from Amazon. Removed all composite lumbers, replaced original cement pouring boundaries. Filled 8 holes with concrete mix, after lifting one of the concrete mix bags, I realized it is probably not a good idea as my left knee felt a bit tender afterward, so I decided to mix only enough amount of concrete to fill one maybe two holes at a time, this way I only had to haul relatively small weight of it to mix in the litter box.
Filled 8 more holes with concrete mix, also wedged some underneath the two bridges, hope they can hold better, holes on the right side of center stair are now complete (will add some more cement if there's any left after the other side is done.
Found out the ASUS RT-N12 wireless router has 192.168.1.95 as it new IP address, had to enable SSID broadcast so that the WPS button functions.
4/22/2019: Got up at 7:20. Turned on sprinkler system to water front lawn every third days for 15 minutes at 3:00 am, ran 5 minutes manual as the lawn was pretty dry. Filled 5 more holes with concrete mix, that left the final bag of concrete mix to fill remaining 3 rectangular holes, should be enough.
Filled all remaining holes with concrete mix, used leftover on some of the ones that were not complete.
Will need to wait at least 24 hours before applying weight on them, work on the composit boards would be the only thing I could do before that. Spent one hour trying to recover my hotmail account so that I can login Skype on my new iPad.
4/23/2019: Got up at 7:42. Visited Lowes, purchased one bottle Gorilla glue and three bags rubber mulch. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Had 40 minutes MB with RM, EJ-nice one!
Lined up most composite lumbers for the ground level walkway with adequate spacers, used two narrower ones for the two lumbers just below the center stair, made more spacers for the remaining short lumbers and inserted them. Need to fill the gaps between beams between the first stair and the fake Cherry tree with some original soil before putting walkway lumbers on. Will need to trim off some of the longer lumbers tomorrow before attaching them to the beams.
4/24/2019: Got up at 7:05. Added some dirt to the beam gaps near the fake Cherry tree. Watched "Captain Marvel" at Santana Row with Anita-10:30 for $7.50 early bird fare. Received my white iPad cover from Apple delivered by FedEx. Made several weed control covers for the soil near the fake Cherry tree.
4/25/2019: Got up at 7:15. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15. Spent nearly 2 hours making tickets for Saturday's event, maybe due to hot weather (there's only a fan keeping the temperature around 78°F, I lost concentration and made over 3000-5 times the amount, oh well. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one pack fried fish cake, one pack smoke bacon, four bags spicy peanuts, one red onion, one dozen XX beer, one dozen Michelob Ultra, 3 Fuji apple, one pack (x4) Neoguri seafood noodle, and one bunch (x7) bananas. Trimmed off uneven length lumbers for final installation. Had to make some gap adjustments for a smooth appearance, will adjust the short lumbers tomorrow morning and start screwing them into place, should be able to finish them by the end of this Saturday.
4/26/2019: Got up at 7:20. Visited Costco with Anita and got one Cranberry Walnut Round, one pack (x12) Artisan Rolls, one pack string cheese, one tub plain Greek Yogurt, one bag mixed Nut and Berries, one pack (x12) Pineapple sausage, and one Baby Spinach. Preparing measuring tapes for walkway installation, these were used to drill holes at proper locations.
Used combination of various screws to attach composite lumbers to their support beams. Discovered, after several flat head general purpose screws were used, that I need to make the top drill hole larger (by using a larger drill) so that the flat head screws would not squeeze out some of the composite material and made the surface appear awful. Finished all but one walkway lumber installation.
Remaining tasks, boundary cleanup and fill up, lattice, deck door, risers...
5/27/2019: Got up at 7:00, hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Wayne, Ming, the other Ming, Ming's friend couple, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl and one Today's Special Bento. Pour most remaining sand onto the open area between deck and the Cherry tree, applied water to compact them, tried one large brick on it, seemed to work.
Laid all available and non-defective large bricks.
4/28/2019: Got up at 7:45. Cleaned up most of the tools and junks in the working area.
4/29/2019: Got up at 7:48. Took an early mornoing photo of the deck with all tarps removed.
Trimmed of some sick branches/leaves from the fake Cherry tree, applied front lawn trimming to the planter boxes as well as the Wisteria base. Installed battery based Arlo camera on the fake Cherry tree watching feeder area.
Took the leaking LS400 tire to Chevron station, the guy replaced the valve in 10 minutes for $15 cash, released some air from the tire (it was at ~38, should be ~30 for my car) mounted the tire, will still need to monitor it constantly until I am sure it's really fixed. During the process of leveling the walkway in between the two planter boxes, I discovered that the brick length is not double its width, so mixing them vertically made the pattern appeared awful-gaps everywhere. Used several shorter pieces of brick and arranged to have them all go in line so that no gap can be formed.
4/30/2019: Got up at 7:10. Prepared several lattice panels, some details need to be worked out for the panels to fit perfectly. It was also tricky since some portion of the panels would be on top of the stringers, would have to add boards to cover the uncovered areas.
Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Made several more lattice panels, the chamber below the deck can be covered except the main entrance which requires a swing door.
Received Vremi Garden weeder hand tool from Amazon at 1:24.
The tire did not get fixed after all, the leakage is now at the rim near the replaced valve, it's possible the guy who replaced the valve damaged the seal on the rim. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Made another panel for the main entrance, this will be a temporary solution, will work on door style solution after getting back from the trip.
5/1/2019: Got up at 7:10. Trimmed the main stair bottom portion of the lattice closest to the fake Cherry tree, made it in line with the slope of the stringer. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Stopped by Costco to examine the leakage tire, the technician separated the tire and the rim to show me the stuff inside that he said could not be reused or sealed, they din't look too good, I ran my hand through the rim and felt I could clean it up and reuse it, took back the rim but discard the tire as I wasn't sure if it could be reused, better get a new tire if the rim turns out usable. Attached 6 lattice panels, large and small, to the deck, 3 more to go. Online ordered Titanic Belfast and Belfast City Sightseeing Tour online for £60. A bit worry about the wait time between buses......
5/2/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:20. Brought along 9 Bird of Paradise flower branches, Cynthia got 3 of them, Yolanda got two, one of the library volunteer got the remaining 4. Stopped by Marina Grocery and got one bottle powder Hazelnut creamer, two bag spicy peanuts, one bunch bananas, and 2 fried chicken legs. Received my Levi's 550 relaxed fit jean from Amazon delivered by UPS, it fit well but was 2 inches too long. Compiled more info for Inverness, this will be useful whether we took NCL excursion or on our own. Attached remaining lattice panels, some more work are expected after the trip to make the appearance prettier and more sturdy. Ready to book NCL Inverness excursion but found out they only have one opening left, cancel the idea, we are on our own.
5/3/2019: Got up at 7:27. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, pulled weeds from the two oval shape planters in the front yard, watered Bird of Paradise, roses next to it, Lily of the Nile planter and the square flower yard in from porch, rid off weeds from the brick gaps in the back yard. Spent nearly 3 hours searching and booking Dublin city Hop-on-hop-off bus tickets, two of the companies I searched ran out of tickets for 5/20, the third one was a charm, $45.10 for two. Decided not to visit London as the transportation was a hassle, to many issues to resolve, instead I booked Greenwich Time excursion (two for $214.20, 10% off for Platinum member). Booked shuttle from Zeebrugge to/from Bruges, $22.78.
5/4/2019: Got up at 7:15. put away our important documents in the attic, also moved iMac to the attic, replaced it with the old iMac. Made seedling cups for cucumbers, pepper, Passion Fruits....
Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ-not good! Built several flower base boundaries from the large pebbles in the front yard.
The deck will look like this until the end of May when we come back from the trip, several tasks ahead-change/add risers for the stair and sidings (to cover the top side of lattice panels), more brick to cover the sandy ground (after soaking with water to make it settle better), and, most importantly, solidify the deck floor support to remove the squeaky noice coming from the not-well secured cross-beams.
Anita booked AMS airport to Hotel Van Gogh transfer from Connexxion for €37. We decided not to book return transfer from cruise port to AMS, expecting there'll be plenty of taxies and/or shuttles at the cruise terminal-hopefully.
5/5/2019: Got up at 7:26. Applied all remaining rubber mulch to rose bases, there were still quite a few did not get mulch, will have to purchase more after returning from our trip. Watered all roses and planter boxes. Cleaned up and rearrange soil covers for our compost area to deter it being plowed again during our absence. Realigned Arlo camera focal point to cover bench and the faucet area, also rid off some fake Cherry tree branches that were blocking the camera view. Downloaded offline maps to my new iPad, also checked all necessary Google drive files are made available offline, Logged out Line on old iPad and logged in on new iPad, like starting from scratch.
5/6/2019: Got up at 7:15. Added cover for the two planter boxes as something (opossum?) started digging them after I covered up the compost area-switching targets?
Used old cylinder with new twist to increase the auto feeder capacity as the dispense volume had been doubled, had to use a piece of styrofoam to make a makeshift lid instead of the original since it could not fit .
Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Drew trip routes based on Google map
Down loaded Jack Ryan episodes 3-8 plus trailer, in the process downloading the original "24" season 8 episodes.
5/7/2019-5/8/2019: Got up at 7:22. Turned off heater, set water heater to vacation mode, put away MacBook Pro in the closet. Joe picked us up at 2:30 (I checked with him at 2:27 to make sure he’s on his way), got to SFO at 3:10, printed boarding pass and luggage tags before dropping them off at SAS counter at 3:20, security check was slow but we got through and arrived at gate 97 at 4:05. Boarded SK936 at 5:10. Our flight took off at 6:03, 28 minutes behind schedule. My right thigh was extremely uncomfortable throughout the flight, it would have been unendurable weren’t we had the 3rd seat available. We landed at Copenhagen at 1:20pm local time. Waited until gate number became available and walked 15 minutes (from C33) to B8 at 2:20pm. Boarded the flight SK1549 at 3:30, but did not take off until 4:04, we landed at Amsterdam airport, one of the busiest airport in Europe, got on connexxion shuttle at 6:04, the shuttle waited for system prompt to start our journey at 6:12, got to XO Hotel Van Gogh at 7:00, it’s a remodeled old hotel with small rooms, for $~180 per night in the museum area. Visited Albert Heinz Supermarket, got one bottle 750ml Zinfandel, one pack small tomatoes, one box cooked shrimp, and one bunch bananas, prepared Noguchi noodle with for dinner.
5/9/2019: Got up at 1:00, finished the Zinfandel with Anita before heading back to bed. Got up at 7:35, had breakfast downstairs, Anita was suffering from suspected cold, slept until 11:00 when we went to check on-site if there were Van Gogh museum ticket available, the answer was, as expected, NO, strolled around the complex and visited the souvenir shop before coming back to the hotel for a short break. Picked up salad, cucumber, and tri-cured meat for lunch. Anita’s still not feeling well, she slept through most of the afternoon, we stopped by AH Supermarket at 6:00 and picked up one bottle 750ml Moscato, and one pack cooked shrimp. Dinner was one bowl of Neoguri spicy noodle plus the remaining tri-flavor preserved meat, cooked shrimp, plus the other half of the cucumber, a big meal.
5/10/2019: Got up at 7:35, had breakfast in the hotel. Arrived at Rijksmuseum, Netherlands’ national vault for paintings, the process of getting in to see Alle Rembrandt’s special exhibition wasn’t straight forward, the skip-the-line ticket we purchased online did not appear to help much, we still had to wait in line to get in the museum, then exchange tickets to get in the special exhibit area....., I was extremely tired and could not enjoy the exhibit at all. Purchased one sloppy hotdog for lunch. Strolled to the canal cruise pier and enjoyed the scenery but did not take the canal cruise. Visited AH supermarket, got one box cooked shrimps, one pack Cherry Tomatoes, and one box dual salad (seaweeds and edamame) to go with Neoguri noodle for dinner. Packed most stuff.
5/11/2019: Woke up at 1:05, went back to sleep around 2:00, Got up at 7:30 but did not feel rested at all. Took a taxi (called by Hotel Van Gogh guest service) to passenger cruise port at 10:35. Filled out medical check form, checked in, waited in the lobby, waited in the boarding area, finally boarded NCL Pearl at 12:25, the boarding process was kind of inefficient, the announcement did not clearly identify who or what group can go, our “platinum” status should allow us priority boarding but we were not told ahead of time, had we not standing close to the boarding gate and heard (not through speaker) the words we would have waited even longer. There’s possibly some issue with previous crews/passengers (someone might have gotten sick or something), as the Pearl under went detailed sanitation process even after we had boarded and we were not allowed to enter our stateroom (we did stopped by and dropped off Anita’s luggage, mine was tagged and handed over to Pearl to transfer as it may be too large for the onboard scanner). We were finally allowed to go to our stateroom at 4:40. Made several pots of hot water, will do this on a daily base to provide drink water.
Once again, did not have my luggage delivered to our stateroom, finally decided to checked with the crew but was told to wait as there were still some being delivered, but no luck after checking back half an hour later, waited another half hour, finally found my luggage around 10:00pm, there was a sticker saying “unidentifiable”, not sure what it meant as the tag with “5008” stateroom number were still on the handle.
5/12/2019: Got up at 5:35 (England time), booked dinners at Le Bistro (5/18 at 7:00) and La Cucina (5/19at 6:00) with NCL Latitude award. We are now on England time (one hour behind European time) for the next two days. Went for breakfast at Garden cafe, even though it’s already 7:00, it’s still operating as early bird mode, plus only their staff can touch any food/drink, the efficiency was simply non-existent, the NCL crews kept their mouth shut regarding why we were treated this way and there was no apology as if this is normal - it’s really really bad. Resented a while before going to deck 7 cruise next desk for Latitude cocktail party info but decided not to as there were too many people waiting in-line, had lunch at Lotus Garden, food wasn’t as nice as the last time we were on Jade, had our key card and passport checked for entry into the UK, don’t know why-everyone had to do it. Had dinner at Garden Cafe, not crowded this time. Watched “Pure Variety” at Stardust, good dancers, OK singers.
5/13/2019: Got up at 6:30, had breakfast at 7:15. Headed to Indigo (reserved for Latitude members and Haven suites for tenders. The ride was about 25 minutes to Newhaven tender port, where it was very easy to just follow the “Shuttle Bus” signs-turn right once onshore, turn right again and there will be bus ticket sales representatives, round trip ticket is £4.00 per person, it took only 15 minutes to get to Andrew Square where all tour sites are within easy walking range. We visited Edinburgh Castle, St Giles’s Cathedral, Palace of Holyroodhouse, and Carlton Hill, had lunch at Oink with beer. Got back to the ship at 2:15. Rested remaining of the afternoon, had dinner at ‘Osheenhan, watched 9:00 show “Andy Buenger-the Power of Music” at Stardust-very entertaining.
5/14/2019: Got up at 6:05. Haven’t been able to download any Mercury News to mine or Anita’s iPad, at first I thought it was because too many people using it but later found out it did not matter since I wasn’t able to accomplish it any other time, tried the 250 minutes package we purchased after the Latitude minutes ran out and still no luck downloading the News, NCL Pearl sucks all the way! Disembark at 9:30 onto Invergordon, found bus 25X heading to Inverness, £12.25 per person for the whole day covering zones 1 to 3, it took nearly 40 minutes to get to Inverness where we visited Inverness Castle and a few nearby vista points and headed back to the bus station, while we were waiting for 25X to get back to Pearl, Anita found bus 925, without confirming and assuming it goes directly to the cruise port, we got on , I checked the GPS map and discovered that the bus was not going back to the ship, turned out it was going to Urquhart Castle near Loch Ness after checking with other passenger, we could not do anything and visited the Castle (in a distance, not paying to see it close by), came back to Pear at 3:20, 10 minutes before scheduled gate closing. Watched Stardust show “Celtic Soul” at 7:00 after dinner.
