I fired up the ESP again today in the back shop and used the scope to figure out what was wrong. I eventually hooked up just the sensor lines to the ESP on a breadboard. This worked well!!! I decided to build a second prototype by cutting another proto board and then gluing with expoxy the two RJ45s and the power jack. i soldered down the 4 pullup resistors and the two ESP 0 pin headers.
Dinner tonight was the leftover Rotisserie Chicken from the chicken soup yesterday. We had this with baked yams.

The sunset timer works well. It turned the lights on last night and turned them off again at 3:30 this morning. Next I turned my attention to the flakey temperature reporting from the porch and greenhouse. I decided to wire up an ESP chip to do the job but first I tested the WiFi in the back room by planting an ESP chip in the corner transmitting MQTT packets. I was able to receive them all. I struggled with getting a one wire device working on the ESP. Finally i hooked up a little breadboard and discovered the secret was to turn on the internal pullups in the ESP at the setup interval. This did the trick for the breadboard. When I moved the real thing to the shop and hooked it up to the sensor lines these was nothing. I tried a few different programs but nothing. I may have to get out the scope.
For dinner tonight we made Cooking Light's Coconut curry Chicken Soup. This took quite a bit of prep time with cooking noodles, snow peas and spinach then making the broth mixture with onions, spices, chicken broth and coconut milk. Then the two mixtures were combined with red pepper flakes. The end result was well worth it. We had the soup with half a bottle of Shiraz.

I did the Tuesday groceries and picked up the ingredients for Pad Thai. After lunch Libbie and I went to the Asian store on Kildaire Farm Road to get bean sprouts because Kroger doesn't sell them. this store was a find. We also bought some Spring Rolls to try them. Libbie wanted the vegetable ones.

When we got back I worked on the shop ceiling and installed a 4 foot LED strip light. I'm not happy with the job, too many holes in the sheetrock plus I can't get the strip flush so I put shims in place.

We made Shrimp Pad Thai for dinner which we had with a bottle of Shiraz. The meal is definitely a keeper it was so good. Notable was Libbie adding Siracha to her serving to spice it up. Wow, she has come around to the dark side.

I fired up the chain saw and cut up a small tree that fell in the woods in the back and hauled the bigger pieces away. I used the cart to pick up the small stuff. I have a successful version of the sunset python program running. It also has MQTT publish commands built in. The MQTT gets published when the seconds to sunset counts down to zero. I tested it using MQTT-Spy and an MQTT publish was issued at exactly sunset.

Later in the day I took apart a Sonoff and soldered an FTDI header onto it then hooked up the jumper wires to the programming cable. I put an MQTT based program onto it and tested it out. The program is based on one by Superhouse on YouTube. It was a success and issued MQTT packets on demand.

Dinner was the last of the turkey along with a baked Yam and some gravy.

This morning during CBS this morning I worked on the Stauffacher-Ward genealogy from the files Mary and John sent yesterday. Unfortunately I can't read the box file which comes from the Mac Reunion program. Once CBS Sunday morning was done I went upstairs and finished scanning the Mary Condon 1930s book.

Libbie made her excellent pizza once again. The crust came out pretty thing which was surprising.

Libbie cleaned the floors downstairs. i continued to scan photos from the Stauffacher album and also wrote a Python program that works. The program sends an MQTT publish out for the outdoor lights to turn on. This routine will be incorporated into a sunset program so that when sunset arrives the MQTT command will turn on the outdoor lighting. Thanks to MQTT I can also include feedback to determine if the lights received the command.
Dinner tonight was turkey again with stuffing, broccoli and with Chateau St Michelle Sauvignon Blanc. Good stuff. I'm now researching the python sunset calculation program.

I worked on scanning more of the Stauffacher pictures today and also resurrected the genealogy site on the web. I added plenty of headshots to the program in addition to names and dates and a history. I like te TNG program a lot.
I bought groceries in Kroger today along with a $100 Bean gift card which got me $20 back for the groceries. I spent the giftcard and ordered $130 worth of clothes which came with a 20% off Black Friday discount. In addition I got a $10 gift certificate, 4x fuel points at Kroger and the usueal 2% credit card rebate. Good deal.
Dinner was the leftover turkey with just water.

Thanksgiving Day. I looked for a Black Friday code for ProShow but came up empty handed. Instead I found a portable version on Pirate Bay and used a Sandbox type program called Time Freeze which restores your PC to the point before using the program. This insures you have blocked key loggers and viruses.
Sheetz was running the promo again they featured last year and before, buy a paper and get a free coffee. I bought 2 donuts as well when I got the paper. It's thick and full of Black Friday ads. I'm not very interested in anything. The Sheetz donuts are very good. I built a nice movie today of the photos using the new version of ProShow Gold version 8 that I sandboxed. IT played nicely on our TV.
We had a very nice Butterball turkey cooked in a bag along with stuffing, broccoli, cranberries, potatoes and Brut Champagne. Topping it all was a pumpkin pie with whipped cream topping. Libbie worked hard all day because in addition to the Turkey dinner she also made the traditional annual fruit cakes. Wow, lots of good food.

