Alelou, are you surviving the ice storm?

[Bether6074]

Our power is back up! I spent the entire afternoon cleaning up from the mess and throwing out bags and bags full of ruined food. This entire adventure has been very expensive. Alelou, you can come over here for a shower. I'm home right now. Let me know if you need anything. I did see many trucks on your road today. I hope your power is on soon.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Good news for you, Bether and I hope that you get your power back up soon, Alelou.

We have the same problem every season here in Sweden too. There are always places that manages to be surprised by the new snow of the season. You'd think that by now the power companies had learned to either put the lines under the ground or to cut down large trees close by the power lines. But noooo....

I'm just thankful I live in a city.

[Alelou]

Power came on at 6:15 pm -- we nearly fell over we were so surprised. My son had just announced he was sick of board games, so it was good timing.

Sorry about all that food, Bether. I was lucky not to have very much, and I put most of it on the back deck in the cold and managed to keep it going (ice from Cumberland Farms helped too. ). I decided this was also a great opportunity to get rid of some stuff I wasn't really all that keen on eating anymore anyway (turkey carcass, fish that already survived a partial thaw once before...). APFD gave out dry ice the other day, too, so that helped on the day we were above freezing. Now I have to figure out what to do with that. Know anybody who still needs it?

Thanks for the concern, CX. The woodstove really does keep the place livable; we're fortunate to have a well-insulated house. Luckily that's the kitchen/family room so it's cozy anyway. And there's no TV there to mock us with its big blank screen. (First thing my husband did besides flushing toilets was turn on the TV of course.)

Since our water comes in from the well through the basement wall already I have to wonder if we couldn't just get a manual pump that works out of that same junction. Though the pump itself is undoubtedly in the well so maybe not. Hmm. I can't imagine a manual pump being too cooperative if we're below freezing out there, but the settlers must have done something. I know a lot of them liked to keep the water running somehow. My brother's old converted school house in Western MA actually has a spring running through the basement. This was actually sought after in the old days as a way to keep butter and stuff cold. Not terribly convenient nowadays, though it would have been handy in this storm!!

Ah, it's so nice to be back in the 21st century!!!!!!!! Long may it last. (Another storm arrives tonight but it's only supposed to have good old snow and some minimal icing ....)

I don't think a wind turbine would work for us unless it was incredibly tall; we sit east of a small hill which may explain why we didn't actually lose any trees. That still amazes me. It's certainly not that we lack for ratty old trees. And our winds are not that steady unless you have a mountain ridge to put the turbines on.

I'm so glad I'm unemployed. Tomorrow I can clean! With water and lights!!!!!!! I can't believe I'm looking forward to cleaning!!!!

[Aquarius]

Hooray for Bether and Alelou's power!!

It really sucks about losing the food. I'm very sorry to hear about that.

The last time we had a significant power outage was when the whole northeastern part of the country lost power. We got lucky; we have a deep-freeze in the basement that was full, including three turkeys that were over 20 lbs each. There was enough thermal mass in there to keep everything frozen; we only opened it once to stick stuff in from the fridge that we didn't want to lose. Fortunately we only lost stupid stuff like popcicles and a jar of mayonnaise, etc.

[Alelou]

Did you know that mayonnaise doesn't have to be refrigerated? At least the Hellman's kind doesn't. It actually helps extend the life of the food it's mixed with. It's the vinegar or something.

(But isn't that really pretty disgusting to think about? Ewww.)

I had decided against a chest freezer since it costs more to run it in a year than I'd probably save preserving my own veggies, but after this outage I'm rethinking that. They really are handy in a long outage.

I think I may keep thinking about it until one turns up for free on freecycle.org though.

[Alelou]

Pictures of the crystalline North...

The chickadees managed to get in there anyway!


Trees at the park across the street.


The driveway Saturday afternoon.


My husband getting water for flushing.


A bush alongside that same lake.


The lake again. (Jaime is still there but very tiny!)

[Aquarius]

Did you know that mayonnaise doesn't have to be refrigerated? At least the Hellman's kind doesn't. It actually helps extend the life of the food it's mixed with. It's the vinegar or something.

(But isn't that really pretty disgusting to think about? Ewww.)

I had decided against a chest freezer since it costs more to run it in a year than I'd probably save preserving my own veggies, but after this outage I'm rethinking that. They really are handy in a long outage.

I think I may keep thinking about it until one turns up for free on freecycle.org though.

No, I didn't know that! Wow, you learn something new all the time, don't you???

Still, mayonnaise is one of those things that I'm really paranoid about. I don't know why. I love the stuff, but I'm afraid of it! At the time I figured for the couple of bucks it would cost to replace it, no big loss.

Our deep-freeze really didn't ramp up our electric bill that much, which surprised me because we got it from a friend who didn't want his any more. For what we spend on it, it's more than made up for itself for allowing us to stock up on meat and other stuff when it goes on super-cheap sale. We wait for low prices and then stuff the thing full and I plan my menus around what's in there. After a few sales we end up with a pretty good variety, so it's not like we end up eating the same thing all the time.

Those pics remind me of winters where I grew up! In fact, we had an ice storm like that on Easter of 1979, of all times. The power was out all over town, and everything had this creepy kind of quiet to it. We had to postpone Easter dinner, but the photos were cool!

[Asso]

Pictures of the crystalline North...

The chickadees managed to get in there anyway!


Trees at the park across the street.


The driveway Saturday afternoon.


My husband getting water for flushing.


A bush alongside that same lake.


The lake again. (Jaime is still there but very tiny!)

THEY ARE AWESOME!
But... how it's cold!

[Alelou]

Maybe compared to Italy -- really it's CX who is cold!

We got a couple of inches of snow last night and another bigger storm arrives Friday. I'm SOOOOO glad they fixed it before all that!!!!!!

Now I have a back-on-the-Internet headache. I think my eyes and neck are freaking out. Guess I should go clean house instead. Funny how my motivation to clean was so much stronger when I COULDN'T plug in the vacuum cleaner or use water with abandon.

[Escriba]

Still, mayonnaise is one of those things that I'm really paranoid about. I don't know why. I love the stuff, but I'm afraid of it!

Don't be. I'm the living proof that you can eat a mayonnaise that is out of date for ten years and survive

Cool pics, Alelou. It looks like the world is made of glass.

[justTripn]

OOooo. AAhhh! Alelou

Beth prepared me. She told me in the midst of her displacement: "I could go outside and take a lot of Christmas card pictures."

Nice upbeat Bether.

[Alelou]

It really was spectacular. However, I think I'll be happy if I never see it again, except in someone else's pictures.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Very nice pics, Alelou.

I still don't like winter, though. But it can be beautiful to look at.

[Asso]

Very nice pics, Alelou.

I still don't like winter, though. But it can be beautiful to look at.

HOW MUCH YOU'RE RIGHT!

[Bether6074]

It seems as if pictures can't even do it justice. On Saturday I was driving home from work and the sun was hitting all of the trees just right. They were literally sparkling and looked almost like glass sculptures. It was this amazing thing in the midst of all of the disaster. Mother nature...angry, yet still beautiful. Odd. Glad to be warm now, though. Here are some of our pictures.