A collection of personal thoughts, opinions, and viewpoints. Because when we rise up for the truth and stand compassionately with our values, we truly can change the world.
I know we’re all tired of hearing about COVID-19, so let’s pivot away from that and focus on a topic that is much nicer to think about. I’ve decided to expand the scope of this blog a bit to cover some of my other hobbies and passions, which include good […]
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I recently identified a rather unfortunate bug that left part of my weather station’s QA/QC algorithm redundant. Fixing it treated the symptom, but not the cause of the problem. Today, we’re going to look at what is causing the temperature sensor on one of my Raspberry Pi’s to seemingly randomly […]
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Have you ever heard the expression “Measure Twice, Cut Once”? It’s commonly used in woodworking and carpentry. It’s a reminder to always double and triple-check your measurements when you cut a piece of wood. You’d be amazed at how many times you screw it up. Well, let me tell you […]
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When I started experimenting with smart home technology and automation last year, I spent way too much time planning around the “smart” part of the smart home technology. Indeed, as a user, my first attempt didn’t gain much benefit. I just had a computer telling me when I turned on […]
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A couple years ago, I built a weather station using a network of Raspberry Pi’s. It obtained data from Weather Underground and the National Weather Service. Last spring, I finally added temperature, humidity, and barometric pressure sensors to the weather station. I have plans to add rain and wind sensors […]
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The mathematics have confirmed that the anti-woodpecker spray system can protect the whole house. It’s time to start building a prototype. Most of the system is just 3/4 inch PVC pipe, so we will focus on the smart-home integration with the prototype. I originally looked at using smart valves to […]
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Well, this is the moment of truth. It’s time to calculate the pressure loss from a leak to see if this crazy idea for deterring woodpeckers will actually work. The idea is that the woodpecker deterrent will connect to my outdoor hose spigots, which hopefully will provide ample water pressure […]
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This fall, our neighborhood has been dealing with an invasion of woodpeckers. While you would think they would stick to pecking on wood, they have been doing incredible amounts of damage to the stucco homes in our neighborhood, including my house. Who knew woodpeckers could peck through stucco so easily? […]
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Well, it’s been quite a busy past few months. My three-country road trip in August and September to get the rest of my stuff from my mom and dad’s house in Massachusetts was the highlight. I’ve been busy since I got back, re-touching and refinishing the furniture I brought out […]
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I recently built a couple of DIY solar radiation shields to house outdoor temperature sensors I have at my house. I built one out of plastic plates and one out of plastic bowls because I was curious to see if one worked better than the other as a solar radiation […]
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Wow, it’s hard to believe that the hardware for taking sensor readings for the DIY weather station is finally all in place. Now, it’s time to dive into the programming and the software end of things that makes everything click. The software for the sensor and the data logger consists […]
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For our DIY Weather Station, we’ve built our sensor housings and run power and internet out to the data logger site. It’s time to install the data logger and hook up our sensors. Thankfully, this is much easier than getting power and internet to the site. First, let’s take a […]
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