It's a rainy day. I stayed inside and put down the three remaining pipes on Tower 1. I also hooked up the relay for shelf 3 to the relay box which I mounted on the wall. Programmed the controller to do a 15 second watering cycle at 2 PM. It did this but we decided it needed more water so I did 15 more seconds at 2:20. The mistake was doing a third watering, this time manually for 5 more seconds. This flooded the bench too much but all the plants are now watered. Libbie said we need an LCD to show what's happening. I agree and started looking into deploying one. Arduino has an LCD library available. This was a successful day. Libbie also talked to a guy named Keith at Family Garden Center about buying the greenhouse steel. I prepared a price list of all the equipment.

Today I mounted the relays into a steel box along with a power supply. I have a single power cord feeding everything - the transformer and a 5 volt power cube. The power cube runs the Arduino and the relay board. It all seems good. Tomorrow I'll mount it all on the wall and wire it up to the solenoids. In the afternoon Libbie and I went to BJ's at crossroads for ribs and cheese then stopped into Home Depot across the street for plumbing pipes and 2x6x8 to finish the roof framing for the new greenhouse. Dinner was ribs, shiraz and butternut squash.

I had trouble getting the relays to work on the card then found that I had the One Wire chip, DS2408, soldered in upside down. After I carefully unsoldered each pin I put it down correctly and fired up the Arduino and was able to run the led strobe program which exercised each relay back and forth. Worked on getting my tower timer program working correctly. At first it seemed like the timer was not working but it really was the while loop handling in Arduino. Another issue was the check alarm. Couldn't get the return working. It turns out that I left out a return statement, I had only set the return value but did not send it back. I had to leave this momentarily because Libbie wanted to go out to dinner at La Cocina. We had the usual Quesadilla and a Margarita. When I came home I worked some more on the timer and had overwhelming success. The thing is ready to be packaged and deployed.

This was a much nicer day. I found the problem with my Arduino uploader. The wrong board was selected in the IDE. I uploaded and finished debugging the time and alarm routines. this can now be used in timing functions. Outdoors I took down the dish from above my workshop then went to the greenhouse and got the smaller extension ladder. This made a big difference. I threaded the new wire for the floodlight, finished cutting the 1.5 inches off the siding and installed the first piece of header. i also cut all the new header blocks. The project is moving along OK. Dinner was crabcakes with Farmers market tomato on a bun.

Worked outside on trimming 1 1/2 inches from the upper siding above the new roof to accommodate a slope. This was hard work. I also decided to relocate floodlight up higher but the satellite pole is in the way. need to remove it. Came inside to work on the tower timer and was bummed out that the thing won't upload anymore. I got online quickly and ordered a new USB FTDI chip. While ordering I also picked up some Xbee sockets and more headers. We had BBQ sandwiches for dinner before we had to go out to the Carolina Ballet rehearsal. The rehearsal was great. We had free wine (3 glasses ), imported chocolates and a very nice performance. We left at 10:30 but it probably was still going to continue. A nice evening.

Worked on the RTC alarm function this morning before going to Home Depot for framing wood for the Downing greenhouse roof. Came back and got ready for TAVS at 12:30. Sheila came early at 12:00. The meeting was nice and was basically planning for next year. After the meeting I spent hours worth of time figuring out how to write the DS2408 PIO. I think I have it figured out. I'm expecting the Hobby Board relay board on Thursday. Dinner was the Eggplant Parmesan again.

Joe left this morning for TN. He was going to white water raft in the mountains on his way there. He offered to come back in Nov to help with the greenhouse. I spent some time getting the RTC running. It seems to work OK. I need to find how to get the library functions to read/write the RAM. I also need some DS2408 programming info for the Hobby Board relay board which will be coming. I went to Krogers for Broccoli salad ingredients for violet club tomorrow. Made the salad and refrigerated it. Libbie made eggplant Parmesan which we had for dinner. I took down the strip of siding on the back of the house where the lean to greenhouse will attach. This went well.

Didn't watch the Sunday morning shows. They were doing 9/11 junk which I wasn't too interested in. Started looking at how I was going to assemble the RTC, Xbee, moisture sensing and relays. Went outside to put away the myrtle and rose of Sharon I cut down. Libbie and Joe went to the greenhouse, Joe returned with the Jade and put it on the backporch. He volunteered to remove the two stumps from the bushes which was great. In the meantime I was putting away bricks and got stung by yellow jackets next to the shed. Painful!!!! Joe had a Panthers pizza party at 4. Cole and Emily, Josh and Kelly with their two kids and us. The pizza was great. I had 2 Yuenglings and a glass of wine. Too much alcohol. In the meantime I cut a proto board and glued two RJ45's on it upside down. Will mount connectors for the RTC and Xbee.