I got the MQTT thing resolved. I needed to close the previous HTTP connection before it would use MQTT to transmit status. This now seems reliable. I continued with the genealogy work and learned quite a bit more about the program's templates and options. This may work well. For dinner tonight we picked up some Sczechuan 3 flavor and a bottle of Ravenwood Zinfindel. The grocery store was less crowded in the evening then when I went earlier in the day to get Apple Cider, flour and baking soda. It was a zoo in the afternoon. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving.

I captioned all the pictures today from the envelope and tried making a movie of them in 1080p but it didn't play on the TV USB port. Back to the drawing board.
Next I played with updating the genealogy program. This is slowly coming along one name at a time. Libbie went grocery shopping with me today. We picked up our turkey as well as wine and other things needed for the Thanksgiving dinner.
Dinner tonight was Spaghetti without any wine, just water!!!

MQTT seems to be unreliable. I eventually traced the problem to the initial http connect to one of the 5 URLs. Once the connection is made the MQTT client publish fails. This is not good but the good news is we really want to know when it does not connect and not when we do connect. However, I am going to try an http stop tomorrow to see if this corrects the issue.

Libbie went to the dentist today at 2 which was risky business for our 3:30 dance lesson. The studio is closed Wednesday before Thanksgiving this week so we rescheduled for today to continue our routine. We pretty much have most of it and did well only missing once or twice. Half way through the lesson we switched to Rumba which was great because we did pick up a few pointers. We did the sliding doors which starts with a box then immediately an underarm turn followed by a turnout. We then go back and fourth before getting together and completing with a fifth position to close.

When we got back I spent the evening scanning an envelope of Libbie's Mother's pictures. Next I will read the backs of the pics and label the front with the captions. This will mean each pic becomes 2 pics, one with a caption and one without. In the evening while scanning I listened to Manon Lescaut live from the Met with Christina Opelais. I heard Anna Netrebko do it last week. I like them both.

Dinner tonight was leftover chicken with a bottle of Parker Estates Cabernet we picked up in Kroger today along with baked beans. We also picked up some Triscuits and a brick of cheddar to have a glass of wine along with a pre dinner hors d'oeuvres.

No internet this morning. After the CBS Sunday Morning show I went to Best Buy to exchange the modem for another. The warranty is the best $10 I ever spent.
I worked with Time Warner to get the modem listed on my account. When that wa s done all worked again. In the meantime I struggled with the modem reset. I researched forwarding MQTT to websockets. It's built into the version of MQTT on the Debian repository but not on the Pi Jessie repo.. I followed some online instructions for adding the Debian repo and installed from there. The web page I created seems to work with receiving MQTT messages. Dinner was Libbie's pizza.

I cleaned up the router room and installed the router restart box. I tried doing a few updates from upstairs and hung the thing. I need to look into a watchdog timer for the thing. We went out in the PM first to Loews to look fro bulbs then to Fresh Market to get Ribeye for dinner. Dinner was ribeye, lima beans and baked potato with sour cream. Accompanying the meal was Fess Parker Cabernet.

I prepped the junction box for the Router reset and mounted all the parts. I did this while Libbie was having her vein surgery over at Wake Radiology. I drove her there at 8 AM and picked her up at 11:43. We wnet to O'Charleys for lunch. I had the half a club which had turkey and bacon along with a bowl of loaded potato soup. The soup was cheesy with bacon and potato in it. i had a 22 ounce Red Oak beer with this. Later in the day I got the modem and router reset circuit hooked up in the closet. i also took the opportunity to clean up a lot of the wiring in the wiring closet. This went well but I only got about half the job done. Still more to do. It is cramped in the closet so I got out of there for now. The major components usch as router, modem and switch are mounted. The modem is at the end of it's cable so it's not on the shelf where I wanted it. Will try again some other time. I think there was an issue with the center conductor not making electrical contact so I had a flaky connection. Dinner was leftover Portabello stuffed with Chicken and Pesto.

I prepped the junction box for the Router reset and mounted all the parts. I did this while Libbie was having her vein surgery over at Wake Radiology. I drove her there at 8 AM and picked her up at 11:43. We wnet to O'Charleys for lunch. I had the half a club which had turkey and bacon along with a bowl of loaded potato soup. The soup was cheesy with bacon and potato in it. i had a 22 ounce Red Oak beer with this. Later in the day I got the modem and router reset circuit hooked up in the closet. i also took the opportunity to clean up a lot of the wiring in the wiring closet. This went well but I only got about half the job done. Still more to do. It is cramped in the closet so I got out of there for now. The major components usch as router, modem and switch are mounted. The modem is at the end of it's cable so it's not on the shelf where I wanted it. Will try again some other time. I think there was an issue with the center conductor not making electrical contact so I had a flaky connection. Dinner was leftover Portabello stuffed with Chicken and Pesto.