5/15/2019: Got up at 7:15. The Garden Cafe finally operates normally where you can get food/drink all by yourself now. Arriving Bergen at 12:00pm, very nice weather, this is the first ever sunny visit we experienced, made two rounds of strolling around the city before settling back in our stateroom.
5/16/2019: Got up at 6:0p, logged on to try loading Mercury New one more time, no luck and when I tried to log out after 5 minutes, got Luna led to reach servers” error messages, not sure if I’ll lose minutes as a result. Disembark at 9:30, while I stayed at visited center and attempted downloading Mercury News, Anita went shopping, the Internet access was slow but works, finished 5/12-5/14 versions for Anita’s iPad but gave up mine as it took too long to complete. This town is very small, the visitor center and the train station were to serve as portal to other interesting areas, it is amazing that a cruise ship could dock right next to it.
Checked with Internet Cafe personnel, the Flåm region terrain disrupted satellite signal so nothing got through, he told me to try around 8:00pm. The Internet came back and I still have 233 minutes, it’s normal even though I still have no access to Mercury News.
5/17/2018: Got up at 6:40. Pearl stopped at Helleslyt to drop off some excursion customers before arriving Geiranger at 11:00. Chatted with an Australian couple in Garden Café during the wait. Went on shore and booked ticket for 1.5 hour Panoramic view of Geiranger tour for $50 each at 1:45pm. Trying to get Wi-Fi access while waiting for the bus, but could not even get connected. The tour was OK but still felt tired, went back to the ship before having dinner at Garden Café.
5/18/2019: Got up at 6:00, the time is one hour behind London for Belfast and Dublin starting early morning. Watched tour talk for the remaining ports, mostly for NCL excursions. Verified our dinner reservations are for today and tomorrow. Had dinner at Le Bistro at 7:00, this is a French style restaurant, I ordered mussels and duck while Anita selected “蝸牛” and scallops, we also had a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon, the cost of $60 was nullified from being Platinum status. Walked 5 circles outside deck 7.
5/19/2019: Got up at 7:35. Mistake having breakfast around 8:30. Took shuttle to Belfast city center, got a map then walked (with instructions from several Citysiteseeing personnel on the way) to Stop number 1 of the Hop On-Hop Off bus. Titanic Belfast is at stop #5, Got to the museum, exchanged real tickets and started the tour at 11:55, continuing with Nomadic exhibition at 12:45, missed the Citysiteseeing bus by 30 seconds, waited 35 minutes before boarding the next one at 1:25, had to sit in the open sky section as the covered section on the second deck was full, the cold winds throughout the drive almost made me sick, got off the bus at 3:00. The waiting line for shuttle bus back to the ship was also long, but we finally got back at 4:05. Dinner at La Cucina with leftover wine from yesterday.
5/20/2019: Got up at 7:05. Anita went purchased shuttle tickets from the service desk before we boarded the shuttle to Dublin at 12:45, Got to Dublin at 1:19. Got on Big Bus Hop-on/Hop-off bus at 1:25 (stop #4-National Art Gallery), got off at stop #7 (College Green-Trinity College) and visited Trinity College, Dublin Castle, City Hall, Christ Church, and St. Patrick’s Cathedral, found some Vikings historical memorial plates near Christ Church. Got on Big Bus Bus blue line (we were on red line) which has 13 more (less 3 red line stops) stops, took nearly 2 more hours to get back to stop #4, we could not see any shuttle bus that took us there to head back to cruise terminal, before figuring out what to do if we could not find it, Anita spotted similar bus or a different corner of the street, checked and verified it was our bus. Got back to the ship at 5:57, had dinner at Garden Café before going back to our stateroom.
5/21/2019: Got up at 6:40. At sea day-the itinerary provided by NCL online did not specify only stated we are leaving the port at 2:0pam 5/21 and arriving Le Havre 6:30 am 5/22, took repeated reading to figure out, quite misleading. Watched “International crew talent show” at 3:00, all of the performers are from Philippine or Indonesia, not bad. Sat down in Garden Café at 4:25 to get better seats for 5:00pm dinner as it will be crowded for at sea day. Watched “Eternity Amici” after dinner, high level soprano performance.
5/22/2019: Got up at 6:30 (one hour ahead of yesterday). Pearl docked at Le Havre at 6:30am. Anita got shuttle bus tickets from the cruise terminal for €5 each, it’s an all day pass good for all buses in town, we spent 2 hours in city center and came back for lunch before returning to Le Havre at 1:15, took bus #4 to Hanging Garden 15 minutes away, did not see their flowers in the green houses but walked around the compound, very pleasant experience as there were many wild flowers and grass walkway, came back to Pearl around 4:00.
5/23/2019: Got up at 6:00. Our one and only excursion with NCL took place today: “Greenwich - Home of Time”. Waited in Stardust at 9:00 but did not get on the excursion bus until 9:40, bus headed off at 9:45 and got to Greenwich at 10:30, visited Old Royal Naval College, University of Greenwich, and Cutty Sark (the last tea clipper). Enjoyed River Thames on the bench by the University. Got back to Pearl at 3:0p, exhausted. Watched “Legends in Concert” after dinner at Garden Café”, representing Michael Jackson, Tina Turner, and Elvis Presley, quality performance dancing & singing.
5/24/2019: Got up at 6:05. Last port of call-Zeebrugge/Bruges, Belgium. After exiting the free shuttle that took us from the ship to the cruise terminal, we followed the instructions and got to the Cruise Express Burges bus stand and got the tickets then walked to the bus waiting one block away, bus left the stop at 8:45 (most likely the 8:30 one delayed by the late disembarkation). Arriving Bruges at 9:15. It was an easy walk seeing Bruges, although it’s a bit long to catch the 1:30 bus back, we were all very tired from accumulated walking in the past few days. Finally got back to Pearl at 1:55. Started packing after a late lunch at Garden Café. Discovered the world clock app I downloaded for my Pixel phone was incorrect, the Amsterdam time was one hour ahead what it should be, need to get a correct app.
5/25/2019: Got up at 6:00. Disembarkation day, will stay in Amsterdam for one more day before flying back to SFO Sunday. Took a taxi to CitizenM hotel, turned out there’s no public transit to the airport (a miscalculation on our part), taxi was the only option, it costed £70 for the run. Rest a couple of hours before checking at the airport for food and check in location, there were Albert Hein to go and Albert Hein Supermarket in the airport, found out our check in will be at departure 1 row 2 tomorrow (should confirm this), purchased some pastry and salad for lunch.
5/26/2019: Got up at 5:45. Picked up coffee and more pastry from AH Supermarket and consumed them back in the hotel. Headed out to the airport at 7:50, Got to the check in line at 8:00, Got our boarding passes at 8:45 - very slow moving line. Our flight got in at 9:18, only 17 minutes before boarding time, boarded at 9:55, one of the last few, our seats were 3C and 3D as booked but were changed to 24 B and C, we were a little upset at first but found out these were actually better seats-right next to the emergence door, more leg room, and only two seats, too bad it’s for only one hour flight. Landed at Copenhagen at 11:10, 15 minutes ahead of schedule. Walking to gate C33 from B3 wasn’t as smooth, one thing it is a long walk and secondly we had to wait in a long long line for non-EU citizen, finally our flight was called for us to hurriedly pass through the passport control and ran to gate C33, we were the last few getting on board, flight SK935 finally took off at 12:53 after all passengers (waiting...) got on-29 minutes behind schedule. Watched “Arctic”, “Journal 64 (Purity of Vengeance...”, and the last 3 episodes of “Jack Ryan”, all were good watches. Landed at SFO at 2:36pm, 9 minutes ahead of schedule, but had to wait for 10 minutes for free gate. Jack picked us up at 3:30, got home at 4:10. Turned in around 10:00.
5/27/2019: Got up at 3:30. Had breakfast at 5:00, a couple of Artisan rolls. Trimmed off weeds in between bricks and concrete flats, trimmed off excess Passion Fruit vines and fake Cherry tree branches too low for easy walking around, the Passion Fruit vines are bearing flowers, looks like we should be able to harvest some.
5/28/2019: Got up at 1:30, went back to sleep at 3:00, got up at 7:30. Stopped by Costco, got one pack (x12) Artisan Rolls, one box seaweed salad, one Mediterranean Salad kit, two dozen organic eggs, and one (x2) pack smart light bulb, also add gas for RX300 but did not fill up due to sensitive auto pump. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, Kung's just returned from Taiwan.
5/29/2019: Got up at 2:30, went back to bed at 4:40, got up at 6:05. Decided to go to the movie next Monday instead-Anita is confident "Marvels: The Endgame" will still be playing next week. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Continue working on trip photos, had MB (found young Yolly film) with legs, EJ.
5/30/2019: Got up at 6:00. CCC volunteer day, first after the trip, got there at 9:15. Swing by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, one fried fish cake, one bag dried shrimp, one pack stick noodle, one pound lean ground pork, one white onion, one pack salad bamboo shoot, 6 Romaine tomatoes, one head, one packs cucumber seeds, two packs chili radishes, one pack beef shank, and two Korean melon. Gave ride to Stephanie and Alan for their trip to Vancouver from SJC. Received LED night lights (x6) from Amazon.
5/31/2019: Got up at 6:15. Cleaned up leftover garden waste, the tree professional Anita contacted dropped by and checked the Oaks, he said when trimming not to cut off too much which would gove the trees shock and possibly got sick as a result, ours are ok so far, just watch them carefully. Had haircut by Ahyui at 9:00.
6/1/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking shifted to tomorrow due to Jason's restaurant work. Moved Miter and table saws to the backyard, ready to resume deck work. Contemplated the addition of composite boards to the walkway, after discussion with Anita, the better choice would be to put them close to the deck instead of next to current walkway since it will be sitting on the sand without securing to anything, putting them there reduces the chance of disrupting them by putting weight on. Cutting the last walkway board with angle appeared to be more challenging as neither Miter or table saw could process it easily. Received new Costco Citi Visa cards, tried to follow the instructions on the card to activate, downloading app or go to their activate web site turned out to be more hassle, I finally called the activate number instead after 15 minutes fruitless effort and got both cards activated in just one minute. Had 15 minutes MB with RM, EJ.
6/2/2019: Got up at 6:50. New hiking day, Jason drove. There were 12 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, ShingKuo, Wayne, Jerry, Jason, myself, Helen, James, Alan, Alan's wife, and Melody. Stopped by Marukai and got one Rainbow Poki Bowl and one Today's special bento. Resumed deck walkway, decided it is better with the new composite section in between current walkway and the brick section but at lower level, not only they stay more secure (clamped by the two sides), also created a a new pattern (Anita's idea).
Relaid bricks to make consistent white/red flips. Picked up Stephanie and Alan at SJC at 10:35pm, took them to the Foundation for their cars.
6/3/2019: Got up at 6:40. Movie day-"Marvels:The Endgame", watched it at GreatMall, the movie is 3 hour in length - a bit long though. Received notice of data breach, signed up for their free 24-month credit monitoring at www.experianidworks.com online (peichen lin, patricklin100/xxxxAcyyyy!/taipei).
6/4/2019: Got up at 7:05. Stopped by Costco, purchased one bottle (dragon shaped) Brandy XO (for Vincent's 70th Birthday party on 6/22), one bunch banana, one tub cream cheese, two dozen can Modelo, one pack BiBiGo Beef Bulgogi MANDU (dumplings), one box organic raisin, one bag blueberry, and one pack Kirkland Signature USDA Prime Beef Loin New York Steak.
6/5/2019: Got up at 7:15. Removed the 4 old deck lumbers from beneath the deck, preparing them for eventual disposal in the next several weeks.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Kung, 20 minutes with Stephanie.
6/6/2019: Got up at 6:20. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:10, there were already a crowd waiting to get in, they were the attendants of the two-day 元極舞 event. Swung by Marina Grocery and got one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, onr bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, two pack pin noodle, one pack frozen squid, one envelope cucumber seed, and one pack small mustard green. Filled LS400 with 7 gallon Octane 91 gas at Costco. Replaced the 3 red bricks footing the lattice near the BBQ grill for a smooth appearance, moved one of the 8' 4x4 to the Cherry side, also for a smooth support and appearance.
6/7/2019: Got up at 7:10 . Trimmed off low hanging Oleander and Cherry tree branches. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Water cleaned the four 6' boards to be used below the deck and in front of the crawl space entrance. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, Kung went home a while back due to jet lag (?). Applied water seal to the four boards. Had 20 minutes MB with legs, EJ.
6/8/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 11 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Alex, Ming, Ching, Steve, Cindy and husband (Steve?), Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai, purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Sashimi Moriawase, one Shimesaba, one Bara Chirashi, and one King Roll whole - for Anita's Birthday! Made a couple more boards for the deck floor, water sealed them, plan to place them a littler later. Placed all deck floor boards after trimming two of them slightly to fit.
6/9/2019: Got up at 7:00. Picked off some dried Oleander flower bases. Visited ValleyFair-specifically Nordstrom, Anita got a pair of sandals she liked, had lunch at RAAM, had to leave the mall and came home as my sinus's bothering me so much, not sure if it's cold or allergy.
Temperature reached 102°F (39.1°C) around noon.
6/10/2019: Got up at 7:20. Visited Costco with Anita, returned the 2 LED smart light bulbs before getting two packs Caesar salad, two dozen organic egg, one Chobani Greek Yogurt, two packs Artisan Roll, and one basket of small tomatoes.
Played 35 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung. Backyard temperature reached 109.7°.
Had 20 minutes MB with RM, EJ. Finished processing trip photos on Google photo.
6/11/2019: Got up at 7:25. Carol called to inform me that the missing "-" in my name should be OK. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. It's still extremely hot, about the same as yesterday-109.7°F. Temperature stayed near 90°F well into the night, moving the large fan upstairs didn't help much.
6/12/2019: Got up at 7:55. It's not even 10:00am and we have over 100°F already.
Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Backyard temperature reached 106°F, indoor temperature: 88°F upstairs, 81°F family room.
6/13/2019: Got up at 7:05. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:20. Didn't get in until 9:25 as Yolanda went running errands before coming in. The FASCA (Formosa Association of Student Cultural Ambassadors) begins this afternoon at 2:00 and will continue tomorrow (8:00-5:00) until Sunday. Stopped by Marina Grocery and got two bags spicy peanuts, one Soy paste, one head Taiwanese cabbage, one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, one bunch bananas, two golden apples, 4 white nectarine, two packs thick bean curd, one pack bacon. Trimmed some ground level Oleander branches, rounded up dried flowers and leaves, left them by the curb for collection tomorrow.
6/14/2019: Got up at 7:15. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, stupid idiot worker, spread everything in the street. Reconsidered using the green house door frames to make crawl space entrance after carefully studied its housing, it appeared that I could pry the openings a little more to allow hold lattice panels, will sit on it for a while. Tried to sand off the top side of the lumber boarding the brick platform, this is so that the composite walkway would not appear too low when joining, the belt sander belt sand paper broke, need to find some other ways to do the job. Widened the lattice opens on the frames and after several trimming on frames as well as the lattice, one complete lattice door was done, but it was too wide to fit the actual open space, it turned out I forgot to account for the extra width of the frames, it actually added nearly two inches to the door, or well, had to trim off the excess later. Shortened the width of the frame and trimmed off the lattice, drilled a couple of holes for the screws, added stabilizer (the L shape parts) to the corner tubes, secured them with screws, looking good, need to build support post for the door to hang on next.
