Sunday, March 11, 2018

Some observations on powerlessness

Powerlessness-No, not the feeling that one gets when they feel they have no control.  I'm talking about the kind that comes through electric lines at almost the speed of light, aka electricity.

I haven't posted anything in a while because we had no electric service for the past several days.  It took me over a day to resolve a problem with our generator transfer box but once that was fixed, we had limited service for a few hours a day.  On top of that we have a wood burning stove and an ample supply of firewood so we kept warm.

But even with the generator and stove it was a pain in the rump.  Every morning I'd be up early, back the car out of the garage, move the generator into position a few feet from the garage door, start it, run down stairs where the transfer box is located, flip all the circuits from 'line' to 'generator', run back up stairs, make coffee, flush toilets, etc etc etc.  You get the idea.  All this before my first cup of coffee!

After that morning routine I filled the wood boxes and got on with whatever else needed to be done. I would let the generator run about 4 hours in order to keep food frozen.  Then every afternoon I'd run it some more for whatever else I needed.

Other inconveniences were things like sitting in candle-lit rooms at night, no TV or internet although my iPad does have cell service so I could use that.  Evening meals had to be either cooked on the wood stove or gas grill-or more often than not we ate out.  Our kitchen range is not connected to the generator.

We're back up and running now and if it happens again any time soon I'll have a more efficient routine in mind.

This was the first time we've used the generator.  We bought it 5 years ago but didn't need it until now. All that time there was a wiring problem I didn't know about until of course we went to use it.

But anyway, that's all resolved.

A friend of mine commented on how hard it must have been for pioneers but at that time there was no electrical service so a person's life was much different.  Things like hand pumps, outside bathroom facilities, cold rooms for food storage, etc.  No one knew enough to miss the convenience of electricity.

Anyway, on to the next challenge-another nor'easter coming this Tuesday. Yuk!

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