29 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Work and prepare for storm today.

  • 05:30 up, started coffee and checked my E-Mail
  • 08:00 Built a Raspberry Pi4 with 4 Gig of memory.
  • 11:30 Leisure day at work, went for a short walk.
  • 12:00 Discussed the weather with the team.
  • 13:00 Worked with someone sending Dominican coffee overseas.
  • 13:30 Took a much needed nap.
  • 15:30 Read through the news, updated DH Gate and put in a new Insta Cart.
  • 16:00 Writing in my blog.
  • 19:30 Church tonight.

Narrative:

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Work at 06:00, Insta Cart at 09:00, Walk at 11:00

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

28 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Work, take a walk around the block and work on the homestead.

  • 06:00 Got up, made coffee and checked in with work.
  • 09:30 Checked my video mouse trap, nothing at the peanut butter.
  • 12:00 Had a fun day at work, mowed the neighbors yard.
  • 13:30 Took a much needed nap.
  • 15:00 Hooked both 48V battery banks together and ran the UPS until 12V/Battery
  • 17:00 Set power supplies to charge batteries and went in for dinner.
  • 18:30 played a game of scrabble and prepared for bed.

Narrative: I have two 1500W UPS units that run on a 48 Volt battery. I’ve found it difficult to match four 12V batteries in a string. One string of four batteries have two batteries that have a little less capacity that the other two. (So the two strong ones push the weak ones into deep discharge.) I bought a battery management device that matches the four batteries as they are charged. What it cannot do is match them when they are pushing 15 amps into the UPS. The plan is to find a pair of batteries in the seven 24V banks on the other UPS. Otherwise I’ll have to buy 4 new batteries with no guarantee they will discharge as a team.

2 x 48V 35AH Battery Banks

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Groceries and then prepare for storms.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

27 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Work, put away groceries, take a walk and work on the homestead.

  • 06:00 Check in with work
  • 09:00 PTO
  • 09:30 put away groceries
  • 10:00 Return to work
  • 11:00 Take a walk
  • 12:00 Had salmon cakes for lunch.
  • 13:00 Set a video mouse trap.
  • 14:00 Took a nap.
  • 15:30 Writing in my blog
  • 16:30 Patched the roof.
  • 17:00 Watched the Governor’s speech.
  • 18:00 Mousetrap Test passed, re-centered camera.
  • 18:30 Ordered fan motor for fridge.
  • 19:00 Hung some pictures up for the wife.
  • 20:30 Bought Hue Hub and a few bulbs. (The bulbs I have flounder)

Narrative: Had a busy day. Went to a friends house and setup a camera on the floor with a spoon of peanut butter on a paper plate in front of it. I set the camera to send me and E-Mail with 5 pictures 2 before, 2 after the movement.

A spoon of peanut butter and a camera
Infrared night camera view

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Tuesday, 4 more days till I retire.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

26 April 2020, a day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Eat breakfast, Attend church, work on my list.

  1. Get up and sip on a cup of coffee
  2. Gett’n ready for church at 10, had eggs and green peppers for breakfast.
  3. Generators 4 and 2 both have gasoline in them, will try to run them dry today.
    • I put a fan on the generator to provide a cool down from full load since I do not know when the generator will run out of gas.
  4. Had a chicken salad sandwich for lunch, pretty good.
  5. Took a picture of the neighbors lawn before the weed+feed takes ahold of the lawn.
  6. Mowed our front lawn, our neighbor did theirs and mine looked pretty high.
  7. Gen 4 ran out of fuel, I’m switching over to non Ethanal gas for them.
  8. installed UPS neighbor’s house
  9. Checked cameras before retiring for bed.

Narrative for something cool I did today:

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Back to work, not going to be a good day.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

25 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies. Day one for Georgia businesses being open, virus number still climbing. (53 people in perished in ~2 days.)

Plans: Work on my task list above, it’s a beautiful day outside.

