Bedrock

Archive for the ‘Home Control’ Category

Interesting week but then it would be – we’re in peak season here so the pubs are chocker at night – it’s a short season of course.  Wednesday we met up with friends Roly and Jackie as it was their last night in Galera for a little while. Last night we’d planned to go visit neighbours but we’ve been that busy we decided to simply stop in and relax – which we did – well, kind of, I was finishing off the Pergola for most of the day and Maureen was working on the garden – thankfully both are now now well on the way to completion.

Today a new solar regulator turned up – I blew one of mine up last week due to incompetence and I need a spare – so the new one is now taking pride of place – I just need to make the wiring a little more permanent – my early evening job when it cools down a bit.

Some of the lighting is fixed (green) – the rest is programmable to any colour we fancy – and all of it is for free and controllable from anywhere like the cameras and monitoring sensors.

Today we went off shopping – firstly to Commercial Morino past Baza for some new mesh – Simba in one of his desperate bids for freedom (he HATES being inside when we’re outside but it’s not a nice environment outside for him) managed to slightly damage one of the window meshes – this one is more substantial – anyway, so then then off to the Chinese store for general shopping and to check out their very expensive after-shave (not) – and finally – we went off to Negratin for a soak.

What a CRACKING day for it – calm (though the water could have been calmer) and 36c – just superb.

Tonight we’re stopping in – got some company later on – I think a few glasses of wine in the Pergola are in order – I’ve been writing technical blogs every spare minute and my fingers need a break.

Oh, the waterproof camera case was a failure – nothing down there but green – same colour as the water looks from the surface – which is a huge shame because was we were wandering around aimlessly in the water today, the fish were jumping out of the water constantly – clearly lots going on down there and I noted a couple of times some fairly big fish wandering past me – but the camera was not having it. I’m guessing it is due to high calcium salts or similar – it’s certainly not due to pollution as power boats are not allowed – though I did notice on inconsiderate type out there ignoring the rules.

This morning the sky was wonderful and it is still that way now early evening – I think the rain we had the other day has cleared the way for a nice few days – or weeks…

Another successful delivery from Seur – obviously we’ve cracked that nut – mind you it did say delivery between 9pm and 10pm – and it turned up at 7pm – but that’s just a minor detail in the scheme of things.

And just for the sake of it, here’s a strange tomato we bought this afternoon! More expensive than normal tomatoes – but then a lot bigger too.

After a successful morning which saw Aidan and I working together by Skype as he helped me sort out thermostat issues (successfully up to now) at Hollyberry Cottage (Skype and decent broadband are a wonderful combination), a bunch of us headed off to Restaurante El Maño II at the far end of Huescar for lunch which ended up filling the otherwise rather miserable (weather-wise) afternoon  – and I have to say, the service and the food were both excellent.

It’s going to be a couple of days or so before we see the end to this unusually damp weather (hopefully by the time Aidan and Helen get here) and so chatting with friends all afternoon made a great alternative to fretting about lack of sun. We had a nice time. Thanks to all for making it that way.

Tonight I’ve been debugging some silly issues with lighting here in the cave – again successfully (one of my late night experiments I’d forgotten all about and left running). That and the first of several additions to my new camera turned up – a screen protector for the display. I’m hoping to continue my current success record at actually getting post delivered to the house! About the only thing that hasn’t gone well, I left my charger out yesterday in the short-lived sun which as it happens was quickly followed by a downpour – I’m not sure the LCD is ever going to recover.

Working on the hallway water feature to make it all WIFI controlled – this needs a little more care than usual given the fact that it uses water!! 

Finishing off the night with a nice glass of Spanish wine and some blogging. I could see an early night tonight as we have a busy day tomorrow.Hopefully will pick up some material to restore the Pergola to showroom shine after the winter winds have taken their toll.

Sadly, we know where this is heading after such a marvelous summer… still – I’d rather this than British weather. The blue line is the external (outside – shielded from the sun hence accurate) temperature at the top of the hills around Galera – the green line is the internal humidity in our cave which will be lower than the outside. Still peaking 25c mid-day which is marvellous… it’ll be down to 20c before long as the change is fairly consistent over the month.  Just ordered a moisture sensor – the idea being to put it in one of the plant-pots to monitor the watering system. I have to say, despite the variability of Spanish electricity, this has performed flawlessly all month. That hike in humidity levels around the start of the month never did go away.