6/15/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ming, the other Ming, Alex, Ching, Wayne, Jason, and myself. Drilled holes for the hinges but discovered that not every corner holder accept hinge screws (only two of the four corner holders were equipped with), had to disassemble the door, move the correct corner hold to the correct location, reassemble the part for the door, ready for hinges,.../except that only one hinges seemed to work, the other one was either broken or required additional parts to work, plus the hinges were designed for door swing inward, not outward, need to think about this, worst case scenario would be to hang the door instead.
6/16/2019: Got up at 7:50. Discovered the first Passion fruit from the newly planted vines, must have blossomed while we were away on our trip.
Visited CVS on Capital ave with Anita, purchased 6 bottle 750ml Barefoot Riesling, one bottle 750ml Barefoot Moscato, one bottle 750ml Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, one bottle 1.5L Gallo Cabernet Sauvignon, and one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Merlot. Stopped by Lowes after dropping off Anita at City Sports, went in twice and got one can Thompson solid brown water seal, 7 sidings, one pair hinges, one can spray paint (brown), and one pack (x5) 3"x18" sanding belt. Found out I missed quite a few photos taken in Amsterdam with my Google Pixel phone.
6/17/2019: Got up at 7:25. Used the round tube file and enlarged the hinge screw holes to fit the existing ones on the door, had to try several times before getting it right, plus the hinges had to be files a bit different. Added washers between the screws and the hinges to provide more secure attachments.
Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Processed Pixel photos that were missing from the Google album, finished the whole thing by 8:30.
6/18/2019: Got up at 7:10. Tried 2x4 but did not think it was the best way, tried 4x4 and attached the door with hinges, looked good until I tried to place it in its designated location, because a gap near the wall was required so that the door could be opened properly, the resulting door+support post was a bit too wide for the open, resorted to two 2x4 glued together and reduce the gap, will see how to use the new post this afternoon.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Tried new post with door attached, it seemed to work except that it won't open all the way as expected, glued a 1 centimeter thick wood pieces to the back of the post (on the wall side), hopefully it will allow the door open a bit more and also clear the stairs.
6/19/2019: Got up at 7:15. Added yet another thin wedge to the back of the post to refine it a little more. Cut up several old lumbers for garbage pickup.
No table tennis today as it's a group lunch date for them. Tried cleaning up the LS400 wheel that housed the leaking tire, found out that the compound I injected to fix a flat did quite some damage to the inside of the wheel, it's unsafe to house a new tire, maybe I should get a replacement wheel??????
Had 5 minutes MB with legs, EJ-no fun! Almost all of the Passion fruit flowers had dried and fall to the ground, not sure why until I searched online, turned out it also requires hand pollination. Will start doing that.
6/20/2019: Got up at 7:00. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15, the summer camp sessions are on the whole week, JP, naturally, being the wife of the host, working mostly for the camp and not CCC volunteer, I also spent some time helping out. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one pack fish ball, two bags spicy peanut, one bag lean spare rib, two white onions, one bunch green onion, one box strawberry, one bunch banana, and one pack lotus root. Applied solid forest brown water seal to the door post (after removing the hinges from it), will reattach hinges, attach door, put it in place, level it, secure it (temporarily) with 4x4 lumber, drill two wood hole, change to mason drill and drill 1-1/2" wall holes at the same location, secure the post (with what?), do I use glue in between the post and wall for a more stable bond??????
Attached the post and door, placed the structure in its designated location and temporarily secured it with a 4x4 lumber.
6/21/2019: Got up at 7:31. Decided to use glue instead to secure the post, made a small widget to fortified the attachment.
Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Applied filler to the post where small pieces joined to smooth out the surface, applied spray paint to it.
Applied glue to the back side of the post, sprayed water to the adjacent wall, moved the post/door in place, secured it with 4x4 lumber, leveled the post, secured the post to the deck beam with one screw, will check the result tomorrow-should be OK.
6/22/2019: Got up at 6:50. Got a Line message from Peilee, he's very upset regarding he's the only one taking care of Mom and Ahfen is suffering from her own illness and emotion stress. Hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, Alex, Ching, the other Ming, Jason, and myself, Shinkuo and Steve joined us half way through. Stopped by Marukai and got one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one California Roll, and one Yakisoba set. Attended birthday party for Vincent's 70th Birthday.
6/23/2019: Got up at 8:30. Visited Target with Anita, purchased 4 bottles 64 OZ Hazelnut creamer, and 4 bottle 750ml Yellowtail Moscato. Filled up the auto feeder. Hand pollinated several passion fruit flowers. It's quite warm today, got to 101.6°F by 1:00pm. Finished reading "The Overdue Life of Amy Byler".
6/24/2019: Got up at 7:50. Hand pollinated several more (a couple maybe old ones but just to be sure I did it anyway) passion fruit flowers. Sprinkled more water to the planter boxes, get them ready for seedling transplantation. Played 30 minutes table tennis, 10 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung. Gave Kung ride to pick up his Toyota Avalon being serviced at Piercey Toyota. Removed the old shoe strings from my Merrell Vibram and replaced them with a new pair which should provide a stronger hold-the old ones were elastic, easy to manage but lost their elasticity.
6/25/2019: Got up at 7:17. Applied second coat of water seal to the riser boards.
Harvested 2 perfect Cherries, they are the 4th and 5th of the season.
Transplanted all (7) Oriental Pickling Cucumber seedlings (小黃瓜) to the planter box near the Cherry tree. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung.
Transplanted all remining seedlings to the planter box under the fake Cherry tree, C: TG (4 on the right side) and C: PSE (4 on the left side).
6/26/2019: Got up at 7:06. Sand off some top portion of the divider (brick platform and composite walkway), made a L shape wedge to replace the old rotten divider lumber near the deck with the drill, cut off several old lumbers for garbage collection.
Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Applied water seal to the newly sanded boarder lumbers, it's kind of intrusion to the eyes, may have to change to transparent Autumn Brown later. Made a narrow wedge to raise the last composite walkway board a bit so that it would look more inline with the brick platform, screwed in the last walkway board.
6/27/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:05, Yolanda was waiting at the door for TAs for another summer camp to arrive, I got in just in time. Discussed with JP, we tentatively decided to quit CCC volunteer work at the end of September. Stopped by Marina Grocery, got one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one pack bacon, one pack beef tendon ball, two bags spicy peanuts, two packs thick bean curd, one dozen Michelob Ultra infusion, one Daikon, 4 green Bell Pepper, one bunch banana, 2 packs beef tendon, one pack fried tofu, and one bag bing Cherry. Injected some wood glue to one of the stair risers to reattach the peeling surface back to its body, this is an attempt to keep the original risers instead of replacing them with thicker siding boards. Found out that the mobile table saw blade height can be adjusted, from 0 to 3", originally I thought this feature is available only on regular table saw, now I can use the Miter saw on top of the mobile table saw platform with its saw at 0" height.
6/28/2019: Got up at 7:40. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Cut the siding boards to approximate lengths needed to cover all lattice panels. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, she and Alan did some (60+ houses) serious house hunting lately. Went to Lowes after dropping Anita off at City Sports, purchased one can Thompson water seal (Semi-transparent Autumn Brown) and one can WD-40. Received Meow Mix original 16 lbs from Amazon, one day earlier than scheduled. No passion fruit flowers blossomed today.
6/29/2019: Got up at 7:35. Repainted siding boards with newly purchased Thompson Semitransparent Autumn Brown water seal, now they looked much better-one trick learned was to apply the paint under the sun so that the paint could be spread evenly otherwise the paint would just lump themselves into small spots. Visited Marukai, Harbor Freight Tools, and Lowes after dropping off Anita at City Sports, purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Yakisoba set, one King Roll whole, one Bara Chirashi, and two Myojo Udon Crab flv from Marukai, got 2 2" paint brushes and one 10" 60T saw blade from Harbor Freight Tools, got one sweet Basil and one Chocolate mint from Lowes.
Trimmed off top portion of the siding for the lattice cover nearest the first stairs, applied water seal to the now exposed wood from cut before securing it with one long screw (o make sure the piece is well secured) and 2 short screws.
6/30/2019: Got up at 7:20. Blood in my stool again even though I did not have any liquor two days in a row-days are coming. My attempt to use small pieces of lattice and composite board leftover to level the surface of the beam so that siding boards could be secured vertically failed, partly due to lack of slim and long screws, partly due to miscalculation, I had to glue plywood pieces to the top back of the siding boards to accomplish that-not tested yet, just theory. Applied another coat of Autumn brown water seal to the siding boards making them darker. Added a wedge to the siding board next to the first stairs to fill the gap.
7/1/2019: Got up at 7:30. Continue siding board work, dealing with adding wedges to support screws, also needed to trim off several portion of lattice panels to make siding boards appearance more in line.
Made riser (ground level) for the center stairs, used scotch tape to protect cutting area, the result was satisfactory, but due to the uneven nature of the board plus the warping effect of the composite board, some gaps were visible after nailing the riser in place, will have to ponder how to tackle this later, declaring the completion of the new backyard deck.
7/2/2019: Got up at 7:20. Started repaving the bricks near the composite walkway, the idea was to make the brick platform edge higher as it approaches the walkway so that the whole thing appear at the same level, there was a problem layering the last few pieces of bricks, due to the change in corner enclosure, a couple of bricks could not fit, applying sand with water to make it look nice for now, possibly would need to cut bricks to individual sizes to fill in the gaps.
7/3/2019: Got up at 7:10. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one bag organic pine nuts, one organic Cherry Almond salad kit, one box Bibigo steamed Beef Bulgogi MANDU (dumpling), one box Bibigo mini wonton, two bottles Nature Omega-3, one bottle Areds 2, one jar Grape cooking oil, and one bunch banana. Trimmed off Oleander branches that were hanging over Monica's garden, many of them were actually dried. Cleaned up the bench, moved most tools back to the garage, left just a few essentials on the work bench (placed a board on top to cover the opening).
7/4/2019: Got up at 7:30. Did window shopping at ValleyFair, surprisingly, there wasn't a crown, had lunch at KoJa Kitchen. Sanded off the forest brown I applied to the boarder boards, the combination of belt sander and palm sander did the job, applied Autumn brown to the boarder boards, blends much better. Secured the siding/riser between the second and third levels, a small piece had to be sawed off to fit, plus a wedge at the back of the shorter riser was added for a more stable bonding.
7/5/2019: Got up at 7:20. Watched "Aladdin" at GreatMall with Anita, well made movie starring Will Smith, partly musical and very entertaining, although many attending small children were at times making noice. Watered front yard, in the process broke the short water line between faucet and the hose reel, connect the hose directly to the faucet for now until a replacement is found.
7/6/2019: Got up at 7:10. Paid a visit to Marukai, purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one pack Saba fillet, one Karei whole (Mackerel),Today's Special Bento, one Sukeroku, and one Bara Chirashi. Swing by Harbor Freight Tools, got one magnetic bit hold, and one set 13-pc Titanium HSS drill bits. A new passionfruit flower finally showed up after more than a week of absence. Trimmed off some Wisteria branches before they grew out of control.
7/7/2019: Got up at 7:50. Pollinated 2 passion fruit flowers. Received Anita's 16" 18K gold chain from Amazon as delivered by USPS at 12:50. Sent video of Milly and Molly to Lin Family on Line, they seemed to be very interested.
7/8/2019: Got up at 7:10. Tried but decided not to cut bricks to fill the gaps between brick quarter and the border as the saw blade I have for masonry cutting simply could not provide easy and small precision cuts, will use composite remnants instead, tried several pieces, not perfect but close. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Made 3 more composite legos for the boarder, 2 of them were made twice as the first round had left and right measurements reversed, wasted nearly one hour.
7/9/2019: Got up at 7:15. Made several more wedges for boarder, not sure where to stop as there were still quite some uncovered gaps.
Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, she and Alan just made an offer for a townhouse in Almaden-~$994,000. Removed and replaced all wedges after watering the sand down to compact them. Cleaned (finally) outside of the kitchen windows.
7/10/2019: Got up at 7:30. Visited Costco with Anita and purchased one jug of soy sauce, one Cranberry Walnut round, two dozen organic egg, one tub cream cheese, one unsalted mixed nuts, two dozen BlueMoon beer, one seaweed salad, one calamari salad, and one Areds2 (for KwangHuei). Played 45 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung. Working to make a rectangular board from composite remnants, will use it to replace the sand/white stone just in front of the door below the deck, it should be cleaner and less chance blocking the door.
7/11/2019: Got up at 7:08. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:05, there's a summer camp already going. Got some bagels and many many plums (small species) from Cynthia. Stopped by Marina Grocery, got one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, one pack fried fish cake, one pack (x4) Peedan, 4 bag spicy peanuts, 2 pack thick bean curd, one bunch bananas, one pack small Gai Choy, 4 pickle cucumbers, one string garlic, two packs bamboo shoots, 4 white peach, 2 pack (x4 each) Neoguri fast noodle, and one pack Taiwanese sausage.
7/12/2019: Got up at 7:17. Trimmed the remnants to fit on the plastic base, ready to glue them onto it. Removed the white stones and most of the sand in the front of the deck door, leveled the ground, the plastic sheet appeared OK sitting on it, total weight of the composite remnants that were to be on top of the plastic sheet, I may have to glue the remnants to the sheet as it sits at its designated location, the risk of remnants not secured to the sheet properly because of imperfect surface worried me though.
7/13/2019: Got up at 7:10. Joined John and Show at their home for plum harvesting party, their Passion Fruit produces huge fruits. Stopped by Marukai (which is only a couple of minutes from John's house) and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Fish Ara, one Bara Chirashi, and one Yakisoba set. Leveled the sand floor of the deck crawl space entry door with 4x4 lumbers, this produced a much better result. Stock up wine at CVS with Anita, but they seemed running short on Yellowtail Moscato, so we only got 4 bottle 750ml Barefoot Riesling, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, and one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Pinot Noir.
7/14/2019: Woke up at 4:30, worrying about Mom and the situation she kind of created at home. Went back to bed at 5:50, got up at 7:50. Glued one more (the third one) composite remnant stripe to the plastic sheet, two more to go. Pollinated 5 passion fruit flowers.
Found and relayed Social Security benefits application beginning point "https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/forms/" for Jason.
Tried and discovered that the platform was too high for the door-it could not be opened fully, chipped away portion of the stair base concrete that was causing the problem, tried again but still won't work, removed a good portion of the sand underneath then tried again, this time it worked but only after I stand on it and used my weight to compact the sand a bit more.
A clean boarder wedge shoot.
7/15/2019: Got up at 7:25. Made three pieces 10.5" 4x4 to serve as the base for a mobile step, this will be placed somewhere near the 3 level deck, glued them together with Gorilla glue, also glued three old kitchen lumbers, it as a flower pot stand. No table tennis today as the Chinese calligraphy exhibit starts today. Drilled and secured the new step with four 4" screws, glued the composite pieces to the base.
Applied water seal to the step and flower pot stand, secured 4 rubber feet to the step for easy balance and raised height.
7/16/2019: Got up at 7:10. Spent an hour trying to figure out how to put additional screws to minimize the squeaky noice coming from the new decks, no drill bit is large enough to make a shallow hole to cover the wider screw heads. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, they successfully bought the house in Almaden, since Stephanie still has mortgage on her current house, Alan to buy the house on his own, she will move in and sell her house later. Received Electric Egg Poacher. Called Mom at 7:00 for 31 minutes, Peilee, Ahfen, and Tina left for Japan for a 7-day trip just 30 minutes before.