  • 06:00 Up early for a Saturday, sipp’n coffee and checking out work E-Mail
  • 07:00 Work is crazy, logged into DOD and getting acquainted.
  • 08:00 Setup WiFi outlets and walked next door with a couple desk lamps.
  • 09:00 Dusted the neighbor’s lawn with fertilizer while it was still wet.
  • 10:00 Cranked up a generator and played with the solar panel and generator/
  • 11:30 Took a nap
  • 13:30 Up from my Nap writing in my blog, not much of an excuse for Saturdays.
  • 14:30 Still writing…. LOL
  • 15:30 Dealt with the Bees and the gas line hole is plugged with Great Stuff!
  • 16:30 Dinner, Fish
  • 17:00 Repairing the driveway remote controlled light.
  • 18:00 putting power pole connectors on inline fuses.
  • 19:00 Watching TV with the wife.
  • 20:30 Checking on neighbors lights I put in today.

Narrative: Nothing dramatic today, it was a beautiful day to work outside when I can.

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Sunday services at 10AM.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

24 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Work, take a walk and work on the homestead.

  • 06:00 Wake with the alarm, sip on a cup of coffee and check in with work.
  • 09:00 Walked around the block.
  • 11:00 Signed out of work.
  • 12:00 Started generator #1 and let it run for 40 minutes.
  • 14:00 Took a nap
  • 16:00 Ordered Door Dash, Chilis.
  • 17:00 Writing in Blog.

Narrative: 06:00 is tough on a Friday, only one more to go!

The sun came out today before we took our walk around the block, very enjoyable!

The roof patch kit is here and so is the Great Stuff can. (I want to wait until both surfaces are dry before trying to patch them.)

Mom got the 48V Inverter to run her refrigerator off of her golf cart today. We still need a cable to her battery plug.

Started Generator #1 of five and pulled the plug on one of the 48V UPS units. I ran it more than 40 minutes using the generator to charge the batteries. The UPS complained that it had run out of run time, but the battery voltage was still over 49 volts.

We splurged and ordered Chilis tonight.

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Saturday, A Day Off!

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

23 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies.

Plans: Work in the morning and weather the storms.

https://www.lightningmaps.org/?lang=en#m=oss;r=0;t=3;s=201;o=0;b=0.00;n=0;y=31.7725;x=-88.83;z=8;d=2;dl=2;dc=0;ra=1;ts=1;tr=1;

  • 07:00 Woke up late, checked in with the team and grabbed a cup of coffee.
  • 12:00 Storms were a bust, no much of anything.
  • 13:00 Took a nap
  • 15:00 checked the mail, neighbors mail and their cameras.
  • 16:00 had a salad and black beans for dinner
  • 18:00 played a game of scrabble with the wife.

Narrative: The Inverter for Nancy’s golf cart will be there on Monday, but the cable is three more weeks. I could make a cable but then someone would have to install it.

The Pi-Aware receiver is holding on, I may wait to change it out since it got a little warmer in the plastic box. (Versus the metal one.) It was within 10 degrees of throttling last summer during the heat of the day.

I looked at portable freezers while I tested my Raspberry Pi and i still like the one we bought. It has been a little on the high side of temperature -2 to -8, but way cold enough to keep the contents frozen. It is quiet as a mouse and doesn’t draw much power.

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Friday, get up early, take a walk and watch a movie.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

22 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of supplies and food.

Plans: Work at 06:00 and receive our grocery order after 10AM.

  • 01:00 Bought a 48V Inverter and cable for my mother.
  • 05:50 Started a pot of coffee, made oatmeal for breakfast and started work.
  • 09:00 Worked our shopping cart and plucked our groceries from the porch.
  • 10:00 Returned to work
  • 11:00 Signed out of work and vacuumed the floors.
  • 12:15 Called my mom told her that the inverter for her fridge will be Monday.
  • 13:00 Took a hard nap.
  • 14:30 Read the news, in depth about strangeness of the virus.
  • 15:00 Wrote in this blog.
  • 16:00 Mowed the side yard before it rains tomorrow.

Narrative: Bought a 48V Inverter and cable to connect to Nancy’s golf cart today. That should be able to run her refrigerator for a couple days.

What I don’t know is if the 12AWG wire will be too small for the startup current needed. The wire is 10Ft long which will allow the Inverter to be inside. Will have to try it. She may have to cut the wire down to 3 feet and put a bucket over the inverter.

Got up at 5:50 and clicked on the coffee, then checked in the with team at work.

InstaCart again delivered a box of groceries with 12 rolls of toilet paper this time. The website would not allow us to add toilet paper to our order. However, we asked the shopper if she would check the shelves which indeed had TP. She was able to add the TP to our order. (I had planned a trip to the store because we generally had access to TP with a 1 per customer limitation when shopping in person.)

