Generator SC

[EricKei]

And then my one friend said her store was completely sold out of yogurt. I'm not sure I get that one.

Same reason as hoarding milk, I suppose...Whatever that might be. Maybe because yogurt is kinda sorta preserved milk...? But it needs to be kept cold anyway if it's been Pasteurized. Cheese would last a lot longer out of the cold, methinks...

[Mikkel]

Cheese would last a lot longer out of the cold, methinks...

But it won't be as good in coffee.

[Seshat]

Loss of refrigeration is more of a worry to me: I've had food go bad before. Whew! It's a mess to clean up.

Blankets all around the fridge. Insulate it heavily and don't open it. It's an insulated box already, insulate it even more and it will probably keep until the power comes back on.

(Unplug it, however. Otherwise the blankets on the back might burn from the coils.)

I've never understood people who stock up on bread and milk during a crisis. They're both perishable.

[LadyAndreca]

We just had a few downed branches and a swollen stream that didn't do any real damage. My in-laws, a block from the ocean, lost about 2' of fencing but that's it. Power outages in both towns were confined to small areas. The boardwalk is a different story. It's very strange to be walking down the beach, see a section of the boardwalk just sitting in the sand, and have to walk another hundred feet before you can even see where the piece was ripped away...still, there were only three sections completely ripped apart like that. Most of the boardwalk is still useable.

*sigh* I suspect we're going to be retuning about 250 of the 300+ generators we sold...

[RealUnimportant]

I have to wonder why people are worried about keeping their computers (more specifically their laptops) & cellphones powered - if you've lost power, unless you have dial-up & an internal modem then you're not gonna be surfing any time soon; similarly, your local cell tower's likely to be offline due to the same power outage you're experiencing.

[EricKei]

I've never understood people who stock up on bread and milk during a crisis. They're both perishable.

Well, bread, I can understand, provided that most or all of these things are true:

- You have something to put on it that is either (a) non-perishable or close to it (peanut butter, jelly, honey) or (b) canned that comes in units small enough that you can finish the whole can at one time (tuna, spam), or (c) dried, for the ever-popular "shit-on-a-shingle" experience

- You are using proper loaves of bread that have NOT been pre-sliced, because they will generally keep longer without refrigeration (french bread/baguettes, "homestyle" breads like rounds of sourdough). Bread that is "meant to be hard" will also keep longer, so will hard-crusted breads (that's the whole point). They might keep for only an extra day or two, but that may still be enough. No need for a full basket or anything >_<

- You have some source of open flame to cook with so you can toast the bread once it gets stale, making it still edible even after it gets a bit too hard. Can also be used to make ersatz bread pudding or even pain perdu ("lost bread") in a pinch with some condensed milk, I would think.

As for milk....Maybe cans of condensed milk to mix with water, or POWDERED milk, for the same reason. That or shelf-stable milk. None of which are really that hot as far as milk substitutes are concerned, but if you need your calcium, you need your calcium.

[Catwoman2965]

I don't people who a. aren't prepared and b. then bitch and moan about how long it will take for power to be restored. My 76 year old, wheelchair bound mother, who lives alone I might add, has had no power since Sat at 10pm. They say she may be restored by tonight, but if not, the power co. says 90-95% of those out will be restored by FRIDAY. there were 1.2 million out in NC and VA (where she lives). Now my mom cannot get out to the garage, as her wheelchair lift runs on electricity, but knowing this, she had candles, flashlights, and food. She can use her gas stove, and the water is running, but its not hot. But other than being bored - she's managing.

You shoudl see the bitching and moaning on the power co's FB page about how its not fair, and despite being told to CALL in any outages, that they cannot take any info ON FB, people still are asking when they will be restored, or pissing and moaning about how long tis taking or will take.

STFU and get over yourselves; the crews, along with many from a bunch of other states, are working their behinds off, and just beacuse you don't see them working, or gasp, having a meal, or trucks parked at motels (do you really want someone with no sleep fixing your power?) doesn't mean they aren't working on fixing the problems. The co. has been great about keeping everyone up to date on what's going on, but there are still a lot of unknowns, which they can't see until they actually go out to areas to work on the problems. The entitlement boggles my mind!

[PepperElf]

I was trying to figure out why you'd be out of batteries then I remembered... o yeah the hurricane.


where we live our bad-storm season is a bit earlier in the year but my BF is prepared for emergencies all year round.

1) Flashlights in Every. Single. Room. And candles. Oh and a very low load battery tester. (i.e. won't drain the battery you're testing)

2) Emergency food supply - MREs, water, ramen noodles, giant juice cans

3) a battery-powered water boiler. And a Pur water pitcher - that way once we run out of bottled water we can still purify whatever water is around & filter it

4) Emergency med kit.

5) S.A.M.E weather radio, set to this county and the counties around us, especially the ones to the SW since most storms travel SW to NE across here.

