iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 15/08/2026

huh, one of these things doesn't seem like the others:

Legend for a map with "Amtrak Cascades Train" , "Seattle-Los Angles Train", "Bus" and... "Canada"

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 09/08/2026

For the first time in my life, having a shandy. I think I like it...

A image of a can of deschutes brewery anytime lemonade shandy.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 25/07/2026

Decision chart for mowing the path on my property: Is it a tree, or a fern, or other nice plant? -> go around Is it grass or scottish broom or weeds? -> go through Is it blackberry? -> detour to mow it even if it's not in the direct path Its gonna be a […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

Blackberry thicket with lots and lots of proto berries and some flowers still.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 19/07/2026

And so it begins... (Smoking a roast again, this time starting much eariler so hopefully it's all fall aparty by dinner time). Using a CQ60 Chef iQ BLE temp probe with #homeassistant

A home assistant sensor page showing ambient temp of 235.9F and a Food termp of 57.7F

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 17/07/2026

My outdoor pm2.5 sensor spiked last night. But there wasn't any smoke or anything here, so what was happening? I went and looked and... a spider decided to setup shop and was probibly blocking the sensor. ;) #homeassistant

A home assistant history graph showing a pm2.5 sensor almost reading 400 Ug/m^3

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 07/06/2026

When the grass and ferns are high, take the log road... #caturday

A semi-feral tabby cat walking on a log, surrounded by tall ferns and grass.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 03/06/2026

Got my may electric bill... Just the connection fee, and more than 1000 Kwh exported over my usage. So, thanks to 1 to 1 net metering, thats 1000 Kwh in the 'bank' for winter. :) Also today was really cloudy all day, but still enough solar to run the house […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

A grid energy balance meter from home assistant for the month of may.
333.45 kWh used, 1380.63 kWh generated by solar and thus 1047.18 kWh net exported.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 01/06/2026

More yard work, more planting things. Waiting for the meat to be done in the smoker. Time for a cider... it's kinda dry.

Home assistant temperature sensor in some meat in a smoker. 176.7 degrees F

a can of portland cider co cider labeled "kinda dry"

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 31/05/2026

Spent the afternoon in the big blue room. Had a helper ( #caturday ). So glad this garden soil I got is for "in ground use" (as opposed to what? in water? sky? ) Got a bunch of weeds pulled up and zuchini and squashes planted.

Tabby cat laying there 'helping' with gardening work.

A bag of all purpose garden soil that says "For in-ground use" on it.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 25/04/2026

The botanical gardens near hilo has some flowers that do not seem real.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 24/04/2026

Volcano. Missed lava fountaining by ~15m. Was still really cool.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 07/04/2026

There were wispy high clouds, so not max production, but yesterdays solar/power graph is kinda pretty! (The bump after dark is the electric clothes dryer running... man those use a lot of power).

A power usage graph, showing grid use until solar ramps up, then mostly exporting to the grid with some small amount of charging the battery. The graph is a pretty smooth bell curve.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 02/04/2026

solar cooking today: (able to export now and it's finally a sunny day).

A home assistant solar card showing solar producing 15.88kw, 3.6kw going to charge the battery, 3.9kw to the house/load and exporting 7.6kw back to the grid.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 02/04/2026

Pretty wacky day for solar here. Rain waves where cloud cover was heavy and some short few periods of sunlight. solar tv is pretty amusing to watch...

A home assistant power graph with solar, grid, battery and consumption. The day starts consuming from the grid, sun comes out and a few times generates enough to charge the battery, but then it goes away and pulls all that back out of the battery.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 22/03/2026

Man, things grow everywhere here in the spring (example: grass growing out of a pine cone).

A green grass shoot growing out of a pine cone.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 15/03/2026

This young swordfern ( Polystichum munitum ) thinks spring has arrived and it's already going...

A new / young swordfern plant looking very green and vibrant, growing fast now that it thinks spring has arrived.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 14/03/2026

Sometimes if you need to prop your leg up, your mom just happens to be handy... #caturday

Two cats in a cat bed. A tortishell curled up sleeping and her tabby son using her as a leg rest.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 09/02/2026

well, my gauntlet machine still mostly works! The monitor has a lot of burn in, the red gun is not doing it's job and it froze up on me a few times, but overall still working. I need to look for the keys. Probibly going to see if I can sell it to someone […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

A picture of a guantlet arcade screen with the wizard being played. A bunch of ghosts and 2 treasure chests in over the wall.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 31/12/2025

Before and After organizing my pump house. Not great, but better! A powerline network over power device, ethernet to a SMLIGHT SLZB. power for it, and a esp32 thats running the ultrasonic distance center in the holding tank to monitor capacity. 2 third […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

A tangle of wires and devices all hanging off a power plug and looking nasty.