Finished up the water on Tower 1 then went outside to cut down the shrubs for the new greenhouse. While doing this Joe arrived with Libbie. He went to the greenhouse first from his TN trip. We got cleaned up and went to the Farmers Market restaurant for lunch. I had BBQ chicken with field peas and sweet potato fries. I did not care for the peas. We had tuna sandwiches for dinner because we were full from lunch. Joe went to Josh's for dinner with the gang.

Moved Tower 1 away from the wall and installed the manifold. This went pretty well. In the afternoon Libbie and I went to Logans for lunch then drove over to Hancock fabrics. while she shopped fabric I did Trader Joes in front of the place and got wine and supplies. Dinner was chicken Serenada with TJ's Organic brown rice. I bought this as a trial. We like brown rice but it takes a while to cook. The Trader Joe's stuff is frozen in microwave packets. It wasn't too bad.

Went to Home Depot and bought the rest of the fittings and solenoids to finish up the tower irrigation project. Built a manifold for Tower 1 but did not install it. Tower 2 is totally finished. I started doing some programming for the relay timer for the towers. Ordered a pair of plain Jane Arduinos from Sparkfun to get this going further. I really need the hobby Boards relay board. The UPS guy left 2 packages under our mailbox. My Nook color and the Ben Meadows squeeze bottles were left out there. Libbie brought them in. I like the clarity of the Nook color. It came with a charge on the battery although the warnings say to make sure it has a full charge before using. Dinner was Briyani. I'm still waiting for a 4 GB SDHC card so that I could root the Nook and install Android on the thing. It's pretty acceptable right now as is.

Finished up the manifold and also the plumbing to Tower 2. Put a cap in line where it will extend to Tower 1. I used the darkroom timer and did an experiment where I watered the bench for 2 cycles, each of 15 seconds. My future test will be a 10 second cycle. Eventually I will monitor shelf moisture but the goal right now is vacation at the end of the month. Dinner was Pad Thai from Whole Foods enhanced with chicken ala Libbie.

Worked on finishing the lighting on Tower 2. Picked up a box of tubes from Lowes and outfitted the fixtures. Finished wiring the 4 gang outlet and tested the Tower. One of the tubes has a problem, it won't light. I also bought a washing machine hose set to connect the towers to the water supply. Libbie cut some matte material for 2 shelves. Tomorrow i will finish the supply plumbing and will do some fill trials. Dinner was spinach filled tortellini.

This was a 2 different Lowes day. In the morning I went to Lowes N Cary to get light fixtures. I need 4, they only had 2. Picked up some plumbing parts to work on the Tower Irrigation. In the afternoon Libbie went with me to Lowes at Crossroads where we got the two remaining light fixtures. We also stopped at Walmart in Apex to get containers for flour and rice in the cabinets. Finished up the remaining 2 lights. Tower 2 is completed with the exception of purchasing light tubes and building the power cord. I studied the needs of the controller for the tower and decided that in order to get 8 moisture sensors on a controller I need to build a custom PCB with relay switching of the sensors. This same controller will operate solenoid relays via a one wire interface to a Hobby Boards relay board. The dilemma is what to do for communications. I want to use a wireless Xbee but am unsure if i can get this working before we leave for Florida Sept 28. If I use RS485 for communication I will need to run wires. The Xbee however requires a 3 volt interface. Dinner was pork chops, sweet potato and apple sauce. We had a bottle of shiraz with dinner. The end of Labor day and the end of summer.

After the usual sunday morning programs I started working on the lights for the second tower. This is a big job. I started with the hardest first which is the bottom shelf. Finished up the two shelves (four light fixtures). Now I need to get more lights from Lowes. I'll try Lowes North Cary tomorrow. Libbie made her wonderful pizza again which we had with leftover wine. I resumed reading "Exposed" which is a local story aboud sexting. I don't like stories where bad things happen.

Finished up the last shelf this morning then vacuumed everything. Libbie came home and painted the light shelf while I worked on the water plumbing. Drilled a hole in the door frame for the water pipe and glued together the beginning of a Hoson siphon station in the line. Late in the afternoon we made a Lowes trip to return some 1x2 lumber and then bought 4 light fixtures. This was half of what we need but all they had. Dinner was leftover eggplant Parmesan with Shiraz. We even sat on the back porch and talked about the phasing down of the greenhouse while we drank from a second bottle of wine. Not a good idea but we were happy.

Started moving the plant shelves upstairs and constructing Tower 2. Eventually all the shelves were moved up and placed onto the tower and bolted in place. The fifth shelf is on but not bolted yet. I got cleaned up and we went to First Friday downtown. Surprisingly the beltline was bumper to bumper at 25 MPH because of beach traffic before Labor Day weekend. Walked around Artspace with a glass of wine. We talked to Pari Alexanders wife and also watercolor artist Nancy Taylor about her flowers. Libbie went into a rummage/jewelry sale in one of the galleries whie I went into Judy Cranes gallery and talked to her about her beautiful landscapes. On the way out we listened to a very nice band playing out in the City Market area before walking down the street to Caffe Luna. Our waitress screwed up our order and forgot to put it in. To make up she served some more wine on the house which was nice. When the bill came it was wrong since it showed 3 entrees. Not a good night for her but were in no hurry and it all worked well.