I prepped the junction box for the Router reset and mounted all the parts. I did this while Libbie was having her vein surgery over at Wake Radiology. I drove her there at 8 AM and picked her up at 11:43. We wnet to O'Charleys for lunch. I had the half a club which had turkey and bacon along with a bowl of loaded potato soup. The soup was cheesy with bacon and potato in it. i had a 22 ounce Red Oak beer with this. Later in the day I got the modem and router reset circuit hooked up in the closet. i also took the opportunity to clean up a lot of the wiring in the wiring closet. This went well but I only got about half the job done. Still more to do. It is cramped in the closet so I got out of there for now. The major components usch as router, modem and switch are mounted. The modem is at the end of it's cable so it's not on the shelf where I wanted it. Will try again some other time. I think there was an issue with the center conductor not making electrical contact so I had a flaky connection. Dinner was leftover Portabello stuffed with Chicken and Pesto.

I prepped the junction box for the Router reset and mounted all the parts. I did this while Libbie was having her vein surgery over at Wake Radiology. I drove her there at 8 AM and picked her up at 11:43. We wnet to O'Charleys for lunch. I had the half a club which had turkey and bacon along with a bowl of loaded potato soup. The soup was cheesy with bacon and potato in it. i had a 22 ounce Red Oak beer with this. Later in the day I got the modem and router reset circuit hooked up in the closet. i also took the opportunity to clean up a lot of the wiring in the wiring closet. This went well but I only got about half the job done. Still more to do. It is cramped in the closet so I got out of there for now. The major components usch as router, modem and switch are mounted. The modem is at the end of it's cable so it's not on the shelf where I wanted it. Will try again some other time. I think there was an issue with the center conductor not making electrical contact so I had a flaky connection. Dinner was leftover Portabello stuffed with Chicken and Pesto.

I spent a bunch of time answering stupid FC for IOS questions. The Apple users are definitely a lover class of people. I went out to Kroger and bought the ingredients for Portabello chicken Pesto mushrooms. The recipe was kicked off by the idea of clearance priced Portabello mushrooms. Libbie helped me make the meal which was outstanding. Cooking Light comes through again. We had this with a Parker Estates Cabernet Sauvignon. While Libbie was at quilting this afternoon I put in 4 packages of bulbs. The drilll bit makes it easy except I practically went through both batteries on the portable drill. The drill is the greatest thing ever.

The reset circuit kept crashing after x minutes. I did some googling and reading and found this is common. One person used the Ticker library function and had success with no crashes. I changed the code to utilize the Ticker library which isn't much different than the TSR I included but apparently this one is safer and doesn't result in crashes. It ran all day without crashing. Need to decide whether I will have a separate router reset from the cable modem reset. I went outside and picked up the pinestraw in the piles next to the driveway. I spread it around in the back by the new dogwood and around the Camelias. Dinner tonight was the leftover meatloaf muffins with a tiny bit of leftover wine and some Lima Beans.

Worked this morning on the reset some more before leaving for the airport at 11 to get Libbie. i waited in the cell lot for her to get her baggage. I enjoyed reading the "Now you're 70" book from Ken and Anita. With Libbie home we did the Tuesday groceries and picked up the ingredients for a single fruit cake batch. I finished the code for the reset and ended up doing a mod to the circuit board where i removed the relays from GPIO 0 and 2 and moved them to GPIO 4 and 5. 0 and 2 were wired to the RED and Blue LEDS but were also used for the firmware update which caused the relays to chatter. We made muffin tin meatloaf this evening which we had with green beans and a bottle of Rodney Strong Cabernet.

Took a ride to Sanford, it was a dreary lightly sprinkling ride. I thought it would be a nice Fall day trip. Continued the reset work and also managed to get the updates up on the web for Android. Dinner tonight was the leftover pulled pork on a bread round.

Spent a lot of the day online learning about the election and electoral college and other nonsense. I did get the First Class update out the door hopefully for users of Android. iOS subscriptions still have a problem That's the next issue. Dinner was 2 mini pizzas made from scratch. I bought crusts from Kroger then loaded them up with cheese, tomato sauce and onions and peppers. They were pretty good. i ate this during the interesting interview with Donald Trump on 60 minutes. i like Melania.

I got the Lonestar website updated and also tested the IOS Scrollview which seems to be working pretty good. I haven't found any issues with it. Drilled some holes in an electrical box to mount the relays and Huzzah for the router and cable reset device. Dinner was a little different tonight. i bought some precooked ribs sealed in a package and heated them in the microwave. They were OK but not great. I had these with baked beans and a bottle of red blend wine that Kroger was sampling.

I was depressed today. Laura got some nasty mail because I commented on her stupid petition for the electoral college to elect Hillary. I said she lost because people didn't want socialism, an opinion shared by my friend Andrea who has family living under socialism in Argentina. I called Mary and John and also talked to Laura. She is off the wall. I viewed it as a poor snowflake who didn't get a participation trophy because her person lost the election. For dinner tonight I made a large pizza using a Kroger pizza shell. The rest of the pie was from scratch. I updated the MAAVS website. Still need to do Lonestar.

Left the house at 5:30 to take Libbie to her 7 AM flight. Spent the rest of the day working on the IOS scrollview. I seeemed to get it working. Took a quick trip down to Fuquay and on the way back stopped at BoJangles on 55 in Apex and picked up a 2 piece dinner. It was great. Dinner tonight was chopped BBQ which was premade in a tub along with baked beans.