Cameras

Hi, I hope that your weekend is going well.  Thanks for stopping by!

Saturday was way too cold to do anything outdoors it was a great day for sitting by a fire, sipping hot chocolate or curling up with a cover and a good movie.  I stayed home for breakfast but the kids (cats) got me up early, despite my insomnia acting up overnight. 

I got a shower and then headed out.  Stopped by the post office to pick up the mail.  I’ve got a package coming that I have to sign for, it’s sleeping medicine and the new pharmacy makes you sign for it, which is stupid but whatever.  I setup an electronic signature through USPS which is pretty cool but it won’t apply to this particular package.  I think because they have my street address on the label.

Then I went to get my vehicle emissions inspected which took all of 5 minutes.  I passed which I wasn’t surprised by that, I was surprised that their computer was able to interact with my vehicles because the last time I was there it didn’t read and it was a huge ordeal that took way longer than 5 minutes. 

Off to visit my friends.  I got some advice about my cameras and found out that they will paint my house sign.  It’s just a wooden sign with the house number on it but it’s getting old and could some paint.  I had planned on doing it myself but if I can get a pro to take care of it might as well.  They said bring it out next Saturday.  I will be without it for a few days but they will paint it any color I want.  I’d like to get creative but I think of the HO ASS (aka Home Owners Association) and I don’t want to rile them up.  So I’m just going to say make it highly visible but don’t go horribly crazy on the colors.  Presently the background is white to match the house and the numbers are green to match the shutters.  I have never taken this down and I will venture to do that next weekend, here’s hoping it’s not a nightmare. 

I wasn’t feeling Sea Bass for supper so I went to a new pizza place that my friends told me about.  It was a little bit of a haul away from the house but I do like a drive.  It was okay not exactly what I was looking for but it was good.  They use those thin tiny square napkins so you wind up using more than if you were just given a regular size napkin.  I hate them.  I had plenty of pizza left and they brought me 2 small boxes I had to make it fit and I wasn’t happy about that.  However, they gave me this jumbo size cup of soda to go and that made it worth it. 

That was a wrap on Saturday. 

Sunday I had my insomnia and we had a freeze warning out.  The change in weather has my sinuses acting up.  The kids of course woke me up early because that is what they are used to doing.  I tried to sleep in a bit longer but that was futile and I just got up. 

Passed out food for them, took my pills and got dressed.  Out to breakfast.  I had the most delicious Bananas Foster Waffle with some eggs and sausage.  I wanted two of them but I didn’t dare try that after last weekend.  Then on to Target to get some misc. stuff one of which was cat treats.  Morea has a schedule and she holds me to it because she wants her treats.  I’ve created monsters but I love them so might as well make them comfy. 

Then on to the grocery store, where I saw a hunk and swore if our paths crossed after my initial up close sighting I was going to make a pass.  Wouldn’t you know it, our paths never did cross again and he went through self check out and was gone long before I was.  Then on to the gas station.  I got home and didn’t plan to go back out.  Turns out that my battery was low.  I figured that out when I lowered the tail gate and didn’t hear any chimes.  I broke out the battery charger and it was at like 40%.  Not sure if it’s my lack of driving or if I’ve got another issue.  I’ll have it checked out next weekend when I visit my friends.  However, now I am going out to dinner just to put on some extra miles and hey I will get another good meal that doesn’t come out of a microwave. 

Now for the fun part.  Mounting the cameras.  I elected to take care of the garage first and that was simple.  Easy up and done.  Next was the front porch.  I opted to mount it in a more visible location against a wall.  This installation turned into a bit of a problem but with persistence I was able to get it done.  The cats were a bit upset with all of the in and out but they liked watching me.  The mounting was the hardest part.  After that was done setup was super simple.  I’ve got them both on my Guest Network so they are separate from my regular home network.  I want to buy more already but I am going to give it some time to see how it goes.  The sound is LOUD and if you set off the siren that is LOUD also.  The spotlight are LED and they don’t impress me much but I’ve mounted both cameras where there is existing light at night.  So capturing video shouldn’t be a problem.  I’ve tested and set them both off.  They cover a wide swath of an area and for the garage I had to cut the motion area back or I would pickup every car on the street.  I don’t want to be pestered by alerts, I only want the real thing.  I like that I can interact with people via the camera and I never have to actually answer the door, but then again most times I don’t answer it unless there is someone I am expecting. 

Changing the batteries on these won’t be super fun but it’s easy.  I am interested to see how long 1 battery lasts and I will probably load both cameras up with a second one.  Easy to spend money not exactly easy to earn it.  However, once you get the hardware expenses out of the way and have your system setup the only real cost is the subscription for monitoring which is $100 per year.  I saw that Blink has a camera that is powered by 2 AA batteries and they say it lasts 1 year.  Tempting but I’m in the Ring eco system and I don’t want to mix systems but they too have the same $100 per year subscription fee that covers all cameras. 

I’m proud that I was able to set this up on my own with no help from anyone.  I just hope that it delivers what I am looking for given the investment I’ve made. 

Well off to pull the laundry out, head up and check on the battery.  I will probably go grab dinner it’s 3:30ish and with travel it will be 4 or after when I arrive.  I thought about a steak place for some chicken but then I thought about Mexican and well Mexican wins!  It’s a bit further but I think I will enjoy it much more. 

Back to being on-call tomorrow, not looking forward to that.  Plus well Monday and work in general.  Yuk.  I plan to be home all week long and venture out on Saturday morning.  Weather wise it should be an okay comfy week.  The furnace might run a bit before the sun is out but otherwise it should be just comfy and I’m more than okay with that.  I like it when I don’t need air or heat that makes me the happiest but it’s a short lived period where soon we will go in to air being needed and the power company loves that.  Ah well it’s only money, right? 

Have a great week ahead and I will talk with you all again soon.  Be well.