It is funny how good we feel when we successfully purchase a package of toilet paper. I was feeling uneasy when we were getting down to where we had to open the only remaining package. Some weeks ago we were looking at four rolls left on the dryer where we “Store” them. There are immediate supplies of about three rolls under the sinks in both bathrooms.

I’ve been watching the number of cases in Georgia for weeks. To me, we’re not testing enough of our population to have a grasp on how many of us are infected day to day. Even if a business tested every person before they opened, any person in that business could get the virus from their community immediately after they were tested. Two weeks down the road they are contagious and everyone near them is vulnerable. Even though the infected person may show no symptoms. I’ve thought about this for over a while, even testing them as they arrive to work with a thermometer doesn’t clear them from giving the virus to their teammates or the customers who visit the establishment. Yuk!

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Severe Storms

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

21 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering in place, we have plenty of food and supplies. We’re down to 12 rolls of toilet paper, three weeks ish. (No TP has been at Kroger on InstaCart for two weeks.) We did see TP in Kroger when we shopped in person almost every Monday, but no TP using InstaCart.

Plans: Work for 4 hours in the morning and mow the lawns in the afternoon before it rains tomorrow.

  • 06:00 Work for four hours
  • 09:00 One hour break, walked around the block with the Wife.
  • 10:00 Work one more hour
  • 11:00 Eat lunch and start mowing with my battery powered mower.
  • 13:00 Time for a Nap
  • 15:00 Working on my Flight Aware receiver attached to the chimney.
  • 16:30 Dinner pasta and a salad.
  • 19:00 Watched a movie with the sweetie.

Narrative: Up a little early, having for brown eggs, a glass of juice and Dominican coffee. Pi-Aware UAT receiver is still down this morning. I won’t have much time to work on it today.

Work was easy and walking around the block in super nice weather was a treat. Grass was dry so mowing the lawns was an easy task today. Dinner was surprisingly good tonight, the grape tomatoes were a little difficult to eat without getting squirted. We watched Citizen Kane, it was a slow movie that was highly rated. (Will have to watch it earlier in the day when my brain cells are working.

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Work at 6AM, seven days to go.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To

20 April 2020, A day in Progress

Status: Sheltering In Place, we have plenty of food and supplies with out portable fridge to help out. I have submitted my resignation for 1 May 2020.

Plans: We have scheduled a InstaCart for this morning at 09:00.

  • Check in at Work 06:00
  • Watching our shopper get our groceries at Kroger 08:00
  • Putting away our Groceries 09:00
  • Groceries done, back to work 10:00
  • Work done, time to work on the Cameras. 11:00
  • Cameras running, PiAware is stumbling.
  • Unable to fix PiAware and i’m bushed. 14:00
  • Took a shower and sipp’n on a margarita
  • Had a large salad and White Chicken Chili 17:00

Narrative: Rose to my alarm clock at 06:00, nine more days of that before I retire again. Logged onto work E-Mail and exchanged E-Mail most of the morning. Our InstaCart showed up around 9:30.

My Flight Aware receiver is floundering, I may not be able to repair it until next weekend. (I don’t know if it is the Pi, Software or the receiver at this point.)

Worked on my neighbors cameras for a good part of last evening and this afternoon. I have a good view of the inside and the back yard. I use a “WGA600N Gaming Adapter” that was originally designed to bridge the gap between a “Wired” Internet gaming console and a wireless router in the home. It connects to the wireless in my house to extend our network into remote buildings to support the cameras in them.

Obsolete Gaming adapter.

Almost any “Travel Router” has the ability to bridge wireless to an Ethernet connection and they are MUCH smaller. (A mango is less then 3×3″ about the fourth the size of this gaming adapter.)

Feelings:

Tomorrow: Back to work in the morning and mow the lawns in the afternoon.

Injuries: Arguments: Exercise: Feeling words: Travel: Noteworthy: Accmplishments: Purchases: Project: Theme: Engineering: Repairs: Pi News:

From the book “Triggers” by Marshall Goldsmith
Did I DMBT make my wife feel loved? Yes
Did I DMBT help my wife today? Yes
Did I DMBT be happy? Yes
*Did My Best To