7/17/2019: Got up at 7:20. Made a pilot box frame to see how it could be done, made a mistake gluing the frames. Played 35 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie took Shih mama tosee her doctor for low heart rate. Had MB with legs in the shower, EJ-no fun any more.
7/18/2019: Got up at 7:11. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:15. There's a Chinese teach summer camp going all week. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwanese rice wine, one bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, two bags spicy peanuts, one head Cauliflower, 6 Romaine tomatoes, one bunch bananas, one bag small apples, one box Strawberry, and half a dozen cooked salty eggs. Decided to use a different approach making Anita's boxes, instead of attempting to make perfect end cuts to fit each other, diagonal cuts would be easier and consistent.
7/19/2019: Got up at 7:21. Picked up one organic Cherry Almond salad kit, two dozen organic egg, one pack Olay Regenerist, and one tub Greek plain yogurt from Costco. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Seemed to have caught a cold in the backyard early morning, wasn't able to do anything in the yard without endless sneezing. Received Base QC25 wired noice cancellation headphone ordered from Amazon Prime Day.
7/20/2019: Got up at 7:35. Found a better way and finished all 12 wood box frame pieces, sanded them first with power sander, not very effective plus the noise, the hand sanders worked much better.
Started gluing the frames - only two old (really old) corner clamps are available, I had to do it twice to glue all four frames. Sanded off excess glue and uneven junctions, looked OK, made plywood bottom for the box, a little off due to imperfect box (not 100% rectangular).
Received #9 2-1/2 screws ordered from Amazon.
7/21/2019: Got up at 7:25. Applied wood blend stick (wax based filler) to the edges of the box bottom, not easy to put them properly but the result was nice, no more clearly visible ugly gaps now.
Made two more boxes, will sand them down and make bottoms for them tomorrow.
The Epiphyllum white flowers flourished after 10:00.
7/22/2019: Got up at 7:35. Made bottom boards for the last two storage boxes, it took only one and half an hour to finish the whole thing-cutting, fitting/sanding, gluing.
Played 35 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Kung, 15 minutes with Stephanie. Pollinated 12 Passion Fruit flowers-keep trying. Pollinated 12 Passion fruit flowers-the most at in one day. Did final sanding for the last two boxes, they were still imperfect but good for first time adventure.
Called Mom at 7:00, ended up speaking to Peilee for nearly 40 minutes, he's seemed in good spirit.
7/23/2019: Got up at 7:38. Sanded bottoms of the last two boxes, they appeared to be coarse. Made one 3-1/4x6-3/4 x2" board from a scrap 2x6 to make up one section missing at the boarder. Cleaned up the tools and moved most of them back to the garage except those needed for deck board screw attachments. Received the book "Prints Charming" from Amazon delivered by USPS. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Only one Passion fruit flower observed today.
7/24/2019: Woke up at 3:00am, read some of "The Price of Paradise" on Kindle, had one BlueMoon Honey trying to get sleepy but did not work, went back to bed at 4:25, got up at 7:50. Pollinated 4 Passion fruit flowers. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Kung, 15 minutes with Stephanie.
7/25/2019: Got up at 6:58. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:10. Yolanda got me in when she arrived at 9:15, but I had to call her to open the door again when I locked myself out while fetching the newspaper and unchaining the gate. I now had the next two weeks 8/1 and 8/8) off after JP had to sign 8/1 off to give someone ride from SFO. Stopped by Marina Grocery, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, two packs pin noodle, one pack (x3) Udon noodle, 2 bags spicy peanuts, two packs beef tendon, one pack chicken wing, one bunch banana, one pack Gailan, one bag small apple, one papaya, two white onions, one jar Kimbo Pork Sung, and one Napa cabbage. Also got one order sweet and sour pork.
7/26/2019: Got up at 7:12. Visited Costco with Anita, managed to get 2 packs Artisan Rolls (Anita thought it was like bagel, 2 packs for one price, but this one was different-had to carefully wrap them and store in the freezer), one Organic Mediterranean salad kit, one pack string cheese, one bag veggie burger (we were mislead by the picture on the box, it showed bun and other stuff, turned out there were only patties inside), one pack (x4) organic tofu, two dozen corona, one bag coconut chocolate almond, one bag large raw shrimp, one Coconut oil, and one tub Greek plain Yogurt. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, Kung's home preparing speech he's giving to the Chinese Calligraphy class Monday. Applied water seal to the two planter boxes-only the top sides though, also did it to the boarder lumbers.
7/27/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive, he gave me one bottle 2012 Pinot Noir - one of the four his friend gave him. There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, Alex, Ching, Steve, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Bara Chirashi, one Yakisoba, one Salmon steak, and one Futo Maki big roll.
7/28/2019: Got up at 7:35. Went to Nordstrom and did some shopping, Anita bought a couple of exercise wears for workout at the gym, had lunch at the food court-Thai, cheap place, even charge 75 cents for a glass of water even though we used our own bottle, will not go back again-the place is now operated by people from China.
7/29/2019: Got up at 7:12. Leveled a small area next to the side fence to relocate one slab of granite. Cleaned up kitchen floor-sweep, vacuum, and steam. Same cycle applied to the family room in the afternoon.
7/30/2019: Got up at 7:15. Started living room floor cleaning process, began with the long sofa. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Cleaned, vacuumed, and steamed the living room-a small portion near the corner of the display cabinet, will finish it tomorrow.
7/31/2019: Got up at 7:05. Went to Costco with Anita, got one basket Cherry and two dozen organic eggs, also filled up RX300 as I am suppose to drive for hiking coming Saturday. The power strip I attached to the small entertainment center side panel fell off, had to use two screws to secure it, the weight of the power strip with its own cable plus 4 device wire was simply too heavy for the double-sided tape. Played 35 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie was too busy to attend. Got some squashes and cucumbers from Kung. Cleaned up all floors upstairs, sweep, vacuum, and steam.
8/1/2019: Got up at 7:40. Took today off from CCC volunteer work, getting ready to quit by the end of August. Started deck squeaky issue investigation, turned out there were a lot of beams I did not provide adequate solid attachment, almost everyone of them move somewhat, experimenting with Gorilla glue and small wedges to see effect. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Sent resignation Line message and e-mail to Susan and Elaine respectively. Got response from Susan, pretty much a done deal-last day will be 8/29/2019. Called Mom at 7:00.
8/2/2019: Got up at 7:40. Watched "Spiderman: Home coming" at GreatMall.
8/3/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive. Jason and I decided to start hiking at 8:15 at our own pace-slower than usual and rest whenever we needed, we ended up finished the hike in 65 minutes, 10 minutes more than normal. There were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Cindy, Steve, Wayne, Ching, the other Ming, Steve Chou, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and got one Petrale Sole, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Bara Chirashi, one California Roll and Nigiri, one Yakisoba, and one bunch banana.
Far out: Unconventional, unorthodox....
8/4/2019: Got up at 7:30. Stopped by Target and picked up two bottle 32 oz and one bottle 64 oz Hazelnut creamer, three bottle 750ml Yellowtail Moscato, one bottle Ketchup, and one small container for Anita's rings. Swing by Marshall where Anita found several shorts and sports bras. Received 4" screws from Amazon.
8/5/2019: Got up at 7:10. Crawl under the deck to inspect solutions to the squeaky noice problem, turned out no simple solution as each beam/cross-beam was different due to their respective location and the type of hardware attached to it, I believe most of the cause was I did not cut the beams to their exact length-too short so there's too much room for movement. Broke the long drill during the process, curses! Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Not much luck fixing the deck noise.
8/6/2019: Got up at 7:15. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Stopped by 99 Ranch Market, purchased one pack pork spare rib and one jar of white pepper ground, their price is about ~20% more than Marina Grocery. Inserted some wood glue to the gaps between beams, hoping it would improve the still-to-be-resolved deck noise issue.
8/7/2019: Got up at 7:14. Stopped by Costco with Anita, discovered after getting off the car that the RX300 left rear tire was flat, cautiously drove to Chevron station afterward and had it repaired for $10, purchased one Cherry Walnut Round, 7 MoveFree, two Kirkland B-complex, and one Cesare salad kit. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 17 minutes with Stephanie, 23 minutes with Kung. Iregular heart beat continued-since several days before, it now occurs every few seconds.
8/8/2019: Got up at 7:15. Labeling day, got there at 9:25. Spent 2 hours labeling Dynamicfoundation quarterly magazine.
8/9/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC Cynthia checked on why I quit. Stopped by Marshall and Nordstrom with Anita to return her purchases, got two bottles 64 oz Hazelnut creamer from Target while visiting Marshall. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Drilled 8 holes underneath the deck support brackets, attached screws through to make sure the beams at least would be secured to the hardware and reduce their likely movements.
8/10/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 8 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Wayne, Alex, the other Ming, Jason, and myself. Received mosquito net from Amazon, it appeared too big for Anita's bed in Taipei, plus open and close it may be challenging for her, most likely would have to return it.
8/11/2019: Got up at 7:20. Blood in the stool, this has become daily occurrence now. Dropped off Anita at CCC for a speech given by one of her TFGH classmate, stopped by Marina Grocery and got one pack fried fish cake, four bags spicy peanuts (it's now $2.79 each-10 cents more), two pack thick bean curd, one very small cabbage, two heads broccoli, one bag small Gala apple, two packs ready to eat bamboo shoots, one bunch banana (x6), and one pack (x3) udon-got a $2 coupon, a full amount qualification. Picked up Anita at CCC at 5:00.
8/12/2019: Got up at 7:15. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 17 minutes with Stephanie, 23 minutes with Kung. Added several screws to the first level deck-on the top side, seemed to improve the noise condition, will add more tomorrow.
8/13/2019: Got up at 7:28. Added 20 more screws to level one deck, hopefully it can further reduce the squeaky noise. Received the 2-pack meat rub from Amazon. No table tennis today as Stephanie was busy. Had 10 minutes MB with RM, EJ. Received Anita's sports bra from Costco as delivered by UPS at 8:40pm.
8/14/2019: Got up at 7:45. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one box Kirkland K-cup, one Cesare salad kit, one organic Cherry Almond Blue salad kit, one bag organic pine nut, two dozen organic egg, one tub cream cheese, one pack toothpaste, one box Cherry, one box chicken melts, one bag costal berry mix, one box seaweed salad, one Bibigo steam dumplings, and one box organic raisin. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. It's hot throughout the evening, woke up several times because of the heat.
8/15/2019: Got up at 6:50. Had haircut at 8:25 in the garage. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:12, waited until 9:20 before Yolanda arrived, she thought I had stopped coming so she did not come in earlier to allow my entrance. As expected, there was some inquires about my departure. Swing by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, 4 Romain tomatoes, one bunch bananas, 2 white onions, 2 packs chicken wings, and one head Celery. Had 10 minutes MB with hand, EJ.
8/16/2019: Got up at 7:10. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, heart beat a bit off and hard at times during which. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie.
8/17/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive, there were 11 people in the group: Yung, Jerry, Ching, Wayne, the other Ming, Steve (老周), Alex, Cindy and Steve, Jason, and myself. Swing by Marukai and purchased one Salmon filet, one Karei whole, one California Roll, one Yakisoba set, one Bara Chirashi, and one Rainbow Poki Bowl-waited 15 minutes for check out.
8/18/2019: Got up at 7:10. Made 2 pieces 8"x3' panels from the last leftover deck lattice board, this will help cover Anal/Stephanie's deck side (to keep cat from getting into the bottom) for their new house, will give them to Stephanie tomorrow. Finished reading Amazon First Reads "The Price of Paradise".
8/19/2019: Got up at 7:15. Removed all wood pieces from the two patio bench, most of them can still be used turning over, about 6 of them deteriorated too much to be reused in any form, considering we had the furniture for 30 years, it wasn't too bad at all. Trimmed off some Jessamine vines in the from porch, haven't been paying attention to it for a while, will need to trim off more this afternoon as it is blocking the Arlo camera view. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung.
8/20/2019: Got up at 7:10. Stopped by Costco with Anita, purchased one case Corona Familiar beer and one bag Coconut Clusters, filled up RX300 at Costco gas station on our way back. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie 25 minutes with Kung. Had 15 minutes MB with minis, EJ.
8/21/2019: Got up at 7:22. Trimmed off some branches from the fake Cherry tree. Played 40 minutes tabe tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung.
8/22/2019: Got up at 7:10. CCC volunteer day, got there at 9:12. Got in when Yolanda arrived at 9:18. Swing by Marina Grocery and got one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one bag salad bamboo shoots, two packs chicken wings, 6 red sweet yams, one bunch bananas, one gallon bottle vinegar (5%), one bag sponge tofu, one bag mixed nuts, one bag hot green pea, and one bag small apple. Called Mom at 7:00 for 33 minutes. Harvested the only 3 mature cucumbers and made them into pickles-they were either too late in the season to grow normally (way too short) or bad seeds to begin with.
8/23/2019: Got up at 7:38. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, removed all peaches from the "flower only peach tree". Replaced the backyard Arlo camera batteries (took a while to find usable ones, moved the monitoring location to just outside the kitchen sliding door, the signal there seemed pretty bad, need to install another base system close by to be able to do it's job. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie.
8/24/2019: Got up at 7:00. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 9 people in the group (Jason and myself started hiking at 8:17): Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Alex, Wayne, Ching, the other Ming, Jason, and myself. Received Meow Mix from Amazon, except that the driver left on the drive instead on the front porch-not nice!
8/25/2019: Got up at 7:35. Cleaned up dead leaves from the succulents in the backyard, had been ignoring watering them throughout the heat waves.
8/26/2019: Got up at 7:15. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased two packs Colgate toothpaste, two dozen organic eggs, one pack Artisan Rolls, and one pack organic Kiwi. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Took home the kitchen shelf boards Stephanie needed for size adjustment, it was hot but I finished the cutting in half an hour.
8/27/2019: Got up at 7:05. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Kung-started at 12:00 because he had to go to a Chinese Calligraphy class at 1:00, Stephanie had lunch with Teresa and Lisa. Opened the electrical junction box outside of the kitchen sliding door (where the old lamp used to be), discovered that there wasn't a visible opening inside I could simply insert and drop an USB cable down to connect to the power indoor, will have to ponder on that.
8/28/2019: Got up at 7:12. Finally cut through the plastic housing inside the wall, behind the electrical junction box, the hole is large enough to feed the USB cable through, however, one more problem occurred after testing with a steel wire to move down through the inside of the wall, the fiber glass insulation was blocking the wire from moving after just 1/3 of a foot, not sure how to tackle this yet...... Played 45 minutes (with a short intermission after 35 minutes) table tennis with Kung-Stephanie went with the rest of the group for a company luncheon. Made the hole in the inside wall sub-junction box a little larger and tried with a relative thin but sturdy steel wire, it seemed to go down quite easily once I found the right path, however I still could not see the wire from inside the kitchen, after further study I realized I inserted the wire too far down, measured the correct length and tried again, voila, it worked. taped the USB cable to the wire and pull it out without much problem, the remaining task was to put everything back with USB cable extended out of the junction box.
Reattached all wires, junction box, and conduit parts (except one of the conduit holder which was off a bit and could not be put back to its original secured status-but should be OK as it is not under direct weather condition ). Tested the Arlo camera USB power connection, another problem popped up-the USB cable was not long enough (for power attachment inside the kitchen) with current setup, either use the long/flexible camera holder or make an wood extension board and reattach the dome base, either solution must leave enough USB cable length inside the kitchen for proper connection.