Devices moved to a small shelf, power strip and wires somewhat managed.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 29/11/2025

"Mom, can you scoot over? No? ok, I'll make it work" #caturday

A tortoiseshell cat taking up most of a cat bed and her tabby son wedging himself in next to her.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 24/11/2025

Today in not #fedora (I am off all this week): I cleaned out the curtain drain in the back yard. It had so many pine needles in it that plants were growning in it, and I found a big earthworm too. (I rehomed him to the planter). Should work a good deal better for the next wave of rain.

A drain with the covers removed, showing plants growing out of pine needles trapped in the drain.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 26/10/2025

after rebooting my #homeassistant server, pulling the battery out of my WH40 rain gauge and replacing it, resetting it from the web interface, finally went and looked to see why it was connected, but not reporting data... Thanks pine trees.

A WH40 rain gauge showing that some pine needles got into it and are holding the collection bucket down, causing it to not report anything.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 25/10/2025

Was thinking I should test my generator before the outages hit and... today the wind/lightning/thunder/hail/rain storm knocked the power out. Generator working fine. The propane tank monitors that I got are doing great too. (This tank was only 49% full before the outage started).

home assistant card showing a propane tank with 23% capacity left.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 24/10/2025

Not the same. :) The piezo in the WS90 is just reading really really high over the WH40. The WH40 seems much more correct.

Picture of two 'rain rate' readings. One from a Piezo rain reader ( ecowit ws90) and one from a 'real' rain sensor ( ecowit WH40 ). They don't match up at all.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 07/09/2025

@sesivany Interesting... yeah, wind direction here is pretty random as well...

Home assistant history of wind direction sensor, showing it moving around from 0 to 360 degrees.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 07/09/2025

Finally got around to writing up a review of the ecowitt weather gateway/station/sensors I got. Overall it's quite nice and I am happy with it. www.scrye.com/blogs/nirik//posts/20… #HomeAssistant

A home assistant history of a rain rate sensor from a ecowitt weather station. It shows that at about midnight on saturday it rained really really hard for a few minutes.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 23/08/2025

#caturday again? The stealth tortie is only given away by her white feet.

A mostly black appearing tortishell cat laying on top of a cat tree with her little white toes showing.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 17/08/2025

Some good #homeassistant project progress today... I got a bird house pole and mounted my weather station on it. Seems to work just dandy and I can move it around easily enough. Got my ultrasonic sensor setup and working. Using my SMLIGHT SLZB to provide it a […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

A home assistant dashboard showing a water tank level at 1,487.25 gallons, and 99.15% below that. At the bottom is a ultrasonic sensor read out showing 0.29m.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 06/08/2025

Got a ecowitt weather station, set it up in home assistant the other day (look for a more detailed review soon), but amazingly we are having some rare summer rain so I could see that the rain sensor works! About 10 hours of really really light rain and we are up to about 0.65" total. #HomeAssistant

Picture of a home assistant graph for a rain rate sensor. Graph shows the rain started around 1am and is falling usually around 0.06"/hour.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 26/04/2025

well, about 2 months, so time for a gas fill up. (The 3rd fill up I have done in 2025 so far) Sure is nice to mostly use EV miles, and when I do go longer get 40ish mpg. Such a far cry from my old suburban with it's 17mpg.

App screen showing 562 miles range, with 512 miles HV and 50 miles EV.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 06/04/2025

Todays #homeassistant project. Got it all working, had to make a account to add link things, but then was able to set it to use mqtt to homeassistant direct just fine. Will be nice to see water volume when watering as well as being able to be lazy and let it […] [Original post on fosstodon.org]

A box for a linktap 4 zone water value and flow meter unit (with gateway).

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 21/03/2025

A rainy day, so raz thinks it's a great time to cuddle with his mom...

Two cats in a cat bed. One a tourtishell all curled up, and a tabby curled around her looking up at the camera.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 21/02/2025

Also found this little ponderosa pine we planted a few years ago being menaced by the blackberry thicket:

A ponderosa pine sapling with blackberry vines all around it.

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nirik :fedora: :redhat: @nirik.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 21/02/2025

Kicked up the blackberry war today... Worked ok against the thicket I took it to. Managed to clear a path around it at least. Hard work though still.

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