Snow

Update: I've added the relevant pictures that were taken. (Album: http://imgur.com/a/nBu4B#0)

12:50 - first entry. March 6th 2013.

So the snow has taken out our power.

 It flickered all night and went out at about 9:00

The only things with power are the iPad and phones.

We weren't thinking last night as we forgot to fill the bath tub with water. But we have plenty of snow. I think the last time the power went out we were able to take a small shower, but silly me went to the bathroom and used all the pressure up in our pressure tank. So right now we have little to no running water. We have 6 gallons of water stored that we are using to make lunch right now. With the sterno and fondu pot.

We broke out our supplies for cooking from the camping equipment. However that's just a small single burner thing like this. It works really well and highly recommend it for backpacking or camping.

I will be updating this more as we go but right now it is 10 to 1 in the afternoon. I spent most of my morning sharpening my knife as I figure I will have to go look for downed trees at some point. My wife is cooking as I type this, but we have already identified some issues that need to be sorted.

Communication, we have a radio to hear that 13,000 people in our county are without power. I think they said the total region wide was over 100K. However, since the power is out and we have heavy wet snow, We have no cell phone reception. So we are unable to contact family. To be honest that doesn't bother me as we have radio, but my new job requires me to open up an emergency shelter. They have my cellphone as contact, and my home phone is out since it is vonage and over our Internet. Maybe time to invest in a single local phone line? Or maybe just get my ham radio sorted out.

Water, that's going to be an issue. Right now not so much as we have snow and maybe 2 or 3 days bottled. Longer term we need a way to pump from our well. There technically speaking is no water pressure to do anything. So that means no flushing toilets etc. However we do have the snow so we will use that melted in pots for extra water for cleaning and flushing mostly. The bottled water will be for food and drinking.

Heating is our third hurtle. We insulated the house some years ago. You can check that video on right right. That has helped to trap a lot of heat, but I can feel it getting cooler in here. It is not uncomfortable, about 69 right now and power has been out for 4 hours. We have closed doors to keep the heat in and we have blankets and hot packs on standby. Should the temp drop more outside (It's 34 degrees) then I expect it to get colder as the day goes on.

I will type more ideas as I think of them, it is time to eat.

7:04

The rest of the day has been fine. I am now writing this entry in the bedroom under candle light. The snow has melted considerably and the roads are fine to drive. After lunch we got kitted up and walked our long driveway to try and dig out the car. We did not have to do too much other than clear it off and dig around front. Ended up just driving right out without any issue. I suspect work will have a 2 hour delay tomorrow. I was supposed to go with my dad to Indiana but that's not going to happen so I may just go in. After the adventure outside we were worn out, even if it was only about 10 minutes of work. I had to haul a 35lb bag of biljack up the quarter acre drive way. Ended up falling asleep on the sofa as my wife did a crossword. Eventually I just read my book, Orbitsville by Bob Shaw. I had rescued that from my fathers collection i discovered at in my grand parents house on a trip to Wales. Pretty good so far and apparently a trilogy.

Anyway we back to the topics.

Communication still down I did manage to drive up the road to get enough of a signal to text. But I had to type the text, drive up the road for it to be sent and received as there was no good spot to pull off. Also, managed to go to where they open up the emergency shelters. Right now they have 1 person so I ended up going home. Not that I could stay as my wife was only expecting me gone for a few minutes.

Temperature in the house has dropped about 4 degrees last I checked to 65/66 and outside has warmed up.

Food right now seems to be ok it is cold enough in the fridge, but we put some snow in ziplock bags to help lower the temp. Things in the freezer are still frozen, but we do not have much if any meat due to dietary needs, that if it thaws, it won't be too bad. Cooking hasn't been that big of a problem using the sterno, but not having water or trying to conserve it is critical. Trying to minimize use of cutlery is important. Short term solution would be for us to simply have used paper plates and plastic cutlery.

Water again is something I am thinking about that is critical. We have used 1 gallon today. I expect that to increase tomorrow. We have two people, two birds, and two dogs that need water. This evening we opened the second gallon for water for the dogs. We definitely need a way to pump water from our well and then pressurize the tank. Going to the bathroom is interesting since I got too large pots of snow there is still a considerable amount of it and the toilet tank is still not full enough. Hence the need to be able to get water. If I had given it more thought I would have started a fire outside to melt the snow in the pots and dump it into the tub for toilet use.

MSR Camp Kettle..Tea is serious business

So right now I think I will let the dogs out one last time, maybe make a cup of tea, and see if I can get in a bit more reading. I suspect it will be an early night for sure, which is not characteristic of my normal routine.



