Power failure, the funny thoughts

When the power goes out, the house is silent. Look outside and all the neighbours are dark as well. Well, there is strength in numbers at least. The hydro company fixes the largest areas first, so if the power goes out you want to be part of that larger group.
Meanwhile inside the house the show begins. The thought of eating, but then no power to cook anything. The thought of playing the guitar, but no power for the amps, woodworking isn't as much fun manually and in the dark.
You realize you don't have enough flashlights. Most everything in the house doesn't work.
I went to use the bathroom and wondered if there was a catch there too. It would flush, that is good, the toilet paper doesn't need power does it? What if you get the job done and then discover your toilet no longer works.
Sitting in the dark is fine, just have to cleanup with cold water (we have on demand water heater which of course doesn't work)
Then you want to go outside but the garage door opener doesn't work, and you can't find the front door keys because you never use them.

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Musicman · 61-69, M

@ninalanyon For us it is weather related. The local government here says keep a 10 day supply on hand. One thing you mentioned that few people do was having cash on hand. After one bad hurricane power and the Internet were out for a month. No Internet means no credit or debit cards. During those times cash is king.

ninalanyon · 61-69, T

@Musicman Norway is serious about maintaining cash. So much so that it is now illegal for a business that operates from a permanent facility to refuse to accept cash for in person on premises sales of goods and services up to a value of 20 000 NOK (about 2 000 USD). The law came into force a little over a year ago.

Musicman · 61-69, M

@ninalanyon I actually like that law. A few years ago stores here tried doing away with cash. One hurricane ended that.

Picklebobble2 · 56-60, M

In the UK i think Gen.x learned a lot from one fuel crisis back in 1973.

OPEC were playing games in not supplying oil and gas if any western nation showed any kind of support toward Israel during the Yom Kippur war.
One of the reasons our generation mistrusts the Arab nations to this day....long before the fanaticism of later years.

Our coal miners were striking for pay to keep pace with rampant inflation so even if it were mined, industry got first priority before institutions long before anything became available to the public.

So we had to improvise and adapt to things we could control.

My brother and I used to go foraging for fallen trees; fireside logs; newspapers; cardboard; pinecones; conkers; anything we could burn in the coke burner for hot water or on the open fire in the living room.
Those who could were knitting everything from socks to sweaters to hats as fast as they could. Anything that you'd outgrown would be unpicked and remade into something you could use.

Those 'weird' 'Aunty's and Uncles'. You know, the ones with seemingly endless jars of home made jams; pickled vegetables and soups suddenly became our 'supermarkets'.

So some of us learned a lot !

These days i have freezers well stocked to last a season. Even if the power goes out this time of year.

If you've read this far, thank you.....now take a look around at the current political and economic situation the entire world's in.

And tell me how it couldn't happen again !

gandalf1957 · 61-69, M

@Picklebobble2 It could happen again yes .....here in the UK we are about to rerun the 1970s I think growing unemployment, relaxing trade union laws, persistent inflation albeit less than in the 1970s. Maybe we all need to stock in sugar, candles and tilly lights plus paraffin to run them just like the 1970s too.

And worldwide we appear to be re-running the 1930s let aggressors have other countries land to appease them. At least both UK and US politicians from the 1970s would have recognised and stood up to aggression.

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Musicman · 61-69, M

We are on well and septic so when the power goes out the water stops too. ☹

JamesBugman ·

@Musicman And likely last to get power back.

Musicman · 61-69, M

@JamesBugman Yep! Usually it goes out during a hurricane. Power is usually out for 5 to 10 days. Fortunately our motorhome has a 10k onboard generator. 😊

JamesBugman ·

@Musicman Have to adapt to survive. Must be lovely living off the grid, I want that.

fanuc2013 · 51-55, F

Now you know why people have emergency generators!

Musicman · 61-69, M

@fanuc2013 Except in California. Fossil fuel generators have been banned there.

JamesBugman ·

@fanuc2013 Generators are super noisy, cripes if I had a neighbour with one I would be filing noise complaints. We could hear them blocks away. Imagine if it was next door. Lots of complaints about them at RV parks too. Have to limit the times when you can have them running.

Koggg · M

To much word. Dont shaow again. Kog not recomamd

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