Day: July 15, 2013

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I Can Skype!

My neighbour has an old rust bucket of a pickup truck behind his shed. Its rear end encroaches on my property. The truck bed has holes along the side for a canopy. Since one of these holes was very clearly across my property line, I stuck my broom handle in that and aimed the antenna towards the cell tower. *

That puts the antenna almost 30′ from the rig and about 7′ from the ground. I knew from my experience with the whip antenna that I had to get as far to the northwest from the rig as I could and stay close to the ground, hence why I thought the truck would be a good antenna holder.

My RSSI number, the only thing I have to gauge the quality of my signal, dropped from -106 to -96 and has been hovering between -98 and -96. My phone still isn’t working here, but it barely works up the hill with the booster, so that’s fine.

My mother and I desperately needed to have a voice to voice business meeting so I decided to try Skype. We spoke for 28.5 minutes and only got about 10 seconds of fadeout. Otherwise, the sound was crystal clear and there was almost no lag. Moreover, she was on wifi across the house from her modem, not on ethernet, so the fadeout could have been at her end.

I have also been able to effortlessly stream Netflix since I moved the antenna to that location. I am so happy! I just need to find something colourful to tie to the antenna wire so that no one gets decapitated walking across that part of my lawn!

(* my neighbour will likely be happy that someone is putting that truck to good use!)

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Haven Has Improved Water and Internet Access!

I decided to hook myself up to city water, something I haven’t done in YEARS, because I’m tired of having to fill the holding tank every couple of days. Major bleaching of the city water intake ensued. Unfortunately, there isn’t enough water pressure with which to take a shower, so I still have to use the holding tank and water pump for that. Oh, well. At least I have running water!

I added a ‘quick connect’ to the water intake to make it easier to disconnect. It’s an awkward space and always leaks, so I wanted to only have to screw in and leak-proof once. I can now easily separate the hose and connect it to my fancy new sprayer. I also added another 50′ of hose to give me a little bit of play. The hose was cheap, less than $8, and I’m kicking myself for only getting 50′ of it.

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I used my fancy new sprayer and extra 50′ of hose to wash my truck yesterday! The water pressure was awful, so I had to give it several passes, but it was nice to get all the grime and bugs off. I even gave Moya a good hand waxing after, which made Caroline scoff. Yeah, it’s rather pointless to clean your truck when you’re going to be on dirt roads most of the time, but a coat of wax does protect the finish. Anyway, it was wonderful to be able to do wash the truck without worrying about using up someone’s water. The 50′ of hose wasn’t enough, so I wound up driving the truck around back of Miranda since I had just enough space to squeeze around her.

I’m going to order some Poliglow and spiff up Miranda sometime in August.

I was also going to add a quick connect to the water tank intake hose, but decided that instead, it’s high time I properly repair it and put the quick connect money towards repairs. All in due time. 🙂

As for internet, I had a ‘you have a package’ notification in my mailbox Friday. I was very tempted to ring for the postmaster, but prefer to respect her work hours since I have no reason to contact her outside of them. So I waited patiently all weekend with no internet to speak of after I got a great connection on Friday (hence the earlier than expected post).

I have had NO internet since about dinnertime yesterday. I got in and half-assedly hooked up my new Yagi-type antenna because, being the idiot that I am, I forgot to pick up a telescoping pole in Moose Jaw. By half-assedly, I mean I installed it on a pole that I leaned against the ladder like so:

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That’s all I did. I haven’t even tried to point it in the direction of the tower or move it up and down or try different locations around the property. This was still enough to give me a strong steady signal. The blog loads immediately and I’m now downloading a 60MB file. It’s going more slowly than up the hill, but the speed is satisfactory (it has ended up taking about 13 minutes).

Imagine when I actually get this thing pointed the right way?! Once my download is complete, I will see if I can get a phone signal. All appendages crossed that I’ve FINALLY found the solution!

I bought my antenna from the Wilson Amplifier Store based out of Laguna Hills, CA, and was very pleased with their service, albeit a little confused at first.

I saw my package go from Utah to California and the status change to ‘complete.’ I emailed customer service asking what was up with that. They replied promptly that their Utah warehouse can’t ship to Canada, so all orders go to Laguna Hills where they are forwarded on to Canada. They gave me a new tracking number and I was gratified to see that the package had already hit Canadian customs! Shipping was expensive, almost $40, but even with the two-step process, the package arrived here very quickly.

The reason I went with a US supplier is that the Wilson Amplifier Store offered a complete package. I didn’t have to cobble together the antenna, cable, and mounting hardware. I did need an adapter to fit the antenna with my Sleek booster, but the adapter I used with my bigger whip antenna does the trick.

Well, I’d better get to work. It’s nice to have a full plate of it upon return from vacation. I have a lot to make up for, what with all the time off I’ve taken this summer!