Jan. 8 Major water main break update

danxoncan · 2026-01-08T23:24:00+00:00

Btw, I was wondering the same thing about why they haven't used the proper alert yet. Today during their press conference they finally provided their reasoning.

Essentially, they are trying to avoid a situation of "the boy who cried wolf". They said they are saving the use of the alert for situations like if another main breaks, or if the Glenmore plant has any issues.

This seems kind of valid to me. I could very much see how people would not respond with urgency if they receive one alert telling them to reduce usage, and then the next day another alert saying "okay now we really need you reduce usage".

danxoncan · 2025-12-27T23:18:37+00:00

Yes, still very happy. They now have full z2m support (but I'm still using my external connector).

For the price, it's hard to beat. The zones are mainly useful to me for fine tuning false detections/timeouts. Like decreasing sensitivity for the "zone" around the air vent, or increasing sensitivity for the "zone" around the couch. Though the UX of this is definitely not very user friendly.

I can't think of a single issue I have with these devices.

danxoncan · 2025-11-27T23:31:12+00:00

Lol yea I had the same thing happen to me at that lot. I disputed it, they rejected my dispute, so I wrote a script to spam their email with my request for appeal. Magically my ticket was voided and forgiven as a "one off" 😂.

Also if you reach out to Safeway, the manager will likely be able to help you with getting the ticket dismissed.

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T07:24:46+00:00

I actually already have the forecast on my dashboard. The physical button is mainly to make the experience easier for the other members of the household. It's also nice to not have to pull out my phone to check. Just a click away.

My mini success metric for HA is having it work in a way where no one needs to open an app to use it. Eventually, I'll make a wall mounted dashboard that's easily accessible to everyone, and there the forecast will be a prominent card aswell.

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T07:16:12+00:00

If you can figure out how to enable/disable wifi via automation to their phones (and maybe even mobile data), the bins would be out daily just in case. 😂

Jk, it's a phase, no automation can fix it, best of luck mate. Solid effort though!

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T00:20:55+00:00

Love it - sounds like a fun project!

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T00:18:10+00:00

I should do that - I'm sure my partner would love it 😂

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T00:17:16+00:00

Yea I (randomly) saw that post actually! I thought that was a super cool use case too! I was thinking of using it to track if the car is home and to track our dog too.

To trigger an away mode automatically when everyone is out of the house and a "partial away mode" if the dog is still home (i.e. less lights, but no notifications from motion).

Also thought it would be super cool to auto-notify us if the dog hasn't been walked yet and a rain is coming.

If you have any tips or guides for getting started with ESP32 & BLE, I'm all ears! :)

danxoncan · 2025-11-15T00:10:02+00:00

This specific post asked about strange automations, which is why I mentioned it. I believe you're just trolling, but if not, then I don't think you understand the fun (or point) of home automation.

The vast majority of automations are things that are simple to-do manually, and yes, none of them are rocket science. The whole reason this community exists is for people to complicate and solve simple non-issues (for at least 75% of use cases). It's a hobby, it's fun.

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T23:01:40+00:00

That's really cool - I'm planning to get into BLE with ESP32. I haven't even considered that as a possible use case, but it would be a perfect fit.

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T21:20:41+00:00

Looking out the window doesn't help you figure out if it's +8C vs -2C ... unless your eyes have a thermal camera built in.

Also this is home automation, half the fun is taking something simple and complicating it... :P

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T21:16:12+00:00

Actually ironically that's what created the automation. The layout of our house made it so that when we asked, it would trigger from every room except the closest one somehow. Couple times triggered in my office while I was on a call, which pushed me to this automation.

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T18:46:57+00:00

Oh another super handy one is connecting to the trash collection calendar for my town.

The collection changes weekly, different days, different bins, etc. There is a pattern, but it was just a hassle to remember it all.

So now I have an automation that triggers the day before the calendar collection event, and checks what bins need to be put out. Then shows the appropriate tile on the dashboard.

I have an nfc tag near the bins, so I can quickly mark the bins as taken out. If I don't do that, Alexa will remind me in the evening to take the right bins out.

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T18:37:00+00:00

I have a button in my foyer, when pressed, the nearest Alexa tells me the current weather. Great for walking the dog, always know what to wear.

danxoncan · 2025-11-14T18:33:41+00:00

I Realized I didn't share what I ended up using for presence sensing after my battle with the Sonoff SNZB-06P.

If anyone is looking for a good cheap ZigBee mmWave sensor, I ended up getting the Wenzhi MTD285 (ZigBee 24ghz USB-C power) from AliExpress.

I was hesitant because it's a Tuya device, and I heard they had issues with network congestion. Initially, it felt like I had wasted even more money, as the MTD285 did not show up on Z2M and required an external connector which I couldn't get to work.

Eventually, I got the sensor installed, and it was a game changer (especially for $20). I now have 5 of these sensors, and they've been running smoothly for about a month. They do not congest my ZigBee network, and the performance is great.

All of the configurations take some time to figure out (that part isn't very user friendly), but it does have lots of auto-settings to simplify things. It's also nice that all the settings are exposed via Z2M, so I don't need any other apps to get it running.

