Hubby made it home at 7:30 this morning. The power at work came on breifly, long enough for him to get out of bed and start making rounds to reset stuff. Half way through the reset routine, the power went out again. At least, now, it’s someone else’s problem.
I tucked him into bed after a hot shower and a crab sandwich. I’ll call the doc’s office this morning to cancel his 9:45 appt.
How long was he on duty?
Good news here. We’re up to 30º. The faucets in the laundry room are functioning. The toilet intake is almost functioning. I pushed down on the float and it ran for a second, then there was the sound of ice. I’ve turned the heater on, directed toward the toilet. As for the utility sink, I’ve put one of those cup heaters down the drain. It’s doing a good job warming the standing water. With the temperature warming outside, and the warm water inside, it should be clear soon.
He was on for 48hrs. He left for work at 4:30 AM onWed. morning and got home at 7:30 AM today, Friday.
This news report on Jimmy Kimmel is from a hill in our neighborhood. Hilarious.
We’ve had it pretty easy here on the Eastside near the Bellevue Square. I live down a small hill and the mini-van (front wheel drive but that’s it) could only get up about half the hill. The ice on the road was just not workable although a neighbor in a sedan made it up. Because my wife really had to get to Costco to buy a buncha crap to take to Shanghai for Chinese New Year tomorrow, I went out and scraped out 2 lines for the rain to come down and 45 minutes later those had morphed into passable tire tracks. She’s all packed now.
I’ve been so lucky. The power flickered several times throughout the week, but it didn’t go out. I’ve been working from home all week and just tonight finally ventured out for groceries. The store’s electricity had been out for two days, it looked like a scene from one of those apocalyptic movies. All of the shelves for meat, cheese and any perishables were completely empty. It’s less than a mile from my apartment.
Now we just brace for the high winds they say are coming.
It’s Sunday noon here just a bit South of Seattle and we’re still without power. Fortunately my parents do have power (and have since Friday, the lucky ducks), so my husband and I are spending a lot of time with them. There’s a bunch of electrical trucks in our neighborhood, though, so we’re hopeful that we’ll have power some time today. Our neighbor went and talked to them - they’re from Missouri! They must have been driving around the clock to get here. The roads are pretty well clear at this point, there’s just piles of slush at the roadside.
The power company’s putting in some herculean effort to get everything fixed. They’ve restored power to 300,000+ houses already and say the ‘vast majority’ of the 110,000 houses still without power should have it restored ‘by the end of the weekend’, though the most remote / most forested ones may be out until Wednesday. Ugh! Note to self, if I buy a house in a remote or forested area, get a generator.
This is probably the first major storm where we haven’t lost our power. Christmas day we had to do the whole Christmas Story eat-at-a-Chinese-restaurant thing when the power went out in this whole end of town.
This little cartoon, from the local Bellevue paper, says it the best.
http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/7173/pugetsounddriver.jpg
After the 1993 Inaugural Day Storm, when the power here in Bellevue (on the other side of the lake from Seattle) was out for three days, I went out and bought a 3,300 watt Honda “quiet generator”, and had an electrician wire it into the house circuits using a transfer switch and a remote starter.
This action just about guaranteed that the electricity in our neighborhood almost never fails. I’ll bet that none of our neighbors realize the great public service that I rendered with this relatively simple action.
However, when the power actually does go out, you are definitely a hero to your wife.
How much did that cost, to wire it to the house? I have a 3,000 watt honda generator. I use an extension to power the TV, cable (w/Internet), a light, and the computer. I’ve thought about putting a plug through a wall (i.e., male outside, female inside) so I didn’t have a cord coming under the door, but it would be nice to have a receptacle wired such that I could use some of the other things in the house. (I’d still have to cook on a Svea 123.)
When I lived in L.A. the power would go out at least once a year. I bought a Coleman lantern so that I’d have light. The power went out only once since then, for 30 seconds.
When you hire an electricial to wire your house for the genney, have him heat tape the pipes under the house.
This was twenty or so years ago, but IIRC, the transfer switch cost around $250, and the electrician charged about another $150 to wire it in. You really need a transfer switch - it eliminates all messing around with extension cords, etc, and makes it much safer for all concerned. The one I got has six circuits, all with their own breakers, and when the power goes out, the procedure is as follows:
Walk out onto the patio, and start the generator via a remote switch (hard wired into the generator).
Go into the garage (with flashlight), and throw all the six breaker switches, one at a time (as fast as you wish). The house is now on generator power. This all takes about two minutes, max.
Go back inside and continue watching television.
Probably the most important thing about the transfer switch is that, when the utility crews are restoring power, it prevents your generator from backfeeding into the power grid and possibly electrocuting several of the crew. In fact, while the utility crew is at work, if any of them hear a nearby generator, they will suspend operations until they locate the generator. Then when they are told that it is on a transfer switch, they go ahead with business. After the power is restored, you can then shut off all the switches on the transfer switch, then the generator, and all is as before. The switch breakers can be thrown so fast that the lights won’t even flicker inside the house.
The only way to go.
BTW, unless you are a licensed electrician yourself, don’t even think of wiring up the transfer switch yourself. I originally planned to do this, (how hard can wiring up a switch be, right?), but after taking a look at the roughly ten thousand little wires inside the switch box, immediately called up an electrician.