6) Plus we have my 35-mile 2way radios with weather bands and my police scanner

7) Car chargers for the phones or other devices. Solar chargers can help too, assuming you have sunlight to use - but we don't have those unless you count the string lights i have stuffed into a lantern on the deck.

Too many people wait until there's an emergency to prepare. They don't understand... Zombies and hurricanes don't wait for you to get ready.

The one thing I *do* wish we had was a gas-powered stove top. I was in VA Beach during Isabel. For the most part it was boring because there was nothing to do but sit around and read books by candle light and play with the cat. But at least I could have hot food and hot water for the bath.

[LadyAndreca]

We have a gazillion candles, two hurricane lamps (and a nearly-full container of oil), flashlights that run on AA batteries, about 30 AA batteries, a water distiller (we made about 5 gallons of water beforehand), a brita filter for backup, and a car battery jumper that accepts car chargers and the like so we can keep at least one cell phone powered up. We'd just gone shopping for cat food, so ONE loaf of bread (PB sandwiches are better than nothing) and toilet paper were all we really needed from the grocery store. THe duct tape and lighters I bought were just insurance.

[Shalom]

I have to wonder why people are worried about keeping their computers (more specifically their laptops) & cellphones powered - if you've lost power, unless you have dial-up & an internal modem then you're not gonna be surfing any time soon;

Why not? The DSL router/WAP is plugged into the same UPS as the computer, and when that runs down I've got a 55AH deep-cycle battery and an inverter.

(And when that runs out, I'll stick it in the car and charge it back up. Got a full tank of gas before the storm.)

The phone on my wall, incidentally, is a Western Electric 352, vintage 1937 or so, and is totally line powered by the roomful of 48 volt batteries at the telco switch. Last blackout, I was the only one on the block with a working phone... of course the phone wires are on the same poles as the electric lines, so if a pole on my block comes down, I'm screwed either way.

similarly, your local cell tower's likely to be offline due to the same power outage you're experiencing.

There you've got a point. Although when power goes out in this neighborhood, it does it block by block, so it's possible the tower will be in the block that has power. (Whether it'll be so overwhelmed by everybody and his brother simultaneously trying to call PSE&G to ask them when the power will be back on to allow you to log in/make a call, is another question altogether.)

Of course it's equally possible that you'll have power and the tower won't, in which case you're out of luck.

[mhkohne]

Plenty of candles here; any Orthodox Jewish family will always have candles in the house, and matches to light them with. I had a 400W inverter that I bought years ago and never used; went to the auto parts shop around the corner, bought an AGM deep-cycle battery (paid online with a $50-off coupon I googled up), and that should be enough juice to run anything we absolutely must have running. (Basically my CPAP machine and the computers.)

Then we got... nothing. Lots of rain, but hardly any wind. Big fizzle. Other parts of Joisey flooded; we got zip.

Funny, now that the rain has long ended and the sun's out, and the barometer's on its way up, now's when we're starting to get the wind. Still, 21MPH isn't hurricane force by a long shot.

I'll wait one more night; if this wind doesn't knock out power, that battery's going in my old truck Tuesday.

(Just heard, Westchester got seventeen inches of rain. Hully mackeral. I don't think I've ever heard of that much rain at one time.)

I don't know how much we got here in North Wales, but overnight it was enough that it overran my sump pumps and I had water in the basement. Scary stuff.

[Buglady]

... and this is why we have a constant supply of candles and other basics in our house. And are saving for a hand-crank radio and a hand-crank torch. (flashlight.)

I'ma Girl Guide leader and I may as well have Be Prepared tattooed on me somewhere. There are ALWAYS flashlights, candles, first aid supplies, several days worth of food, and usually a couple of large jugs of water on hand (I've fallen behind on that last one, I'll admit). And as for duct tape... well, we have to keep the kids safe at camp *somehow,* don't we??

My parents have done me one better - they are historical re-enactors (Black Powder, basically 17th-late 19thC, lots of frontier type stuff). A few years ago they lost power for two weeks after a very bad snow storm. They hardly missed a beat, other than Dad going outside to switch the freezers over to the generator (they ran that for a few hours a day, and it really was just the freezers). Woodstove for heat and cooking, oil lamps for light, and Mom just switched over to the treadle sewing machine instead of the electric. They said it was extraordinarily peaceful

LMAO at PepperElf's comment about zombies

[PepperElf]

Why not? The DSL router/WAP is plugged into the same UPS as the computer, and when that runs down I've got a 55AH deep-cycle battery and an inverter.

Assuming the stuff you connect into is staying up.

[Tama]

Well, if I had my laptop, pre-BSOD failure, it had tons of old games and entertainment not on the 'net.

Sims 2 (and 3), Fast Food Tycoon, KOTOR...

Plus my E-reader device and tons o' other books. And my ipod.



I fear boredom more than anything.

[EricKei]

But [cheese] won't be as good in coffee.

True, true....but then you just gather up all of the cheese that is still good, but not "turned", and make some fondue. Might as well enjoy it while you can ^_^