LazyAutomation.com

Every morning when I wake up and head into my living room, my wall-mounted screen lets me know, via Homeseer, the current weather outside. It grabs the weather from the internet and posts it in a easy-to-view page. I am, however, unable to see the actual weather at my specific location. Do I really need to know that? Isn’t it safe to assume that the weather 15-20 miles away is the same as what I am experiencing outside my front door? Perhaps… But then we wouldn’t be gadget-freaks, right? And besides… a weather station? Thoughts begin to drift through my head of my Visa bill at the end of the month with the stone-cold evidence of my latest whim…

Make your own weather station on the cheap

A few searches and I find “Make Your Own Weather Station” on the Franklin Institute’s web page. This appears to have all the methods MacGyver would use to track the weather on a daily basis using things like Dixee cups, human hair, spare change and sticks buried in the ground. Not very techy in my opinion… Besides, how do you show this off to your friends? Bottom line is that I will file that info somewhere in the annals of my brain in the event I am ever stranded on a desert island.

Perhaps I don’t want to go that cheap…

Maplin offers a USB weather station for £70, which is about $88US. Unfortunately, being overseas, I would need to pay for international shipping. The weather station looks pretty cool – it offers a rain gauge, temperature, wind speed and barometer. It also stores information on your PC for a historic look at your weather.

The full directions for the weather station are available here.

I am still searching for some other options – any suggestions?