8/29/2019: Got up at 7:05. CCC volunteer day-the last one. Got there at 9:15-April allowed my entrance. Stopped by Marina Grocery, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, two packs pin noodles, one pack Taiwan sausage, two bags spicy peanuts, one bag Wasabi peas, three packs (only one piece in each) beef tendon, one pack one pack bacon, one pack beef tendon ball, two packs thick bean curd, and one bunch banana, also got a small size order of chicken/vegetable mix with accumulated coupon ($6 plus 53 cents cash). Painted the small 1/2"x1-1/2"x5" wood piece for the new Arlo camera holder, secured it to the eavesdrop, attached the dome base and the camera, applied power and, voila, it worked. One last task was to find a good way to protected it from rain and sun for a longer time use.
Had 15 minutes MB with mini, EJ. Called Mom at 7:00 for 45 minutes-a record.
8/30/2019: Got up at 7:26. Used leftover conduit and parts to cover portion of the exposed USB wire, will need to move the camera housing closer to the wall for a better (straight up) look, also need to add a rain shield next to the USB connector area.
Played 15 minutes table tennis with Stephanie-disruptions every few minutes. Replaced the wood piece holding the camera dome base, also moved it closer to the wall so that the conduit can look nicer, and the camera dome faced out instead, camera view can cover more backyard.
8/31/2019: Got up at 6:48. Hiking day, my turn to drive, there were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ching, Wayne, Ming, the other Ming, Jason, myself, ShingKuo joined us 2/3 of the way from the other way - Wayne joined Jason and myself 15 minutes ahead of the rest of the group. Stopped by Marukai, purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Bara Chirashi, one Salmon Shioyaki Bento, and one Yakisoba set. Visited Costco with Anita right after returning home, got one box (x8) breakfast bowl, one tub Greek Plain Yogurt, and one Cranberry Walnut Round. Anita decided to use a different suitcase, it opens on one side instead of in the middle, easier to stuff things in.
9/1/2019: Got up at 7:00. Stopped by Costco with Anita, purchased one bag Peet's coffee beans and ground them right there. Drove Anita to SJC for her trip back to Taiwan on ANA NH171 (SJC to NRT) and NH823 (NRT to TPE), got out of SJC within 15 minutes, parking fee was $2.00, could not be any lower. It took 15 minutes to drive back home, stopped by all but two of the 13 traffic lights-possibly a record also.
NH171 took off 9 minutes ahead of schedule, estimated arrival will be 21 minutes ahead of schedule. Anita called from NRT at 11:31 pm
9/2/2019: Got up at 7:30. Anita called at 7:42 am from博愛街. Finished backyard Arlo camera relocation- rain shield, paint, tightening the conduit joints,......
Watered the backyard plants. Called Anita at 6:00. Called Mom at 7:00, she appeared to be in a bad mood, too much time, nothing to do...... what can be done about it??????
9/4/2019: Got up at 7:20. Went to Costco and picked up one bottle 1.75L Tequila, one organic Mediterranean salad kit, one bag organic pine nuts, one bag Macadamia nuts, one can unsalted mixed nuts, one pack (x2) Flex Seal Clear, and one case (x24) Corona cerveza. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Kung, 25 minutes with Stephanie. Finished shortening 505 jeans.
9/5/2019: Got up at 7:50. Harvested 2 cucumbers, did not even see one of them until yesterday, it looked like a small potato, both of them were kind of pathetic-1/5 of their expected size. Examined the red sofa and realized that it'll be a major task converting it to a 2-seater, will have to put it in the back burner. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Kung, 20 minutes with Stephanie. Anita called at 6:01-I forgot.
9/6/2019: Got up at 7:24. No CCC volunteering any more. Trimmed off several Oleander branches (not major ones) over hanging our Korean neighbor's backyard, there were still quite a few that I planned to cut off but not today, shorten them to manageable length before moving (with the wheel barrel) them to the curbside for tomorrow, my weight dropped to 147.2 lbs afterward-wow! Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. House sitting for Stephanie from 1:30-5:10, for someone working on water softener removal and base boards installation. Called Anita at 6:00. Called Mom at 7:00 but Ahfen told me she's shampooing her hair and seemed tired to talk and ask me to call next week.
9/7/2019: Got up at 7:53. Inspected the patio table and decided that it was breaking down, removed the top lumbers, the useable parts can be repurposed to fix the two benches. Moved the working table close to the wall, produced a makeshift umbrella to cover it from the sun (since itdid not have the fake Cherry tree as shield), the table saw and Miter saw can be placed at its original location, less cramping.
Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, got some Cherry tomatoes and plums from her. Cut all necessary wood pieces for the two patio benches, discovered the Miter saw was not at exactly 90° afterward, trimmed all the boards after adjusting the angle. Planning to use wood glue to attach the boards to the bench base first, add two screws instead of four per boards to reenforce the strength after the glue has dried, sanding the bench after all this should be much easier.
Called Anita at 6:00.
9/7/2019: Got up at 7:00, hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 7 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ming, Ching, Jason, and myself, Jason and I started to hike at 8:15, as the weather was cool, we did not have much problem reaching 50 ft before the high point, in fact we had to stop and waited 5 minutes before Jerry showed up, followed by the other 4 after 2 more minutes. Found the spacers after another search in the house and backyard, turned out Anita put the bag inside the round water bucket under the trellis, no wonder I could not find it. Cleaned up the excess wood debris on the patio bench base and washed them before the next move-attaching the repurposed lumbers. Decided to trim off both sides of the repurposed boards to make their appearance nicer, however this caused another unexpected issue-I need to make two more boards to cover the empty space created by this, so each bench has 14 boards instead.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 27 minutes.
9/8/2019: Got up at 7:17. Stopped by Harbor Freight Tools, purchased one orbital palm sander, 5 sanding disks, one bag 5" zip ties, one pack 2" pegboard hooks, one pack 8" pegboard hooks, and one duck tape. Swing by Marukai, got one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Bara Chirashi, and one Yakisoba set. Made a short stop at next door Daiso, got some plastic containers. Used the newly acquired random orbital palm sander and finished the topside of the two benches, made the job much easier/quieter/faster although it still took over one hour.
9/9/2019: Got up at 7:42. Sanded most of the remaining part of the benches, the areas close to the bottom or unreachable were spared. Hosed them to remove residual dust and sun dried them.
Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung, got 3 cucumbers from Kung, one long and huge, two light color and round ones. Made a rain shield for the garden mobile storage container. Applied water seal to bottom side of the benches, finished the top sides after dinner, the appearance differ a lot before and after the water seal, I liked the look before though-too late!
Called Anita at 6:00, will podcast "So You Think You can Dance" at 8:00 for her. Called Mom at 7:00,
9/10/2019: Got up at 7:10. Volunteer day for Stephanie, got there at 8:55. Bathroom mirror was put on, kitchen sink does not match the opening, he had to find another one. I left there after Jennifer showed up. Had 10 minutes MB with mini, EJ-better this time. Disassembled the two patio chairs, washed them for drying in the sun, will sand them down for smoother surface tomorrow.
Called Anita at 6:00.
9/11/2019: Got up at 7:04. Swing by Costco and purchased one box (x12) Jimmy Dean Croissant sausage/egg/cheese, one tub cream cheese, one dozen Artisan Rolls, and one tub plain Greek yogurt. Started sanding the chair panels, it turned out to be more challenging than I anticipated, the number of surfaces were staggering, need to come up with a better way to handle the hard to access areas of the panels. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 15 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Created a make shift flat sanding bar and finished the first panel (one of four chair sides), I probably should get some coarse sand papers for upcoming tasks.
Called Anita at 6:00.
9/12/2019: Got up at 7:01. Visited Walmart and purchased 2 bottles 64 oz Hazelnut creamer, one pack (x15) gallon zip lock bag, one pack (x2) Bounty paper towel, 3 bottles Aloe Vera, one bag Parmesan cheese, one jar liquid hand soap, and one jar creamy Caesar salad dressing, swing by Marina Grocery, got one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one pack fried fish cake, two bags spicy peanuts, one pack (x3) Romaine lettuce, one bottle sesame oil, one bag roasted nut assortment, one bottle Siracha sauce, and one box thin noodle. Decided not to stop by CCC, came home directly. Replaced the 5" circular disk and sanded down one side panel, sanding bar is still needed for tight spots. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Stayed in the family room the whole afternoon as outside (backyard) temperature was over 100°F. Called Anita at 6:00. Called Mom at 7:00.
9/13/2019: Got up at 6:55. Used chisel (the one with sharp file sides) trimming off the rough surfaces on the remaining panels of one of the patio chairs, also washed it with detergent/water/metal brush-this should make the surface cleaner and easier to sand to desirable appearance, will find out this afternoon. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, Francisco only created a single pile garden trimmings in the street for us and our Korean neighbor, this made cleaning a bit simpler, I was able to finish it before the garbage truck came and hauled it away. Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Kept LS400 in the driveway, sanded the 2 panels with both sanders, I was able to use higher speed to finish the task faster, hose them down and let dry in the backyard. Decided not to join Stephanie, Jennifer, and Michelle to see Stephanie's new house tomorrow. Backyard temperature reached 112.4°F during the day, and it already got to 108.5°F just before noon. Decided to harvested the 3 cucumbers as they were getting too old and getting any bigger.
Applied water seal to all 4 panels of the first patio chairs.
9/14/2019: Got up at 7:00. Hiking day, my turn to drive, there were 7 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Ming, the other Ming, Jason, and myself. John and Shingkuo joined us at Peet's Coffee. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Yakisoba set, one Bara Chirashi, and one Salmon Shioyaki bento. The backyard temperature was 107.4°F at 12:11. Reassembled the first patio chair, because of the design flaws, it does not stand very sturdy as always, need to enforce it!!!!!!
Called Anita at 6:00.
9/15/2019: Got up at 7:36. Began refinishing the second patio chair, use makeshift bar sander on hard to reach (by power sanders) first. Gave the idea working on them in the garage as the temperature in the backyard was nice. Forgot to change sand paper/disk, it took a long time to finish just one panel (back rest-the smallest ) around 3:20pm, called it off the day, will continue tomorrow. Called Anita at 6:00. Answered Stephanie's question regarding rooftop noise issue. Installed new Arlo app on old iPad, new iPad, and my Pixel, seemed to work. Placed buckets under the two down spouts in the backyard, ready to collect rain water tomorrow morning.
9/16/2019: Got up at 7:05. It did start raining around 6:00, although not heavy but the two buckets were full before 9:00, placed several small buckets next to them and filled them with water already in the two large buckets, hope this is enough to cover the tail of the rain stream. Took LS400 to the Chevron station on Lundy and Berryessa, had oil changed for $40, the mechanic indicated that the wheel rim was no good, looks like I'll have to get a replacement if I want to have a spare tire.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Called Anita at 6:00. Called Mom at 7:00. Broadcasted "So You Think You Can Dance" season Finale at 9:00.
9/17/2019: Got up at 7:10. Stopped by Costco and got one container grape tomatoes and two dozen organic eggs, also filled up RX300 at their gas pump. Digging of the dirt in the backyard seemed to the work of racoon as evidenced by the foot prints on the composite deck.
Received my Sketcher shoes from Amazon, it was delayed by one day. Applied water seal to all panels of the second patio chair.
Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Reassembled the second patio chair, for some reason, it is not as sturdy as the other one (after I tighten the nuts more), applied some wood glue to the seat lumbers attaching the side bars, hope this provide some improvement. Washed the chairs after the glue has dried.
9/18/2019: Got up at 7:14. Took RX300 to Chevron station for an oil change for $35, the mechanic indicated that it will need brake job.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Called Anita at 6:00.
9/19/2019: Got up at 7:10. Disassembled the patio swing, this would be the most challenging one as it has the most parts. Started washing and brushing before sanding them.
Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ. Played 20 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Swing by CVS and purchased one Birthday card for Mom, 6 bottle 750ml Barefoot Riesling, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, and one bottle 750ml Sho Chiku Bai sake. Finished washing the last few panels of the swing, let dry under the afternoon sun. Called Anita at 6:00 for 34 minutes (8 minutes call from me, 26 minutes call from Anita). Called Mom at 7:00 for 38 minutes.
9/20/2019: Got up at 7:10. Cleaned up the lid of the water container near the shed. Painted the sun dail in the backyard with leftover outside wall paint.
Received new order of #8 Sketcher shoes from Amazon at 11:08.
Played 25 minutes table tennis. Had RX300 smog test done (PASS) at "South Bay Test Center" after leaving Dynamicfoundation, the center was still at old location but future site is unknown, but according to the owner, should be OK for the next two years.
Paid renewal fee online.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 34 minutes. Processed Amazon return requirements, printed return label (UPS), still need to cover up all original shipping label and other barcode.
9/21/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 7 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Ching, Steve (Cindy's husband), the other Ming, Jason, and myself-however, Ching and Steve came up from the other direction as they were late, the other Ming also came up late but in our direction but he had to stop and help her wife call AAA in New Jersey to arrange towl truck. Jason offered to stop by Marukai so I purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Yakisoba set and one Bara Chirashi. Gave the four-section folding ladder to Jason. Sanded all but the side panels for the swing, washed them and let dry in the sun.
Printed necessary pages from Gate 1 Travel 10 Day Copper Canyon trip document, also saved the whole PDF file as well as the images of those printed ones in Google Drive.
9/22/2019: Got up at 7:15. Anita called at 8:02 from her hotel in Hainan island. Sanded the remaining two panels of the swing, washed and let dry in the morning sun. Dropped off the Sketcher shoes I am returning to Amazon at UPS store near CVS.
Applied water seal to the side panels (2) of the swing, need to get more water seal. Visited Lowes and purchased one can Thompson's Clear Water Seal (got a multi-purpose one this time), one 6' male-female hose (to repair the front yard hose reel water connection), and one bottle wood glue. Amazon notified refund complete-obviously they assume the dropped completion as evidence of return.
9/23/2019: Got up at 7:12. Stopped by Costco to purchase P&G products ($100 to get $25 cash card), but discovered that the prices in store were lower than what I found online, I would not be able to add up to $100 by purchasing the products in mind, had to go home and study what else to buy, instead purchased one bottle 1.5L Johnnie Walker Red Label, one box Seaweed Salad, and 2 dozen Stella beer. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Kung. Applied water seal to all remaining panels, the new water seal I purchased this time was all-purpose, a mistake:-( . Called Mom at 7:00 for 41 minutes.
9/24/2019: Got up at 7:00. Visited Costco and purchased about $103 worth of P&G products-one pack Charmin bathroom tissue, one pack tooth paste, 2 packs dental floss, and 2 packs teeth whiting stripe. Cleaned up the new back sides of the back rest lumber (they faced the front before) with metal brushes, the multi-purpose water seal not only not covering up the weathered look, it actually made them looked worse, maybe I should get another can of wood (only) water seal. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Kung, 20 minutes with Stephanie. Finally succeeded uploading Costco P&G purchase receipt, this is after repeated failure using iPad-it could be the file format (.HEIC) used there, but it never showed any error, just hang there, anyway. Note that I had to create another account with the exact the same e-mail (yahoo) address and password (?xxxac, ?=x+1) in order to login (it claimed my account does not exist).
The thought of getting a short female-male hose to fix the garden hose railing wheel issue turned out to be more challenging, there was a piece of metal of the broken hose stuck inside the connector, took me nearly one hour to remove it, many filed tries, the trick was drilling small holes in the metal with the smallest drill I have, which help break up the metal ring and was removed from the housing, I was able to connect the new short hose, hope it does not leak when water is connected.
