Having a total house surge suppressor installed. We only had a 10 minute outage of power durring the installation, but time enough for me to play with my new project. a solar-based battery bank and inverter. Our network and computers are all on UPS. So all I had to do is plug the UPS into the inverter of the battery bank and ZAP. We had plenty of power. #prepping #emergencypreparedness #preparedness #solar

People keep saying that ham radio is dead. I say no! For hours, we have had no "mainstream" communications (landline, cellular, internet, and 911 service). Between ham radio to communicate to people outside of the affected area as well as using Starlink, we have no outage in our house. https://islandfreepress.org/outer-banks-news/communications-outage-reported-on-hatteras-island-911-service-impacted/?fbclid=IwY2xjawFMIxpleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHXZhLNJCHqICiZHtaQ3P5wk3rSUrbwVouhFj78qxrT3jAb44W-Gn9Lc4CA_aem_DHV8UphzfMkcBNpytv3WIA #hamradio #radio #emergencypreparedness #prepping

We lost one of the disturbances in the Atlantic. Nothing over 20% chance over the next 7 days. Looks like the one in the NW area of the Gulf is going to continue bringing lots of rain to Gulf Coast of TX though. #weather #hurricane #tropicalstorms

What do you do when a neighbor drops off a couple of dozen blue crabs fresh off his boat? You break out the steamer, some beer, and seasoning. That's what you do. #coastalliving #hatterasisland #capehatteras #outerbans #obx #seafood

Every year, I worry I won't get enough peppers. I grow all from seeds saved from previous years. I even had to give away 20+ plants this year because germination was so good. This is my 3rd harvest of over 2.5lbs and there are still hundreds of unripe peppers that if the tree rats and storms stay at bay, I am sure I will get at least 2 more harvests. #gardening #hotpeppers #chili #ghostchili #ghostpeppers

Well, the #starlink #SpaceX launch didn't happen this AM, but at least the moon was pretty. Sunrise not so bad either. #photography #fullmoon #sunrise #surfing #obx #outerbanks #capehatteras

A few hundred purple death hot peppers dried and smoked. #hotpeppers #gardening

One of my latest projects. I 3d printed a model of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. I used filament that has wood particles in it so it feels like wood. I also did my own painting using wood tones to make it look more like an old time children's wooden toy. I finally wired in an Arduino pro mini to a RGB led and wrote a program that randomly cycles through ROYGBIV. I know the stripes on the tower aren't exactly right, but close enough for this prototype. #3dprinting #3dprinter #arduino #obx #outerbanks #hatteras #hatterasisland #theouterbanks

Cheese!

Its Friday!! Wind blowing about 30mph out of the south here on Hatteras Island. Hurricane/Tropical storm Debby is a distant memory (never really did much here). Now for personal projects instead of work. #hatterasisland #hatteras #obx #outerbanks

So far for Hurricane/Trop.Storm Debby in Frisco, NC. Looks like we have had a total of 3.82" of rain so far. You can see where over the last 2 how it was distributed over Wednesday and Thursday. Most of the rain happened early yesterday morning. As far as wind, we have averaged 8.5mph over the last 2 days with a sustained high of 25.3mph this morning at 8:28 and a highest gust of 33.1mph around the same time this morning. NOTE: these readings are coming from our Ambient weather station about 30 feet above ground on a mast. #hurricane #weather #outerbanks #obx #hatteras #hatterasisland #hurricanedebby

Wind picking up this morning out of the SE at about a max between 24 and 25mph. Probably get bigger as Debby moves north into NC. This is the highest wind my 3d printed weather station holder windvane has been out in. Even though it is just a prototype, it did well. Even made it through a particularly heavy but brief downpour. Now to go home and dry off. #hurricane #weather #hurricanedebby #obx #outerbanks #hatteras #hatterasisland

I really like Dilly Beans. Like skinny dill pickles. Just took the string beans out of the fermenter. #fermentation #preserving #canning #fermenting #urbanhomestead

Smoking/dehydrating a couple of pounds of purple death peppers in the smoker. Makes some of the best hot sauce and hot pepper powder. #gardening #hotpeppers #chilis #preserving

Just a sliver of a moon this morning

Still a whole lot of uncertainty. It does look that the consensus is that things will track into the Gulf. What happens next is still up in the air. Images from NOAA and Tropical Tidbits. #hurricane #hurricanes #weather

Air temp warmer this morning. SSE wind is light. Super small waves. But why not paddle out. #hatteras #capehatteras #obx #outerbanks #capehatterasnationalseashore #sunrise #weather #photography

was out for a few days and missed that 1.55" of rain. #hatteras #hatterasisland #obx #weather

Possibility to have a bit of weather a week out. The predictions are all over the place though. You can see from Windy, they are showing something possible off the coast of Hatteras late next monday. But spaghetti models show that possibilities are pretty much up for grabs. #weather #hurricanes #tropicalstorms

I think that the Purple Death is my favorite hot pepper. These peppers are all on the same plant. The peppers first come out as dark purple (they have already faded a bit). then the purple fades until I turns green. Then from green to yellow, to orange, then finally to bright red. Very spicy (around Carolina Reaper hot at 1,400,000 Scoville heat units) #hotpepper #spicy #chili #reaper #carolinareaper #ghostpeppers #bhutjolokia