Boxing Day!!!

If you are like me, you got everything you asked for, and a bunch of stuff you did not even realize you could have asked for, and some cash!!! You also, realized way to late to ask, that there were a few things you should have asked for but did not.

So if you are going on a Boxing Day buying frenzy like  I did, here are a few things to think about.

First, anything from my gifts for geeks list would still be great!

This shirt from amazon is almost as cool as the one I got, but the sentiment is the same:

My first order was the one that everyone was too scared to get because they were afraid to get it wrong:

This digital soldering station with all the tips, and a heat gun for desoldering and melting shrink tubing will be getting a review shortly, and set me back less than $60.

I also picked up the 3rd hand from my gifts for geeks post again, because even though I spelled it out, people felt that was a little too personal of a decision.

next, can you ever have enough SD cards?
I have several fruit pi boards with varying distributions at any one time, and I am always wanting to keep one for fear of losing some work.

These Samsung cards have been reeeeeeealllllly good to me, they are super fast at up to 100mb/sec and only $13 for 64gb, it's a no brainer:

I also picked up some dash buttons to try some automation like Rob from the hookup https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBuEvGLKxmI 

but I am hoping to use them for extra "toggle the lights" buttons for out of the way spaces with some automation magic. look for that in a future vlog.

You can find one for something you would buy anyway, order the dash button for $5 and then get a credit for the cost of the button when you use it the first time.  Or you could get this button even though you don't have a cat or want anything like this product, just because it is a cool looking hot pink button that says "Comfort Zone" ... I feel like I may have revealed too much ... 

The point is:

Boxing day is great! Getting cool stuff is great! and the list of projects to come has become vast.

I got some ESP 01s to play with: https://amzn.to/2RjsJCH

some capacitive touch buttons

A new shiny Raspberry Pi zero W with a case, and power supply and all the cables ... 

I have holiday lights to put up

A smart light bake off to film

Switches to replace

Right now I am working on a vlog about micropython on the esp8266 and python3-function for node-red and why since Hass.io plugins use python, we should all be learning this wonderful language.

Lots more to come, hopefully very soon!