Reassembled all swing panels except the seat and back support lumbers.
9/25/2019: Got up at 7:05. Attached the short hose to water line, secured the long hose to the wheel, seemed to work fine. trimmed off both ends of the seat and back support lumbers with the Miter saw, easier than sanding them, they don't look as ugly now.
Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie was too tired from running errands. Another record breaking hot weather for today.
9/26/2019: Got up at 7:12. Attached all remaining seat as well as back support lumbers, the back support lumbers weren't sanded thoroughly as the old attachment marks made by the cross beam were still very visible, need to do something about otherwise the refinish was a failure. Swing by Marina Grocery, got one bunch bananas, one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, 2 bags spicy peanuts, one pack (x3) Romaine lettuce, two packs thick bean curd, and one pack Chicken wings. Played 28 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Paid Francisco $70 for September. Tried checking monthly bills but having problem login Fidelity, need to verify ith Anita PW/UN issue. Had 20 minutes MB with RM, EJ. Called Anita at 6:00 for 34 minutes, verified that Fidelity account password has an "@" in it. Called Mom at 7:00 for 32 minutes. Entered Explorer (-8110) and CapitalOne (-2641) payment information on Fidelity BillPay, PG&E and Explorer (-9981) statements weren't available yet.
9/27/2019: Got up at 6:55. Sanded the back support lumbers where beam marks were left, it's a little better. Added Explorer (-9981) payment $209.14 in Fidelity BillPay, still waiting for PG&E. Booked plane tickets from ANA for my trip to Taiwan next year, for some reason (maybe too popular due to the election), no isle or window seats were available for the flight from SJC to NRT, I had to pay $25 more to pick one on the isle, luckily all three other flights had free isle seats which I selected quickly, I should check the seat availability to see if new ones released. The printer finally quit printing due to low black ink level, it turned out the new one I purchased was used up already, the old Brother black had some leftover which was placed back to an extended life. Ordered a replacement black ink from Amazon, should arrive by tomorrow.
Confirmed that Amazon had refunded my Sketcher purchase return of $54.63. Moved swing to it's original location, still need one coat of clear water seal though.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 29 minutes.
9/28/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Wayne, Alex, Allen, Steve, Cindy, Ming, Jason, and myself, of course Jason and I started 14 minutes earlier, they caught up with us at the top, we did stop for breaks a couple of times. Swing by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Bara Chirashi, one Yakisoba set, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, one pack Gindara (black Cod) Kirimi, and one pack Salmon Fillet. Stopped by Lowes and got one can Thompson wood water seal and one pack 80 grade sand papers. Received new RX300 license sticker. Called Anita at 6:00 for 19 minutes. Received printer black replacement cartridge from Amazon at 8:06.
9/29/2019: Got up at 7:33. Added two 4' 2x4 to the bottom of long sides of the patio table to strengthen it and improve the warping condition.
Added two 2 3/4" 2x2 lumbers to the bottom of the short sides of the patio table, applied water seal to the bottom side of the table.
Set the patio table up right and washed it a bit before sanding it, noticed that the frame boards were not in good condition, not sure how it would turn out after sanding. Called Anita at 6:00 for 24 minutes. Received egg cooker from Amazon at 7:57.
9/30/2019: Got up at 7:00. Sanded the upper side of the patio table, also hand sanded the parts that were water sealed but not sanded, they looked too dark, most likely because they weren't sanded, the old wood surface absorbed too much water seal which made them darker, hope a little sanding help.
Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. The patio table looked better after sun dry.
Started working on compost bin, decided a design of 22"x29"x20-1/2" (WxLxH) with one side open, a couple of Stephanie's green house leftover hardware may be used, finished building the two side panels (22"x20-1/2").
Had a preview of final design.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 36 minutes. Called Mom at 7:01 for 36 minutes.
10/1/2019: Got up at 7:25. Brought tRX300 to Chevron station for brake job, the mechanic will do the back this time, saying there are still 30% left in the front ones, the cost will be $350, he does accept credit card. I removed the house keys from the key chain, also removed the CapitalOne credit card from the glove compartment just in case, walked home in 8 minutes. Played 35 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Kung, 15 minutes with Stephanie. BC Auto service called twice after 12:00 but I did not get it, walked there from home and picked up RX300 after getting home.
Challenging but I finally managed to put the two side and back panels together, there are more details as this is on-the-fly design.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 28 minutes.
10/2/2019: Got up at 7:11. Stopped by Costco and purchased two dozen Warsteiner beer and one tub organic Greek plain Yogurt, added exactly $30 Octane 91 gas in LS400. Applied water seal to the compost bin under construction.
Play 25 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie did not come back from errands until 12:45 so she did not play. Applied water seal to the patio table upper frames and the back support of the swing.
Received the vests from Amazon, turned out the two I ordered are exactly the same except color, dawn! Should I return one??????........Na!
Sale price was ~60% of list price.
Called Anita for 13 minutes.
10/3/2019: Got up at 7:05. Prepared the edge cover board with Ryobi jig saw (amazingly useful although a bit slow), applied water seal to it as well as the top swing cover. Cut up required length for the front sliding cover holder (the hardware was from Stephanie's old green house), painted them with the same color as the crawl space swing entrance door.
Decided to make additional support beams for the swing, first attempt by using paper to find exact measurements of the needed beam size did not work too well, so I removed the seat lumbers instead, by using same length lumber to get an exact drawing from it should give a much closer measurement.
Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, she and Alan are going to Australia 10/24. Attached the edge cover boards with short and long screws on 3 sides.
Placed the front sliding cover hardware in place, made two 26-7/8" boards, got cutting forms from the existing beam, but trim them won't be so easy as I table saw is impossible cutting curves, need to come up with ideas.
Made holes in the front slide cover support hardware and attached them to their designated locations, measured and made cover from Stephanie's old green house rain shield, had to trim it several times before getting a smoother sliding effect.
Called Mom at 7:00 for 34 minutes.
10/4/2019: Got up at 7:17. Stopped by Costco and got one bunch banana, one container grape tomato, one box (x8) Angus Cheese Burger, one AREDS 2, two dozen Corona beer, and one pack Tortilla. Made two edge boards for the top side of the compost bin, attached the door on the top, added a knob to the door.
Cut all necessary wood pieces to form the compost bin top side alongside the door, applied water seal to new cuttings.
Made a lone but narrow bar to be attached on top of the top front metal to level the front and back of the top side. Called Anita at 6:00, spoke to KwangHuei for 5 minutes, Anita for 11 minutes.
10/5/2019: Got up at 6:50, hiking day, Jason to drive. Freddy (our Korean neighbor) gave me a box of large Persimmons as I was watering the front yard.
There were 6 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, and one Yakisoba. Started peeling the persimmons at 1:00, finished peeling and placed them in the dehydration basket and hung outside the kitchen sliding door.
Secured boards covering the top surrounding the door with leftover screws from the two benches.
The only task remaining was the door center, not sure what to use yet-metal mesh or the same transparent plastic as the front cover...... Called Anita at 6:00 for 15 minutes.
10/6/2019: Got up at 7:24. New idea for breakfast-tortilla with breakfast bowl a good match.
Came up with an alternative solution for the compost bin top door center, found one large enough leftover lattice, trim it to desirable size, removed the knob, applied spray paint to the door frame, drilled knob screw hole in the lattice, attached the knob along with the lattice, lattice not secured yet.
(had second thought after finishing it, if the semi-open door attracts too many flies, may have to close it up with something like the old green house transparent panel).
Harvested 川七 and cleaned up the messy vines preparing room for the new compost bin.
Readjusted the compost area, moved the water container to the front of 川七 as the compost bin is a bit deeper (the area becomes narrower toward the front fence) but the container can fit nicely, put the compost bin in place and moved some overflow dirt and leaves in it.
10/7/2019: Got up at 7:10. Trimmed the fake Cherry tree, the lower perimeter and the upper side close to the house, some top branches were also removed.
Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie's in Notary recertification class. Arranged the compost area, one spot may be candidate for another rain water container.
Stopped by CVS and got one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, one bottle 750ml Sho ChiKu Bai sake, 4 bottles 750ml Barefoot Riesling, and one pack 9'x12" envelopes (to mail birthday card as well as 7"x11" photos), swing by Jason's house and delivered one large bag of 川七. Registered CVS Extracare and turned future purchase receipts paperless-email instead. Called Anita for 24 minutes, showing her the new compost bin seemed to lift her spirit. Called Mom at 7:00 for 31 minutes.
10/8/2019: Got up at 7:06. Trimmed the fake Cherry tree branches near the rose garden side, this actually revealed many of the Passion Fruit vines hidden up there. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Kung, and 25 minutes with Stephanie. Stopped by 99 Ranch Market but could not proceede purchasing meals from there as I wasn't sure how much to put in a container-over the rim or close it......, left without making any purchase. Visited Lowes after resting a bit, did not find Oxi clean or LED bulb but got one pack (x2) 40W light bulb for the miniature light house, a pair hinges to strengthen/straight the one that is holding the compost bin door, also got 6 pieces of lumber to finish the patio table top. Trimmed more branches from the fake Cherry tree, but could only access 30% of the top branches, need more work.
10/9/2019: Got up at 7:10. Stopped by Costco and purchased (self-checkout) one pack (x6) Romaine lettuce, two dozen organic egg, one box Oxi Clean powder, and one tub Greek plain yogurt. Trimmed more top branches from the fake Cherry tree, there were still some branches unreachable but they were relatively smaller ones, should be OK for a while.
Played 50 minutes table tennis, 25 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Trimmed off dried roses, watered them as well. Pulled the drying white flower ground cover, took nearly one hour.
Called Anita for 24 minutes.
10/10/2019: Got up at 7:10. Trimmed the fake Cherry tree one more time.
Mailed Mom's Birthday card along with several photos at the Post Office. Swing by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, two bag pickled bamboo shoot, two pack beef tendon, two pack thick bean curd, two bag spicy peanut, two red onion, one can pork sung, and one bunch banana. No table tennis today as Stephanie was busy with errands in the office. Made 4 make-shift replacement seat supports for the swing, this is much easier to cut with Miter saw, the two 2x4 were so hard to cut I gave up totally, these four will make 2 beams with equivalent function, need to glue and screw them for enough strength.
Received 1T external hard drive and night lights (x6) from Amazon at 4:01. Called Anita at 6:00 for 25 minutes. Called Mom at 7:00, ended up speaking to Peilee for 15 minutes.
10/11/2019: Got up at 7:10. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Applied water seal to the seat support beams for the swing, used 2 screws each to give them better bonding.
The Time Machine backup was done last night but the encryption is taking forever, it is only at 15% at the moment, might take a couple more days. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Secured the two supplemental beams for the swing seat, not a straight forward task but managed ok, the seat lumbers are better supported.
Called Anita at 6:00 for 16 minutes.
10/12/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive. Jason delivered one box of Persimmons, and one bar cheese. There were 10 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ching, Ming, the other Ming, Alex, Wayne, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased Karei whole, two Yakisoba set, one Salmon Fillet, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, and one Baro Chirashi. Swing by Lowes and got one 2x4x8, and five 0.75x6x4. Removed the siding and lattice of the deck near the Passion Fruit planter box, moved all but a few Stephanie's old green house frames and hardware there before closing them up. Put away some unused tools and paint in the garage. Called Anita at 6:00 for 18 minutes, she's heading home tomorrow so I need to call her earlier-at 2:00 pm, her flight will be 5:40 pm (8:40 Taipei time). Cleaned master bathroom with Oxi clean and steam mop, not perfect but better, at least the dirt and dust were gone, also vacuumed the master bedroom.
10/13/2019: Got up at 7:25. Picked up a broom stick and one 54 in. EZ Reach Stik Tree Pruner from Homedepot in Milpitas, took 50 minutes. Tried out the new tree pruner, and surprisingly easy to use and versatile, handily took care of the up shooting branches. Called Anita at 2:00. Watered roses one more time. Used the counter top oven to finalize several of the the Persimmons in the dehydration basket as they were a bit soft, boxed all of the dried ones (including the ones in the oven) and left them in the refrigerator.
Peeled all Persimmons from Jason, saved 6 of the most ripen ones for fresh consumption and the remaining (33) for dried delicacy.
Anita called from NRT at 9:13 for 2 minutes, she's already passed international connection flight security check point.
10/14/2019: Got up at 6:55. Waited at the parking lot of Porcelanosa for Anita, she called three times-just arrived, waiting for luggage, ready-before picking her up at the arrival area.
Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie could not play because Teresa's having a meeting upstairs, we had play silent ball. Finished reading "A Fire Sparkling" by Julianne Maclean.
Discovered the leftover hardware from Stephanie's green house may be a good fit for making shield for auto feeder. Called Mom at 7:00 for 31 minutes.
10/15/2019: Got up at 7:10. Visited Costco with Anita, got one Cranberry Walnut Bread (they changed the name from Round) and one Sunbeam Queen size heated bed spread. No table tennis today, Kung's busy and Stephanie's simply ran over by Teresa's reunion errands. Prepared the 2x4 for patio table support - 27-11/16 long, made rabbets on both ends so that it could rise to level with the bottoms of new table boards. Applied water seal to it.
Discovered "Photo Scan" App by Photomyne does multi-photo scan which can be used to quickly and easily digitize old photo albums, it charges $9.99 each month until cancelled.
10/16/2019: Got up at 7:05. Stopped by Jason's house, got a full box plus a small bag of Persimmons, of which I only picked less than 1/3, Jason did most of the picking, there were over 70 of them, not sure how to handle this many.
Glued and screwed in the center support beam for the patio table.
Played 35 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie's still hanging there handling Teresa's class reunion errands. Cut all 0.75x6x4 boards into 0.75x35-5/8x2-3/4 strips, however, there's a couple of complications, one was the center support beam which I made it flash with the rabbets of the existing frames, since the newly created strips were thicker, I needed to trim off some for the edges but I forgot the center-should have lower the center beam so I wouldn't have to trim off every strip of the boards to fit the beam, curses! Another problem was that the strips I made were narrower than the original, fitting new ones on the table may be very challenging.
10/17/2019: Got up at 7:10. Swing by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one pack Taiwan sweet sausage, 4 bags spicy peanut, one bunch banana, one bag small apples, one head Celery, 2 packs chicken wing, one bag mixed rice cracker, and one Napa cabbage. Worrying about the large number of Persimmons to be sun dried, I decided to make a dehydration box from remnant parts, it ill be simple but useable, a single layer to begin with with possible addition as the new layers can be stacked.
Lightly sanded the frames of the new dehydration box, power washed them and the fabrics.
10/18/2019: Got up at 7:15. Finished the dehydration box, it's a bit rough but should serve it's purpose, I had to add a small strip of fabric at the edge of the bottom layer as there was a 6mm gap due to uneven boards, the stabler I had for many many years came handy to secure the fabric.
I made a mistake when attaching the fabric for the top frame, because one of the long side lumber was warped, if fits ok if the cure is on the upper side, but I had it upside down, this created a large gap pn both sides of the covering, it still had smaller gaps even after trimming off a portion of the lumber-too bad!!!!!! Practiced dado and rabbet cutting using table saw, found the correct depth and made three patio table boards.
Peeled 2/3 of the Persimmons from Jason, placed 2/3 of them in the new dehydration box and 1/3 into the hanging basket. The bottom layer of the dehydration box changed its shape (narrower) after all those persimmons were added, adding a center beam should fix this.
Finished all but two (they are to be consumed fresh) of the Persimmons and placed them in the new dehydration box.