March 7th 10:15

So last night got reasonably cold, when I woke up it was about 58 degrees. Ended up freezing until I put a hot pack behind my back to warm up my midsection. Since I was supposed to go to Indiana my dad is still thinking of going. I will join if he does. However he isn't sure since he is without power as well. I got up at 7:30 and my wife and I packed everything up to basically head over this way to see. She also needed to do work in town so she dropped me off here.

Of course whenever I decide to take a vacation of any length of time crap hits the fan at work. People panicked cause they can't get the internet, or to a specific program, or decide that 1 of the 9 public computers that has been down has got to be back and running immediately. Wouldn't have that last problem if Microsoft didn't change the way they install office 2013' and give oh so helpful error messages like "Something went wrong".

So I am just waiting and emailing as that is the only thing that will go through. To see what is going on with the power, and if we are going to go to Indiana or not. I could use the break, but it never really is one it seems.

Anyway to update it is cold as hell inside. Only a 10 degree difference 57 inside 46 outside.

Make sure that you have wet wipes and some air fresher handy to keep in the bathroom as well. I suspect that gas from the septic is coming up through the toilet making a rather unpleasant oder.

Back to my tea, and shivering.

7:18

So my dad decided not to go after much hemming and hawing. We ended up going in to town to pick my mum up for lunch and got subway. Had the wife stop by and discuss what the plans were and that is where it was decided not to go on our trip.

I stayed there for other hour or so as my wife went to get her hair done, and finish up on some school work. The importance of feeling clean shouldn't be underestimated.

Communication seems back to up to normal. I could surf with the iPad, and now call out. Watching all the alerts come in for my server equipment. I am hoping my NAS box is ok, it seems to have gone offline. Have you ever know a red light to be good, how about a blinking one? Kevin my intern seems to be working well and is holding the fort down. I may not be in tomorrow at any rate as they are saying 17,000 people with my electric company are still without power and won't be back up completely until Sunday night.

That is going to be a cold weekend for sure. However for this evening I broke out the solar blanket. Not something I wanted to do because I have no idea how to fold it back up. Although I figured if I was going to use it now is a good as time as any. We taped it to two blades of our ceiling fan and the back of a picture frame to make a reflective canopy over the bed.

My parents called at about 6 or so and said they got their power back. So I am optimistic that we will have it tonight. Another reason against the solar blanket, but that would be going against our basic need to get warm.

Food is always a challenge for me since I have PKU and makes meals an issue. I tell you what, shivering uses a lot of energy on top of things that have to get done. With that said the diet is mostly out the window tonight. I made a great omelet that my dad showed me how to do, that my granny used to make. So we both made our own. I had mushrooms in mine,and my wife had apples and cinnamon in hers.

Now mind you it isn't a typical omelet either. Two eggs two slices of bread, mixed till it is a liquid with little to no chunks. Add your bits, like mushrooms and tomatoes, peppers, apples whatever. Then fry in a frying pan with oil, preheated with works best for stainless steal. Then tease it up as your going to flip it once it doesn't break apart you know it is ready to flip. I like to posh the edges of it so it is nice and round whilst I wait.

Along with the omelet we had some sausages. All of this I should not be having technically, but I am. I have used a lot of energy so I need to replenish it. I also don't usually eat breakfast or eat a lot in general anyway.

So now that we are stuffed we are under our space age canopy, with our Aussie on the bed curled up at our feet as we wind down for the night. I have finished my book Orbitsville, and now need to get the next two in the trilogy. My dad asked where I had gotten it and I said I liberated it from your collection. I found that amusing. He is now wanting to know if I have any of his Heinlein or the two timers by Bob Saw. Apparently he had had a few of them where he used to work at his office, and before he could go back and get them the next day his replacement had thrown out all of his books. I don't know how someone like that is able to be that careless with others items, let alone throw out books!

Anyway, this is more like a mini book. I will leave at this for now. Go and check to see if I do have the books. Then call it an evening.

March 8th 8:36AM

I have been online now for about an hour or so. Our power came back at 11:00 last night so we were able to get some decent sleep and not shiver. The power flickered at about 6:00 but so far we have been stable. Looks like something is going on with my NAS box so I've been doing work on that most of the morning. I'll probably end up going into work this afternoon, or whenever the water in the tank heats backup. Last night I was mistaken. My wife said that that my parents called back and said their power had just gone out. Checking facebook it looks like the power is still out.

So ends my adventure, learned a lot of things that need to be sorted out, but many of them are minor comfort things.

(or so I thought, just as I was about to update this the power blinked out again....so we'll see how things go today. At any rate I think we're returning to a semblance of normalcy.)