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the pastor who cannot say 'no'
Monday, December 16 2024
My ESP8266 Remote Control system is completely homebrewed from the database design to the firmware that runs on the microcontrollers. Had I been more familiar with the IoT software ecosystem before I started, I might've instead gone with an existing system like HomeAssistant and dealt with the limitations as I bumped up against them. With my system, there haven't really been limitations except for the kind imposed by the laws of the Universe, which is a nice aspect of completely homebrewed designs. But I have had to build absolutely everything myself (though large chunks of it were built by earlier versions of me solving unrelated problems).
Now that everything works exactly as I want it to, one issue that has troubled me is my dependence on that Arduino IDE to flash new firmware. The workflow for bringing online a new ESP8266 (to serve as a remote controller, sensor, or both) requires me to first create a representation of the device in the database, note the device_id created when doing that, and then putting that in the configuration.c file that is used to compile code for an ESP8266. It's a rather clunky process, especially if I wanted this to be a commercialized product. A better system would have copies of all the ESP8266 code on the server, perhaps even including or excluding libraries as needed (though that would make the ESP8266s less flexible once flashed; currently they can be told to start reading from any of a range of sensors without ever needing to be reflashed). The compilation in this ideal system would happen on the server and then an ESP8266 (and perhaps other device types) could be reflashed by the browser, something I learned about today after asking a few questions of ChatGPT. (I can use Arduino-CLI on the backend and ESP Web Tools on the frontend.) That way I could do everything in my system from within a web browser and have finer-grain control (and organized platform targeting). This afternoon, I did a little preliminary setting up of Arduino-CLI on Randomsprocket.com, but when I saw how much hard drive space it was using (that virtual server doesn't have much) I bagged it for the time being.
A dusting of snow had fallen overnight and it made everything beautiful without causing any real transportation difficulties. I went on a stroll a little ways down the Stick Trail to not much further than the Chamomile Wall just to take it all in, and while I was out there, I grabbed a piece of nice chestnut oak to burn in the stove. But it was so waterlogged that it wasn't dry enough to burn even after many hours of drying on top of the stove.
Later Charlotte and I went on a walk down the Farm Road and then back home atop the escarpment to the west. One of her nails was bleeding and leaving spots of bright red on the snow.
This evening after Gretchen came home, she and I drove down to the Hurley Town Hall and caught a ride with Ray and Nancy to tonight's event, which was us attending A John Waters Christmas at the Old Dutch Church in Uptown Kingston. Yes, that John Waters, the guy who brought us Hairspray and Pink Flamingos. First, though, we went to the Uptown Yum Yum for dinner, where I had a tofu Korean taco and one of their Asian-themed Impossible burgers as well as an Ommegang IPA (which was very good; I didn't remember Ommegang making good IPAs). Among the things we talked about was Charlotte's new PitPat tracker, Gretchen's recent drive to Rochester and back, and the annoyance of people trying to talk to you while you're trying to work (something both Gretchen, a bookseller, and Ray, a bartender, know a lot about).
The Old Dutch Church is the big church just south of the center of Uptown with all the ancient gravestones around it. Many date to the 1600s, jut from the ground at weird angles, and, when legible and not in Dutch, are full of words that would now be considered misspelled. The church is host to a weekend market during some parts of the year, but otherwise I don't know much about it. It's a genuine church with a pastor and all that, though it's definitely got a leftie worldview, encouraging acceptance of immigrants and those with the kind of sexual preferences the writers of Leviticus obsessed about. An indication of just how tolerant the church is is the fact that they were hosting tonight's event, brought to us by an organization called Big Gay Hudson Valley. After getting into the venue, we found our way to a large room in the back where the pre-show festivities were happening. On the stage, the place where, during the weekend market, people are often seen playing chess, there was a Santa Claus who spent most of his time shirtless while various people came up to have pictures taken with him, some of which involved playful spankings with a black leather paddle with shiny silver studs. Many of the people who had shown up tonight were in various costumes referencing John Water's movies. Near where we stood, back by the drinks, was an extremely tall drag queen. As for the drinks, they could be had for a modest $5 donation, which is the most reasonable drink price I've seen in over a decade at any sort of event. I got myself a big sixteen ounce unfamiliar IPA from Keegan Ales, and it was mediocre at best. Nancy is extremely paranoid about drunk driving, so she only got a glass of sweetberry wine if Gretchen was willing to split it with her. We weren't sure what the rules were about carrying our drinks into the presumably sacred nave of the church, so we asked one of the people enthusiastically pouring drinks, and it turned out she was the pastor, who said "I'd prefer you not." So out of respect for her wishes, we finished our drinks before going in to see the show (though a lot of people were seen drinking in the pews). Later that pastor was credited during John Waters' introduction as "the pastor who cannot say 'no'" by the head of Big Gay Hudson Valley.
Our seats were fairly near the front but in a set of pews between an aisle and the wall of the church. Just before the show, we chatted with a nice straight couple in front of us from Rosendale. It turned out that we'd all lived in Park Slope, Brooklyn, just before moving here. But of course, Gretchen and I had moved up more than 22 years ago, Ray and Nancy moved up 14 years ago, and they'd moved up somewhat more recently.
The show John Waters gave us was basically a stand-up act that went on for a surprisingly long time. He started by jokingly setting us straight on a bunch of purported "facts" about his movies and the actors in them, though of course none of these facts were true and they were just presented to get us in a mood to laugh. And laugh we did, as he ranged widely from subjects such as "shitting" (which he finds horrifying; apparently he's never enjoyed taking a massive abdomen-unburdening dump) to "Jesus." Everything he said was saturated with his wickedly profane (but clever) take. Very little of it would've been pre-approved to be spoken from most church pulpits, but the Old Dutch Church isn't your mother's idea of a church. Along the way, he also gave us at least one movie to download at some point: Butt Boy (it's not one of his). For a man his age (nearly 80), his humor is surprisingly timeless if not current. That said, it maybe went on just a little longer than I would've preferred given my Internet-altered view of what can be consistently entertaining. Then he took questions from the 600 people in the audience, and he took a lot of them.
Gretchen, me, and Ray in the pre-show area, a posed photo taken by Nancy.
Click to enlarge.
The scene in the festive pre-show area. Santa and friends are on stage in the distance.
Click to enlarge.
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