10/19/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive, he's 10 minutes later than normal, we got there at 8:25, the other Ming arrived at the same time so we started together, we later found out Wayne started ahead of us (didn't know how much earlier). There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Wayne, the other Ming, Alex, Jerry, Ching, Jason, and myself. Added one cross beam at the bottom of the first layer dehydration box to reduce the sagging effect. Made 4 more patio table boards.
10/20/2019: Got up at 7:31. Made 4 more patio table lumbers, prepared two cross support metal bars from one of Stephanie's green house leftover parts.
Assemble the main part of the auto feeder rain shield support hardware.
Added two T shape hardware to the main support to clamp the assembly to the auto feeder box.
10/21/2019: Got up at 7:09. Found out my seats on trip back to Taiwan had been changed again, seat numbers are different but alphabetic numbers stayed the same. Cleaned up all withering cucumber plants. Prepared transparent panels for the auto feeder, will cut them later. Made 2 panels for the auto feeder, washed them with "cone" setting. Made one patio table board.
Played 45 minutes table tennis with Kung-this is only possible with slower pace. Drilled 4 holes in the auto feeder support frames to attach the transparent panels, applied spray paint (the same color as all repurposed SGH hardware) to the support.
Made 3 more patio table boards, will need to trim off some warped rabbet on the patio table as it is pushing up the new boards. Called Mom at 7:00 for 28 minutes.
10/22/2019: Got up at 7:10. The top panel for the auto feeder I made yesterday had several tape glue residual, I used "Goof Off" to try to remove it, the chemical content in the product actually made the panel fuzzy which totally destroyed the appearance, so I decided to make another one from another SGH leftover, cut quarter circle on all 8 corners and trimmed off the rough edges, power washed them as well.
Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung. Anita purchased her March 2020 trip ticket from ANA.
Made 3 more patio table boards, one of them to replace a slightly damaged one and two to serve the junctions-they required more trimming. Ordered one iPhone 11 case from Amazon for Yung.
10/23/2019: Got up at 7:12. Got a cold after morning exercise-late realizing I did not have enough clothes. Drilled 8 holes in the two transparent panels for the auto feeder rain shield, attached them to the support hardware, possibly need to add a side panel for better protection when the rain is blown side way.
Visited Han Wang and Alisha to see their new daughter Ophelia at 2:00, stayed for one hour and heard something new about ChiMing.
10/24/2019: Got up at 7:10. Made one side panel for the auto feeder, also made a replacement cover for the new compost bin-the lattice will be removed instead. Our Korean neighbor placed another box of large Persimmons at our front porch-possibly because Anita sent over a box of Taiwan Pineapple cake the other day. Received #8 1-1/4 screws from Amazon. Replaced the lattice cover with newly made transparent panel for the compost bin door. Attached one side panel to the auto feeder. Made an appointment to see Dr Jennifer Kao's office tomorrow at 10:00, they want to charge me $118 first before filing claim with Medicare, most likely won't pay them nearly that much.
Started Time Machine backup, still very slow encrypting-I should change frequency to every quarter. Called Mom at 7:00 for 26 minutes.
10/25/2019: Got up at 7:10. Left for my 10:00 appointment at 9:30, got there at 9:37. Dr. Cheng took care of the examination, she's very thorough and careful, my recent difficulty seeing letters on the television was mainly caused by astigmatism and cataract, right eye's cataract also was part of the reason that I could see better at certain angles, got prescription to bring back to Taiwan for new glasses. Dr. Chen will call me to pick up specialist recommendation for more cataract related operation. Meaning of the 3 prescription numbers (-0.25-2.25x085/-0.50-2.50x105): -0.25/-0.50 for correction of nearsightedness ("-"), -2.25x085/-2.50x105 for correction of astigmatism, I should get 20/70 for my right eye and 20/25 for my left eye after the correction. The _2.25 is for reading.
Entered "sudo sysctl debug.lowpri_throttle_enabled=0" in a terminal window to speed up Time Machine process (the Time Machine backup process is a very low priority task before doing this), remember to enter "sudo sysctl debug.lowpri_throttle_enabled=1" to restore normal operation settings. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Made two patio table boards-the ones at the junctions of 135° outer frames.
10/26/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive. There were 9 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Cindy, Steve, Wayne, the other Ming, Jerry, Jason, and myself. Swing by Marukai, purchased one Bara Chirashi, one Tuna Roll, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, Yakisoba set, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, and one bottle 1.5L Sho Chiku Bai sake, stopped by Daiso and got one pack (x2) 100ml spray bottle. Made two sets of patio table edge boards, need to cut dados and rabbets for them.
10/27/2019: Got up at 8:05. Cut dados and rabbets for the two sets of edge boards for the patio table. Sopped by Target and purchased one pack (x4) Strawberry Oui Yogurt, one bottle Tartar sauce, one tub Chobani plain Yogurt and one tub Chobani Vanilla Yogurt, swing by Marshall, Anita bought one carry-on Lucas luggage (the same brand as the one she's using but with one wheel slightly damaged, one vest, and one snow globe, I got one bag Arabic coffee bean. Ordered Meow Mix from Amazon, also ordered one size S vest to replace the size M I ordered before.
10/28/2019: Got up at 7:44. Sanded down the uneven area of the original patio table frame rabbets that supported the boards. Sanded and polished the edges of 12 of the 21 new patio table boards. No table tennis today. Went and picked 63 Persimmons at Jason's house. Peeled all but 10 of them and set them in the dehydration basket. A total of 52 were in the basket, the lone one was half eaten by Jason's garden pet, Anita took care of it this morning.
Sanded and polished remaining 9 of the 21 new patio table boards, placed them back to the table, there were quite a few unparalleled gaps due to warped boards, not sure how to tackle them. Called Mom at 7:00 for 30 minutes.
10/29/2019: Got up at 7:30. Reversed the blower and smashed a couple of piles of Oak leaves, dumped them in the compost bin, dual purpose-cover up the Persimmon peels to avert flies/bug, add a different layer of compost ingredient for better result. Cleaned up old dripping system parts-tubes, dripping heads, blocks...... Played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung. Received Meow Mix and vest at 1:53. Need to see if small size vest works later. Cleaned up the dust collector box on the Bauer orbital sander, tried to color the new pine patio boards with the redwood dust paste but they do not look anything close to the original table color. Decided to change plan D provider and save $10/mo each-assuming we wouldn't need any prescription.
10/30/2019: Got up at 7:15. Applied clear Flex Seal to the bottoms of new patio table boards. Started trimming the "bush" alongside out back neighbor. No table tennis today. Trimmed the bushes with 17' Giant ladder, pruner, saw, and EZ Reach Stik Tree Pruner, took nearly 2 hours, these bushes had turned into trees over the years due to lack of trimming, especially on the top.
10/31/2019: Got up at 7:21. Stoppen by Marina Grocery, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one pack fried fish cake, 4 bags spicy peanuts, one pack cicken wing, one pack chicken wing drum, 2 packs thick bean curd, one bottle Hazelnut powder creamer, one string garlic, and one can iodized salt. Swing by CVS and got two bottles 750ml Barefoot Riesling, one bottle 750ml Sho Chiku Bai sake, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Moscato, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Merlot, and one bottle 1.5L Yellowtail Cabernet Sauvignon. Anita and myself moved all the tree trimmings onto the street for garden waste pick up tomorrow. Moved the patio table to just outside the family room, placed the boards back and found optimal placement-gaps were more or less the same.
11/1/2019: Got up at 7:18.
11/2/2019:
11/3/2019:
11/4/2019:
11/5/2019:
11/6/2019:
Lost 11/1-11/6 after software update-DAMN!
11/7/2019: Got up at 7:10. Stopped by Marina Grocery, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one bottle 750ml ErGuoTou, 2 bag pickled bamboo shoot, 4 bags spicy peanut, one bag Wasabi green pea, two bags mixed rice cracker, 4 pickle cucumber, 4 green bell pepper, and one pack (x4) Neoguri fast noodle. Put away all tools back in the garage, cleaned up the backyard except the work bench.
11/8/2019: Got up at 7:11. Our Korean neighbor left another box of Persimmons on the porch. Had haircut in the garage by Ahyui (as always, she arrived 45 minutes earlier for our 11:00 appointment), Anita had her hair dyed in the kitchen as it was a bit chilly in the garage-she's still under the cold symptoms. Gave Ahyui 7 of the Persimmons. Peeled 14 of the remaining Persimmons, they all felt softer than the old ones, too much sugar content, not perfect for drying.
11/9/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, my turn to drive, there were 8 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, the other Ming, Ching, Wayne, Jason, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Salmon Fillet, one Today's Special Bento, one Yakisoba set, one Bara Chirashi, and one Unagi, Futomaki.
11/10/2019: Got up at 7:10. Got 2 pack (x2 each) 48" LED light (for the garage) and 3 cans Satin Crystal Clear spray paint for the patio furniture. I'll install the new ones after the failing but still usable light tubes quit function. Applied Satin Crystal Clear spray paint to the swing (only the the upper surfaces).
11/11/2019: Got up at 7:08. Cleaned the family room sliding door tracks and one of the glass panels (the moving one). Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung.
11/12/2019: Got up at 7:05. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one Thai salad kit, one box raisins, one pack goat milk hand cream (x5), one bag Bibigo mini wonton, and one box (x8) chicken pot pie. Had 15 minutes MB with legs, EJ.
11/13/2019: Got up at 7:08. Played 35 minutes table tennis, 10 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. It seemed that I have a lot of time when no projects were in action:-( . Had 10 minutes MB with mini, EJ.
11/14/2019: Got up at 7:12. Stopped by Costco and picked up one bunch bananas, two MoveFree Ultra, and two dozen organic eggs. Received Lightning cable (x3) from Amazon through USPS at 10:13. Played 35 minutes table tennis with Stephanie.
11/15/2019: Got up at 7:08. With the corded blower, I rounded up most of the Oak and other leaves on the front lawn an used the blower revers function, created two bags of smashed leaves, placed one in the compost bin and one in the planter box under the fake Cherry tree, applied water to them. Need to get a longer (50ft) cord as I had to connect 4 different shorter cords to reach the area I needed to work on. Played 35 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Synced Time Machine, it only took 30 minutes this time around.
11/16/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason decided not to go so I'll be on my own this time. Brought along my Bluetooth ear piece (the one with wire) and listened to 倚天屠龍 while I was alone-discovered that the Youtube version I have been watching actually starts in the middle of the volume 1. There were 7 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Wayne, Alex, Ching, the other Ming, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and got one tube Wasabi paste, one Rainbow Poki Bowl, and one Salmon Shioyaki Bento. Received the 50' heavy duty extension cord from Amazon, it is really heavy.
11/17/2019: Got up at 7:12. Drilled an 1-1/4" hole one the left side of the auto feeder enclosure to serve as food level checking access. Moved one of the D-Link cameras to family room, made it facing the auto feeder.
11/18/2019: Got up at 7:25. Checked and added weather info from Advanced Weather app, the 5 locations were all found from there. Added Gate 1 as well as MileagePlus Explorer call numbers to Google Drive for emergency, also added $4.99 to Skype account, checked T-Moblie account, Mine has ~$9 and Anita's has ~$23, should be enough to use in Mexico if needed. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung. Called Mom at 6:00 for 27 minutes. Checked in Alaska Airlines for tomorrow, printed boarding passes (SJC->TUS).
2019 November Mexico Copper Canyon trip
11/19/2019: Got up at 7:00. Put away iMac and accessories, wallets, hard drives in the attic. Watered the roses and Passion Fruit vines. Put MacBook Pro in the closet, between the top cabinet and the ceiling. Our shuttle came to take us to SJC at 4:45, the traffic wasn’t bad as we got there by 5:05. This is our first time using terminal B, seemed to be bigger than terminal A. Passed through security in 15 minutes. Had dinner (home prepared Angus burger) at Gate 21, waited at Gate 19 for our flight. Boarded the plane at 6:40. The plane is Embrear E175, we’ve never flew in this type of plane (not sure who built it), it is a small and narrow plane seats 76 passengers, everyon:e either has a isle or window seat, and the leg room is longer, more comfortable, plus boarding process is much shorter. Flight 3304 took off on time at 7:05 and landed at Tucson International Airport at 9:48 local time (one hour ahead of ours), 18 minutes ahead of schedule. Called Doubletree Suites Hilton and the shuttle picked up us and two of the flight attendants, got there in just a few minutes, our room was a suite with 2 rooms, two TVs, bar, refrigerator, microwave oven...unfortunately we won’t have time to enjoy as we’ll be leaving at 7:00am.
11/20/2019: Got up at 5:00. Went for breakfast at 6:00 after placing luggages outside our room. I turned out in the 7:00pm gathering last night which we missed, Doug told attending members the departure time will be 7:30, it cost us some rest time. Breakfast was simple but adequate, we also managed to relieve ourselves afterward. The bus Departed the hotel at 7:35. There were two steps entering the Mexico boarder, first was the luggage check which all luggage (except the other stuff left in the seating area) were placed open on the ground and examined by Mexican boarder personnel one by one before placing them back on the bus, we were told they were looking for fire arms. The second step was to bring our passports and visa (which is only required crossing boarder) at a different location 10 minutes bus drive, all this took about one hour and 15 minutes. Had a fried beef (thin but big) for lunch, it was the first time I ever heard and tasted, not bad. Visited Sonora governer’s building and the outside of the cathedral in Hermosillo before heading to our hotel Marinaterra&Spa at San Carlos, Nuevo Guaymas. Had a before dinner during at 6:00 and dinner at 7:00.
11/21/2019: Got up at 6:00, had breakfast at 6:45, it was OK but not as great as our tour guide had claimed. Due to high wind, our morning boat ride was postponed to the afternoon, instead we visited a pearl farm 30 minutes away, leaned how cultural pearls are made, Anita purchased a polished shell in which Pearl was produced fro ~$20. Anita was under the cold condition she suffered before the trip started, so she decided not to go on the boat ride, after some pondering I also decided not to go as my stomach was feeling funny from a combined lunch dishes. Had hard time falling asleep, possibly from the coffee in the afternoon.
11/22/2019: Got up at 6:00, had breakfast at 6:50. Bell boy picked up our luggage’s at 7:45. Checked out at 8:20. Bus heading toward Walmart at 8:35, we picked up some stationeries to be given to school kids a couple of days later, also bought one bottle 950ml Tequila. Had lunch at a Navojoa city residence, it is someone with Spanish heritage and the house is a mansion. Arriving Alamos at 3:30, since Alamos is a small town of 9000 people, we (42) had to stay in 3 different hotels, ours was Mansion room #1, dropped off of our luggages and had a 40 minutes local tour ride.
11/23/2019: Got up at 6:30, had breakfast at 7:30, met a couple from Campbell (Norm and Dian), forgot the time so Anita did not have enough time to relieve before 8:30 city walking tour. Had lunch at 11:30, sat with a couple from Texas (Mimi-possibly 3rd generation Chinese, and Albert-from Hong Kong). Headed toward El Furete at 12:40, got to Hotel Hidalgo at 3:58, our room is #64. Watched a 50 minutes Indian cultural dance, very interesting. Dinner was at 7:00.
11/24/2019: Got up at 5:30. Had breakfast at 6:30. Got on the bus at 7:30, go to the train station at 7:50. Got on the train at 8:15, looks like a fully booked train (El Chepe) heading to Copper Canyon. The group was in cart 2 (first class-costs $150 each) seats 33 and 34. We waited 40 minutes at 10:53 for an express train to pass from the other direction before moving again. Had lunch in our seats-two of the three breads we purchased yesterday during city walking tour, plus one of two circular breads Douglas gave us a couple of days back, plus some nuts. Arriving Copper Canyon station at 3:45, got to Hotel Mirado at 4:00. Our hotel is at altitude ~7800ft.
