Hello, Winter

Winter is finally here in earnest.  Snow to rain to ice and bitter cold Sunday the 20th leading to power out at 2:30 P.M. but back on at 11:30 P.M.  Fortunately we have a wood burning stove and a portable generator that powers all essential appliances i.e. furnace, pump, refrigerators and freezers and some lights.  We were even able to which recorded TV shows even though we didn't have cable or Internet service.  Cooking needs to be done on the wood stove or our gas grill.  We didn't hook up our electric range  since it draws too much power.

We ran the generator for 7 solid hours but when it isn't running,  the wood stove keeps the house comfortable.   We bought it 7 years ago and it sat unused for 5 years.  But for the past two years we have used it for 3 prolonged periods of outages.    Power outages are a pain but without the generator it would have been much worse.

Now we're considering the possibility of switching to a propane run whole-house unit that would power everything.  There is significant cost involved in doing that but it saves me going through a big hassle of having to move the car, pull out the generator, hooking it up, starting it and then going downstairs to switch from 'line' to 'generator.   Every time  we're done with it for the day or to refuel, we have to reverse the process.   Not a major deal but a bit of an inconvenience and if anything ever happens to me where I can't do it, my wife would be helpless.  Anyway it's a thought.

In the meantime it's normal New England weather.