Spent a lot of time today working on the USB Host chip trying to understand how it works. Dinner tonight was Eggplant Parmesan. I ran to Krogers late in the afternoon for Parmesan cheese and bananas.

Started out with a Home Depot trip for a light and telephone jack for the closet. Started installing the switch for the light but had to leave for lunch with Libbie and the greenhouse gang. Ate too much of the BBQ chicken which was delicious. After lunch we walked the Farmers Market and picked up some veggies. Dinner was beets, potato and leftover biscuits, chicken and hush puppies from lunch. I worked some more on the light but didn't finish it up. Need to add a switch and then dress out the wires. Will tackle the telephone jack next. Drafted a letter for the board and the EC regarding the website. The tone is not nice so I'll sit on it for a day or two.

After the grocery run I worked out in the yard with the chain saw. Moved half of the log from the front yard that fell this Spring. Also cut up some logs in the back that fell but did not move them yet. Had some success talking to the new Conexant modem with Arduino. Still have not tried sending and receiving command strings. That's the next big step. Came in tired and slept for an hour. dinner was BBQ on a bun with sherbet for desert. Spent some time online figuring out how to pay the 3300 Visa bill. This included plane tickets to RI and Dallas for $1,000.

Had a few home depot trips about water faucets for the plant room and a UV tube for the outdoor fish pond. Installed the new tube and also did some cleanup of the flower bed. I want a bigger flower garden next year. We had a nasty thunderstorm late in the afternoon. Power blinked once and I think the fish pump turned itself off. Activated the remote control to keep it running. We'll see if the new UV tube clears the water by next week. Dinner was pasta in tomato sauce.

Libbie raked the driveway of all the debris. I took the cart and picked up all the pinestraw using it to mulch the large dogwood in the backyard. I also used the cart to pick up several loads of twigs around the yard. Came in and took a quick shower and then we were off to our first RLT performance of the season, Ruthless. I didn't care for it. The singing was awful, the acting pretty good. Libbie made her wonderful pizza again. We heard from Bill that all the power in Portsmouth was out. Also heard from Mary that they had no power in Waterville.

Watched the approach of the hurricane on TV. It made landfall at Cape Lookout at 7:45. We had light rain all day and breezy winds but according to local weather stations, nothing above 20 MPH. By late afternoon everything had calmed down. I used the time to install a temperature sensor in the Plant Room and I also got the Pachube feed update working in Arduino with my own code in a simple function instead of the library which I had trouble getting to run. We chose to stay inside because of the nasty weather and thawed some ribs from the freezer which we had with brown rice, broccoli and a bottle of Shiraz.

Supposed to be a hurricane this weekend, beginning this evening with rain. Started outside putting down resin on the plant trays. Tried to use up some stuff I had in a one quart can. This can was bad, congealed and came out lumpy. I discarded it, losing the brush in the process. Started over with the AgriSuply resin which ran out before I could finish. Made a quick trip to AgriSupply and picked up another can. Finished the job by 1:40 then took a shower and studied USB programming the rest of the afternoon. It started to thunder around 5 so I quickly brought the trays into the garage. The storm started with a pretty heavy downpour. Received some shocking news from Arlene that my cousin Tom Kawejsza died of a heart attack yesterday. I went to Trader joes and it was extremely crowded. The cashier said it was all hurricane evacuees coming inland and buying party food. Dinner was scallops in cream sauce over brown rice. Yummy. We also had a bottle of Santa Barbara Chardonnay which was an impulse purchase while waiting in the long checkout lines at Trader joes. The hurricane eye should hit NC tomorrow morning around 7:30 on the Outer Banks.

I set up 3 of the shelves out in the yard this morning for fiberglass. I had to install the 1x2 rail around the top of each of them then staple down the fiberglass tape around the edges. I chose not to do the resin today but instead did some reading about the USB host shield which I don't understand at all. This will be an adventure. This evening we left at 5:45 for a 6:10 movie in Apex, "The Help". It was excellent. This was one of the best movies I have seen in many years. The movie didn't get out until 8:50. We had a very late dinner at the Longhorn Steakhouse. We chose the 2 dinners for $29 which included salads and an appetizer. We had chilled shrimp, Salmon with baked potato and a glass of Woodbridge Cabernet. When I came home Janet Castiglione had called and left a message that she needed a new picture for the cover of the DVD. I called her back and chatted about the Movie then listened to what she needed. Went upstairs to the desktop computer and changed the background on picture 1 so that she would have a collage with a compatible color to the rest of her artwork.