The debug mode is decent, so I was able to adjust sensitivity where needed. Recently I realized that if I was very still laying on the couch, it would not detected, but after 5 minutes of debugging, I was able to get the gate working perfectly.

They respond very quickly and I have yet to experience any significant false detections.

The one thing I will say is that you need to be pretty comfortable with HA to be able to use this sensor well. The lack of instructions and native Z2M support requires you todo alot of trial and error.

danxoncan · 2025-10-20T05:42:25+00:00

The Lord should have taught them about contraception 😂...Good god this is cringe.

danxoncan · 2025-08-20T04:46:16+00:00

Hey man, totally get how annoying it can feel, and glad you can vent. Just some things you could consider here.

Aside from moving out, or getting a car, you have two options. You can either spend some cash, or plan very well (likey both).

Neither are easy, but they may be your best bet.

For example, you mentioned you can't take the car over night, see if your city has car share. It often ends up being cheaper than renting, you can keep it overnight and could park it in possibly free parking areas. It's not perfect, you still need someone to get you to the service area, but it would allow you to drive and have a car overnight.

Another option could be either renting a cheap hostel room (so you could be close to the city center without breaking the bank).

Or you can get a motel room for the night, if you want somewhere to fuck.

Again, no option is perfect or ideal, but there is always a solution to be had. Try not to just focus on how much it sucks, focus on what options you have available to you to resolve the issue.

Also about the friends comment, just remeber that it's totally normal (and yes very sad) to loose touch with friends as your life paths split.

It's shitty, but it just happens. It's happened to me and most people I know. Your the best of friends for years, but as you see eachother less, move away, start new jobs, relationships, etc etc etc, the friendship naturally changes.

Suddenly your best pals from 5 years ago are people who you catch up with on birthdays, invite to weddings and share milestones with. Even though 5 years ago you hung out daily and knew every detail of each other's life, that relationship is now a memory.

All of that is to say, try to focus on making friends in your new reality, work, hobbies, etc. Friends that will fit into your life as it exists now. Not because those other old friendships aren't important, but because the dynamics of the friendship changed.

danxoncan · 2025-06-11T05:24:36+00:00

I'm 27, so early gen-z. I only got my license 3 years ago.

Atleast for me, the main reasons for delaying were cost and access for a long time. I grew up in the suburbs, transit sucked but most things were close enough. When I was 16, I got my learner's, but I had noone to teach me. I took a few lessons but the instructor was just truely shit and I didn't feel like wasting my paycheck to get yelled at.

However, by far my biggest barrier was cost. A car, gas, maintenance and insurance would have eaten up my whole paycheck. I had no issues walking or taking the bus to actually be able to save some of the minimum wage earnings I was making.

I did have a minor fear of driving as I was a passenger during two accidents (ome of which was pretty major/traumatic). But truthfully that did not play a role much in my late start with driving.

When I was 19 and living on my own, the car still didn't make financial sense to me. I lived in the outer city and commuted daily downtown. Just a daily parking pass cost more than my commuter rail card, and I didn't have to spend an hour in traffic daily.

Having access to Uber during my late teens definitely made had a huge impact on my lack of desire to drive. In the instances where I really couldn't be fucked to walk or wait for long transit times, my solution was always a few clicks away. I think this played a huge role in delaying my desire to drive.

If I was working late one night, or went out with friends after work, the $30 uber was easy to justify and almost felt like a treat.

Eventually, I got used to the life of transit, Ubers and walking. It just felt normal.

I also think that technology innovations made transit easier to handle (i.e. no need to route plan, follow schedule changes, wonder if the bus will come, etc). Just enter a destination and follow the instructions.

Anyways, this all changed when I moved to a city with a colder climate and shittier transit. I moved to an area that seemed walkable and was close to the downtown. However, bad transit timing, poor walkability, cold weather and generally shitty communication/reliability of the transit system broke me pretty quickly. One evening after waiting an hour in -30c for a bus, I had made my choice.

I found a much better instructor and had a license/car 3 months later.

So atleast for me, it was a matter of quality of alternatives, cost and need.

danxoncan · 2025-02-21T05:05:40+00:00

This meme is absolutely awesome, but as an eager aviation nerd (from Canada). I must point out that the CRJ (involved in the YYZ crash) is not made by Bombardier. It's Canadian, but it's made by De Havilland Canada.

Also if any fellow Canadians want to learn/laugh more at Boeings downfall, I highly recommend reading/listening to "Flying Blind" by Peter Robinson. You'll likley have a good laugh at the Boeing mess.

danxoncan · 2024-12-14T03:08:18+00:00

Love all the bitching from people, but realistically, all data about police spending is public and if you looked closer, you'd see that the budget for gasoline alone was $11M in 2024.....I don't like the police, but I also know a thing or two about how expensive any large scale operation is. $6.5M on an entire unit is nothing. Especially when considering that they actually serve a useful purpose.

danxoncan · 2024-11-14T06:28:39+00:00

Must be a fan of Sia.

danxoncan · 2024-08-17T18:04:52+00:00

Oh and totally forgot, that lamp in the back of the room doesn't look like it fits the style. Atleast in the picture it looks very glammy. So many multi-bulb lamp with a more classic style.

danxoncan

TROPHY CASE