11/25/2019: Got up at 6:30, had breakfast at 7:30. Arriving Copper Canyon park at 9:20, took the tram at 9:45 and got to the canyon viewing level station 2-altitude ~4200. Unlike Grand Canyon, this canyon is formed by volcano activities. Got back to tram station 1 at 40. The group rode in 4 different vehicles and drove up to Tarahumara school to visit and deliver some stationeries to the students there, these were very rough rides up and down the hills.
11/26/2019: Got up at 5:30. Had breakfast at 6:30. Heading toward Nuevo Casas Grandes at 7:33. Had steak lunch at 11:40 at Buffalo Restaurant. “An Old Gringo” was shown on the bus staring Gregory Peck, Jane Fonda, and Jimmy Smits”. Stopped by the museum/ruins and toured the ruins outsideafter lunch.
11/27/2019: Got up at 5:30. Breakfast at 6:30. Departing for Tucson at 7:30. First rainy day of the trip-a blessing for the group. Stopped by the museum/ruins again to tour the interior.
11/28/201: Got up at 5:00, had breakfast at 6:00, got to Tucson International Airport at 6:45- a 3 minutes shuttle ride. Got to Gate B3 at 7:03 after swift security check. Boarded Alaska Airline flight 3303 at 7:45. Our flight took off at 8:16, just one minutes behind schedule. We landed at SJC at 9:02, 33 minutes ahead of schedule. Jack picked us up, got home at 9:31. Visited 99 Ranch Market after a brief rest, got one bunch bananas and 4 boxes of ready-to-eat food from their deli.
11/29/2019: Got up at 7:00. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one bottle 750ml Martell Blue Swift Spirit Drink, one Cranberry Walnut bread, one can Honey roasted nut mix, one can Praline Pecans, one tub cream cheese, one pack string cheese, one bag organic pine nuts, one bag cocktail cucumber, one Thai Salad kit, one bag shrimp, one pack Tri-Tip Steak, one box (x7) K-cup, and one tub Greek plain yogurt. Ordered one pack magnetic latch, one pack Gillette razor blades, and one pair wet shoe from Amazon.
11/30/2019: Got up at 6:30. Hiking day, got there at 8:15, the other Ming and Ching joined me around 8:28. We finished the usual hike but did not go to Peet's Coffee. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Salmon Fillet, one Bara Chirashi, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, one Unagi Futomaki, one Yakisoba set, and one Rainbow Poki Bowl, plan to visit Daiso next door but it open at 10:00 so I went back to Marukai and got one bag Kasugai green peas and one bag Mame Mix rice cracker value pack. Swing by Daiso again when it opened, did not find the small round containers instead purchased one pack (x4) rectangular containers. Visited Harbor Freight Tools and got 3 2" paint brush, one pack (x5) 5" sanding disks, and one Six Flute Countersink-the bit that drill open a sink for screw heads. Visited CVS on Capital Ave, purchased 8 bottles 750ml Barefoot Riesling, one bottle 750ml Sho Chiku Bai sake, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon, one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Merlot, and one bottle 1.5L Barefoot Moscato. Received magnetic cabinet latch from Amazon at 3:31-I found out at 3:54, the delivery was scheduled for tomorrow though.
12/1/2019: Got up at 6:55. Took out the two string Christmas lights from storage bin, one of them simply would not come up and the other turned on 1/3 of the lights, tried everything but failed to make any difference, ordered a couple of new ones from Amazon, should get here by Wednesday. Received razor blades and wet shoes from Amazon one day ahead of scheduled delivery.
12/2/2019: Got up at 7:00. Finished reading "An Equal Justice" by Chad Zunker. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, and 20 minutes with Kung. The new wet shoe proved to be a necessity for cold weather indoor.
12/3/2019: Got up at 7:00. Invasion of the ants in the family room, the now have 3 different access points-one at the back of the long sofa, on near the sliding door, and one at the junction of wood floor and fireplace brick flat. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Received Christmas lights (one 100 mini regular and two 50 LED ones) from Amazon at 2:04.
12/4/2019: Got up at 7:00. Both Molly and Milly were on the make-shift bed under the bench waiting for the breakfast-nice! Molly moved away to under the Wisteria tree next to the large bucket for warmth and shelter, maybe I could make it better when she's not around. Added another carboard to the bottom of the bench to increase the resting area for Milly, added bottom, side and top for Molly beneath Wisteria tree, hope she'll use it when it rains again. Played 40 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 20 minutes with Kung. Found out how to change photo date/time on Picasa: Tools->"Adjust Date and Time...
12/5/2019: Got up at 7:08. Visited Costco with Anita, purchased one bunch bananas, one case Stella beer, and two dozen organic eggs. Swing by Marina Grocery and got one pack bacon, one pack fried fish cake, 4 bags spicy peanuts, 3 packs beef tendon, 2 red onion, one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one pack (x6) preserved eggs (皮蛋), one Taiwan cabbage, one pack Wasabi flavored peas, and 2 packs thick bean curd. Played 28 minutes table tennis with Stephanie, she and Alan plan to go to San Diego 24-26.
12/6/2019: Got up at 7:10. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street. Fixed the leaky steel water bucket, removed the withering rose next to the down spout near the chimney. No table tennis today as Stephanie appeared to be busy. Milly seemed adapted to the sleeping quarter under the bench but Molly did not show any interest to the newly renovated bed at all.
12/7/2019: Got up at 6:30. Hiking day, I decided to go hiking as the rain had subsided. It rained throughout the hike, fortunately I returned home and picked up an umbrella soon after leaving as it started to rain. There were 4 people in the group: Ching, Ming, the other Ming, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one bottle 1.5L Sho Chiku Bai sake, one pack Salmon fillet, one Yakisoba set, one pack Sashimi Moriawase 4A, and one Rainbow Poki Bowl.
12/8/2019: Got up at 7:31. Dug up one withering rose (next to Mr. Lincoln) and moved it to a different location per Anita's instruction.
12/9/2019: Got up at 7:15. Visited Costco with Anita and got one jar soy sauce, one bag cocktail cucumber, one pack (x4) Artisan lettuce, one pack pineapple sausage, one box (x6) stuffed chicken breast, and one pack (x12) Artisan Roll. Played 25 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie simply did not show up for obvious reason. Had 10 minutes MB with RM and legs, EJ, should stop doing this. Called Mom at 6:00 for 33 minutes. Placed order for a TN225M for Brother HL-3140CW for $17.75.
12/10/2019: Got up at 7:05. Pondered on transforming the old patio umbrella frame into a better rain shield, current design is based on two wall edger lining up on two sides of the frame top then cover it with tarp.
played 40 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie's resting to heal her injured waist.
12/11/2019: Got up at 7:00. Blew and collected Cherry tree leaves, piled them in the Passion Fruit tree planter box. As Teresa's conducting a meeting at 1:00pm, Kung and I played 30 minutes table tennis at 11:00. The TN-225M toner cartridge from Amazon was delivered at 6:51am this morning but I only saw it after I came back. Repositioned and secured the old patio umbrella frame with painted tarp, should be OK for a while. Finished processing Copper Canyon trip photos, started uploading to Google Photo.
12/12/2019: Got up at 7:00. The uploading's going, only 250 out of 481 uploaded and it seemed to have stopped, will have to restart this later when I am certain it did stop for some reason. Stopped by CCC to get 2020 calendar, got three (two normal and one from Tina), chatted with JP for nearly 40 minutes before swinging by Marina Grocery, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one bottle 750ml Er Guo Tou liquor, one bottle Hazelnut powder creamer, one pack frozen clam, one pack (x2) Escolar steak, two pack beef shank, one pack Gailan, one bunch banana, and one pack (x3) Romaine lettuce. Played 30 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ.
12/13/2019: Got up at 7:10. Used the electric blower, collected backyard leaves (both Cherry and Wisteria) and piled them on the planter box under the fake Cherry tree, also blew the Oak leaves in the front yard and left most of them on the lawn, kept the driveway clean so that vehicle wheels wouldn't bring leaves into the garage. No table tennis today as Stephanie's sick with head ache. Install a magnetic lock to the deck door.
Ordered a Sunbeam twin heated mattress pad for Mom-$39 including tax, delivery date is Sunday.
12/14/2019: Got up at 6:35. Hiking day, got there at 8:05 but waited until 8:15 before going alone, reached the summit at 8:55, others arrived at 9:05 (the usually time), there were 8 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Ming, the other Ming, Wayne, Alex, and myself. Stopped by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Yakisoba set, one SP Bara Chirashi, and one Salmon Shiroyaki bento. Anita booked 10 Day Classic Baltics-continuing our Paris trip next year. Received 2x50 LED Christmas tree lights from Amazon at 6:27pm.
12/15/2019: Got up at 7:10. Swing by ValleyFair and purchased some jewelry for the trip back to Taiwan-may not enough though. Received my Eddie Bauer vest and Sunbeam twin heated mattress pad from Amazon at 12:55.
12/16/2019: Got up at 7:10. Swing by Costco with Anita, got one Cranberry Walnut Bread, two dozen organic egg, two pack (x12 each) Corn kernel can, and one mixed seafood pack (for Christmas dinner). Played 30 minutes table tennis with Kung, Stephanie had to have her eye examined for redness.
12/17/2019: Got up at 7:32. Played 45 minutes table tennis, 20 minutes with Stephanie, 25 minutes with Kung. Had 10 minutes MB with legs, EJ-a little painful.
12/18/2019: Got up at 7:22. Visited ValleyFair again to return and exchange some jewelry, also purchased a couple of battery operated Christmas lights. Left at 7:29 to fill up RX300 at Costco, got to an unoccupied (they now have display showing which pump is free) pump and got home at 7:47.
12/19/2019: Got up at 7:12. Stopped by Marina Grocery and purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, one bottle 750ml Er Guo Tou, two bags spicy peanut, two pack (8 each) thick bean curd, one bunch bananas, two tomatoes, 2 pack (2 pieces each) Escolar steak, one pack dried mushroom, one pack Taiwanese sweet sausage, one bag cheddar cheese, one bunch Cilantro, and one string garlic.
Swing by CCC to give PJ NCL cruise app info, met deputy director, she handed over one bag tea bags (virtually everyone got one) for her leaving ending her post at CCC and going back to Taiwan. Went to Dynamicfoundation for table tennis but Stephanie texted me before I left the house but did not check, she had to handle last minute notary request from Teresa and could not make it. Filled 10 gallon Octane 91 for LS400 before returning home. Tried MB with legs, no EJ.
12/20/2019: Got up at 7:16. Stopped by Costco and picked up one pack (x2) mashed potatoes and one pack Premium Seafood Medley. Cleaned up leftover garden waste in the street, started sweating 2/3 into the task. Had 15 minutes MB with RM, EJ.
12/21/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason's back and it is his turn to drive but in order to have a safe journey I volunteer to drive. There were 8 people in the group: Ahmei, Yung, Jerry, Wayne, Ching, Ming, Jason, and myself. Swing by Marukai and purchased one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Shrimp Tempura roll half, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, and one Bara Chirashi. Received my Gillette Mach 3 Turbo razor and Mom's Olay face washing form (3 pack) from Amazon at 2:27. Stopped by CVS on Berryessa road, got 7 bottles 750ml Barefoot Riesling, and two bottles 1.5L Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon-all done in less than 20 minutes.
12/22/2019: Got up at 7:17. Received Fire 7 from Amazon-delivered by USPS at 11:09. Separated the egg steamer into 3 different parts for packing. Visited Costco with Anita after dinner, got one box European cookies and one tub Greek plain yogurt-forgot to wear my contact lens, drove extremely slow and carefully. Purchased "Star War: The Rise of Skywalker" movie tickets ($8 x 2 + $3.40 processing fee) from Fandango, they are for Santana Row Friday.
12/23/2019: Got up at 8:00. Purchased "Cats" movie tickets ($8 x 2 + $3.40 processing fee) from Fandango, they are for GreatMall Wednesday - Santana Row ended the show on Tuesday.
Played nearly one hour and 20 minutes with Kung and two other ladies from the Chinese Calligraphy class, the younger one (~50) plays well, many trick serves, the older one (~60) isn't bad either, I was exhausted by the end of the play. Had 15 minutes MB with legs, EJ.
12/24/2019: Got up at 7:08. Started preparing Christmas Eve dinner ingredients at 9:15. Played Christmas carols all day on TV from Youtube. Dinner lists:
These dishes were not pretty but tasty though.
12/25/2019: Got up at 7:08. Watched "Cats" at GreatMall.
12/26/2019: Got up at 7:40. Stopped by Marina Grocery with Anita, purchased one bottle 750ml Taiwan rice wine, two packs spicy peanuts, one bag Wasabi flavored peas, one bag small Gai Choy, one pack (x3) Romaine lettuce, two packs thick bean curd, one head Cauliflower, and one can pork sung, spent $8 coupon plus one dollar and got two fried spring roll, two fried chicken drums, and two fried chicken wings-took about 40 minutes.
12/27/2019: Got up at 7:08. 11:45 am "Star War: The Rise of Skywalker", we got there around 10:20, walked to Macys to kill some time before returning to the theatre at 11:20-purchased another string mini globe lights at Macys, this the third and at ~$7.69, the least expensive one. Finished reading "In the Dark", a pretty nice suspense/thriller. Signed up on Google Fi network, transfer current number, to be billed on ~8110 at the end of each month ($20-$80 depending on the amount of data used), Google Fi card should be here between 12/31/2019 and 1/2/2020.
12/28/2019: Got up at 6:50. Hiking day, Jason to drive. There were 6 people in the group: Jason and myself started at 8:15, Wayne caught up around 8:50, Jerry and Alex met us at the top at 9:02, Ching was late but met us at Peet's after he finished the hike. Got one 巨峯grape branch for reproducing from Ching. Stopped by Marukai and got one Rainbow Poki Bowl, one Salmon Shioyaki bento, one Spicy Tuna Roll, and one Yakisoba set. Planted the 巨峯 grape branch in the planter box under the fake Cherry tree, trimmed off grape vines over 3 ft tall of the grapes I planted 2 years ago, will give them one more chance to produce grapes, otherwise out they go.
12/29/2019: Got up at 7:44. Visited Target on Coleman and got 4 bottle 64oz Hazelnut creamer, one pack (x4) Oui yogurt, 3 bag Parmesan cheese, two jar Caesar creamy dressing, and one bunch bananas. Since Marshall would not open until 11:00 (it was 10:24), we killed some time in Michaels and Cost Plus World Market but still had 10 minutes left, went back to Target and walked 13 minutes before entering Marshall, got one pair Zara leather glove ($7.99-for myself), one pair ear rings ($14.99) for Anita and one mid size and one carry-on luggages ($69 and $59 each). Received Meow Mix from Amazon at 12:24.
12/30/2019: Got up at 7:21. Careless got cold again while in the bathroom for morning routine, thought it was warm enough while the central heating was on and I took off my outer jacket-stupid. Played 40 minutes table tennis, all with different people: Kung, Stephanie, and two other from the Chinese Calligraphy class). My cold did not get any better after playing.
12/31/2019: Got up at 7:17. Last day of 2019, nice weather. Played 35 minutes table tennis with Stephanie. Decided to take Dell backpack wit me instead the lighter one (Sierra). Called Chiming and invited them to our house for a Majong game and dinner tomorrow.
