Nesting
Normally I could see the humour in not being seen by the motion detector controlled light switch in the bathroom as I showered behind the clear plastic (but rather opaque now) shower curtain. But not today, seeing as I’ve probably only had a couple of hours of real functioning on-time.
On-times are those precious moments when my Parkinson’s meds are working and I can perform a few chores around the house like a relatively normal human being. For the last few weeks my on-time has dwindled to almost nothing. As a result I’m behind on everything and my Parkinson’s is doing its best to ensure that I never catch up.
I am now showering in complete darkness waving my arms frantically so that the light will come on before the hot water runs out and I fall in the tub.
Calling Reliance about the hot water issues we’ve been having lately has been at the top of my list for a while now. I don’t know if it’s me, my Parkinson’s Disease, or the silly Nest thermostat that’s been making me feel colder recently, but I do know that we paid almost $250 about 10 years ago for this leap in technology that was supposed to make our lives easier by automatically sensing and controlling our home’s temperature.
The only thing it’s good at is randomly raising or lowering the temperature whenever it senses that someone in the neighbourhood has left for work or come home (except for us).
Lately it’s been trying to break my resolve by making my wife yell at me by coming on when she’s hot…or not coming on for me when it’s 66°F in the house in the dead of winter and I’m freezing my ass off. And over the past couple of weeks or so, the thermostat and our water heater have been ganging up on me, causing us run out of hot water after 30 seconds of shower time and then not
turning on the furnace just as the icicles begin to form at the tip of my shrinkage.
And just now, as I was writing this (no joke), I received a notification from Nest to tell me how much money and energy it’s saved me and the world (as compared to my cheapest neighbours) by
not turning up the temperature when it’s cold in the house. Ha! Comedy really is about the timing.
Maybe I will take that crazy pill after all sweetheart—pass me a Xanax, honey!
Calling
Yes, I really must put calling Reliance higher up on my priority list to come and decalcify our water heater to hopefully resolve our hot water issue—I mean, we do pay for this upfront on a maintenance contract so I should Call on Reliance.
Meanwhile, I’ve been thinking about this Nest thermostat, which is the dumbest thing Google has ever acquired. How could they not know that buying into this was a no win proposition?
In a previous life, Buck (me) was a Facilities Manager responsible for the personal comfort of several hundred individuals. Half my day was spent listening to people complain about how hot or cold it was in their office (the other half was spent convincing them that I would actually come down and do something about it! Ha!)
Come on Google, how much personal data do you need to steal from us to know that personal temperature is as individual as, say …Parkinson’s disease? There are just too many different variables that make it different for everyone—no one’s the same. Gender, relative humidity, season, cost, time of day, etc. are just a few of them.
What’s that? I know! I said the same thing—it’s supposed to be a learning thermostat! I don’t know what it’s been learning for the last 10 years (Conversational Latin?), but it still doesn’t seem to know when I’m home. How smart do you have to be to know that someone is shaking right in front of your sensor? It’s never displayed anything other than “Away”. Errrrm…hello? It’s me!! My simple old mercury thermostat that came with the house could have taught it a few things. Like that motion detecting light switch in the bathroom upstairs (and my hot wife), I think it just likes to ignore me.
“Enjoying”
You don’t really need to have Parkinson’s to “enjoy” Nest’s special features. In case you didn’t pick up on my sarcasm “enjoy” is facetious for “to be aggravated by.” ‘Smart Tech’, which is anything but, seems to be especially “good” at causing unnecessary stress and aggravation to my condition. My smart phone’s spell-wrong feature also springs to mind. Nest Leaf? Eco? Fan? Are these terms supposed to be intuitive features to the averageuser of a thermostat? Sometimes it won’t even let you turn it “off” even when it’s blasting heat at you through the floor vents. Lowering the temperature doesn’t immediately work, nor does turning the furnace to “off” on the iPad app.
When I read into this in their online help, it says that Nest is taking advantage of the residual heat normally left behind in the furnace by running the fan a bit longer. It actually bragged about this! Yes, yes….that’s truly wonderful, but doesn’t “off” mean “off” (like no means no!)?
Not in Nest-world!
Enduring
I do understand the predicament you’re in though…, but calling yourself a smart thermometer isn’t helping anybody. I believe that’s why they invented the word “misnomer” in the first place. There couldn’t possibly be one! Isn’t this the classic example of garbage in/garbage out? I’m surprised that half the time you can even pick a temperature given that one of us is always cranking you up while the other is constantly turning you down…or like my sister when we were kids… l still remember my dad yelling at her: “Cranking the thermostat to 100 won’t heat the house any faster!”
Nope—me and Nest have never really gotten along, and as with my Parkinson’s we’ve endured many battles. Diagnosed at 29 years old I have been duking it out with Parkinson’s for more than 25 years. As for this dumb Nest thermostat, it should possess enough artificial intelligence by now to know that I’m no quitter and that I’m not about to give in that easily.
Cheers,
Buck
P.S. Hey, Honey…why isn’t it mr.nomer? Sheesh…just asking!
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D. Richard Boone, an avid Toronto Blue Jays and Formula 1 fan, wrote a regular motor racing column entitled “Buck’s View”. Prior to this he was a purchasing professional for a large multinational company before eventually giving way to Parkinson’s disease way too early in his professional career. Diagnosed at 29 years old, he has battled Parkinson’s disease for more than 25 years and currently lives in Markham, Ontario with his beautiful wife, Dian
