When you junk an old Nest Learning Thermostat, like I just did, your Google Home app may not get the memo. Here’s how to manually remove your obsolete device from your smartphone app.
I really had no choice but to retire my old Nest Learning Thermostat. It’s an aging 2nd generation model, and Google finally stopped supporting it. So, I recently upgraded to the current gen 4 model and successfully installed that one. Problem solved, right?
Well, not entirely.
The final step was to delete the old unit from my Google Home App on my iPhone. (Who wants to see a deactivated device lingering on your app’s interface as ‘Offline?’)
According to an email I received from Google, the gen 2 model was supposed to automatically evaporate from the app. But it defied that directive and remained in place… stubbornly so.
When I tried to remove it manually, there was no obvious way to do that. So, I had to dig deeper.
If you’ve been trying to crack the same code, here’s how to delete your decommissioned Google Nest Learning Thermostat from your Google Home app:
4 Steps to Remove a Device from the Google Home App
#1 – First, tap on the circular icon with your initial on the top right of the Google Home app.
#2 – Then, tap on “Home settings.”
#3 – Under “Device, groups & rooms,” find and tap on your old device.
#4 – At the very bottom of the next page, tap “Remove device.”
So Simple… That should do the trick! It’s super simple for any of your Nest devices, but you need to know where to look in the app.
After this tweak, you’re back to where you started… with remote and clutter-free access to a sleek Google Nest Learning Thermostat at the center of your smart home experience.
Here’s my photo from an alternate version of a past vacation. Yes, the image is fiction, but the photo is convincingly real. The fundamental reality of any photo album you choose to curate can now be ‘enhanced’ thanks to generative AI. If you are intrigued by the idea of bending (breaking) reality in your photos, here’s how it works…
I enjoy taking lots of photos of my life. Why exactly? Well, why does anybody?
To remember. To reflect. To share. To prove that it happened.
Family. Vacation. Adventure. Misadventure. Home. Passion. Life.
But now with a little help from generative AI, you can whip up your own life’s photos without having to actually experience… your life. Now, you can document your imagined life and share this alternate version if you want.
Sure, I know this all sounds rather absurd. But the fact that it’s possible now… easy in fact, should give us all pause. What is real anymore?
This is, of course, a big topic of discussion on any number of fronts. For the moment, I’m simply directing the focus inward from societal to individual impact.
Google Whisk’s ‘Precise Reference’ Mode Okay. So, with that set up, here’s how to have some ‘fun’ reinventing your life in pictures.
I’ve been experimenting with Google Whisk (one of several players in this disruptive and quickly evolving digital sandbox). Here’s the game-changing trick I’ve recently learned that turned this AI image generator into a reality-blending tool.
Activate ‘Precise Reference’ mode in Settings.
From there you simply need to upload at least one pictures of yourself for Whisk to see. That’s the critical reference point that puts ‘you’ in the new scene.
You can also upload photo backgrounds to help art-direct your shot or create them via text prompts.
Then, everything is ready for you to prompt your new photo into existence…starring you.
And then just click to generate.
Photos from My Vacations Not Taken I followed the above steps, and within seconds, I received back each of these vacation photos from my alternate universe.
Swimming with a Humpback WhaleSkydiving AdventureAt Mount Everest Base CampPacific Coast Highway Road TripSailboat Racing FunDog Sledding in AlaskaRiding in a Hot Air Balloon In Space Port Terminal before My Trip to the Future
Seeing is Believing? Whoa. This other guy sure is having fun. Maybe he should dial it back a bit. No, these AI-generated shots aren’t perfect. But they’re close enough to prove my point.
Creating a fake photo isn’t exactly new. Other tools have been available to do that for years. But it used to take a certain amount of skill and effort. Now, with a couple reference photos, a few clicks and a basic understanding of the process, everyone can access this great power.
And we all know the line from “Spider-Man.”
Time to Meet Your Doppelgänger I am fascinated. I am concerned. I am confused. My creative center feels in flux. My very existence can be morphed (as can yours).
But I’m determined to figure out how to properly integrate this AI-led creative revolution into my own reality (as we all should).
To truly understand it, you have to know how to operate within it. This is no time to ignore what’s already happened.
That’s why I’m spending time creating a vacation album from my alternate universe. Yes, it’s been a fun exercise.
My dad took this photo of Manhattan on a New York Harbor cruise back in the summer of 1988. I recently snapped a similar shot, which created something of a time loop for me. And that’s prompted me to look more closely at parts of my late father’s life. Here’s why.
I’m trying to understand more about my late father through his photography. He passed in 2022, and he passed on a mostly disorganized collection of photos that he snapped across his life.
My dad fashioned himself a photography enthusiast.
My Father, The Photographer While I was growing up, I remember he’d proudly carry around his SLR camera with zoom lens throughout New York City like he was some sort of urban Ansel Adams. Before that, he went through his James Bond subminiature Minox phase. While his tiny Minox camera was indeed cool for its time, the resolution of the resulting photos was mediocre at best.
I believe my father’s self-assigned photography projects were frequently more about expressing his own style and experience than the creativity in his photos’ form. (I was aware how much he enjoyed simply playing ‘photographer.’) But as I’ve been reviewing and archiving his old photos and negatives over these past few years, I’ve come to an additional conclusion.
He was also interested in the art of photography… I’ve uncovered some cool photos.
But my dad was limited by the technology of his time and didn’t have any distribution mechanism to reinforce his efforts. (No social media or blogs yet.) The furthest he went was to blow up a few of his favorite photos to frame for our apartment.
He seemed satisfied with this ceiling for his hobby.
Photo Echoes Between Generations I’ve been digitizing these photos as part of my ongoing family archiving project, and I’ve recently come across an unexpected phenomenon. I’ve found echoes of my own photo work showing up in some of my father’s photography.
It shouldn’t really be a surprise. New York City has certain iconic photo opportunities that a million others have also snapped. So, the fact that my father and I captured the same shot decades apart is hardly a revelation.
But it’s still made an impact on me.
Same Shot – Decades Apart I had the opportunity recently to take a few photos on the water around Manhattan near the Statue of Liberty. After I returned home and reviewed them, I felt a déjà vu like I’d seen these before. Yes, of course… my father’s photos. He’d been on the New York Bay too (multiple times, in fact).
Take a look:
Here’s the southern tip of Manhattan in 1988 and in 2025. (My father’s photo benefited from all the picturesque boats in the harbor. Of course, lots of other differences, including the Twin Towers.)
And here’s the Stature of Liberty, again in 1988 vs 2025. (I really like that giant American flag in my dad’s shot.)
These are hardly unique photos, But their similarities are striking for me, because they come from two generations of Lesters. And I find that meaningful.
My Father’s Legacy I’m still trying to understand my father. I had a complicated relationship with him.
No, he didn’t really bond with me through his photography and share his hobby as a father would with his son.
But he did buy me a nice Ricoh camera when I was in my early teens. So, it wasn’t as if he entirely missed the connection. (And it’s not lost on me that my own passion for photography still found its roots during this time in my life.)
Decades later, the fact that we gravitated to some of the same photo moments has made me feel a little closer to him. I understand I’ve got a little magical thinking going on. Still, I think there was more to my father that met the eye (or at least I want to think).
And that’s made me consider his legacy a little differently.
What Will I Learn from the Next Photo? My father’s photos are breadcrumbs that lead to a truth I’ll never completely understand. But they help me soften the rough edges to the story of our lives together.
And that’s part of what drives me to continue archiving his photos.
At Home with Tech 