Daddy's Home by Tony Rubino and Gary Markstein for September 07, 2020

I once had a Sunday where the power went out where I had nothing to do electronically for a few hours.

Not a problem. Unplug the notebook and browse on the battery.

Tony’s QOTD: Powerful?

I’m not responsible, so no.

Powerful? Not so much.

Influential in a good way? Sometimes.

Peter should better check the fridge and freezer. Keep the latter closed; should be safe up to 48 hours. And/or eat all the ice cream first. That should take a while. Take care of the perishables from the fridge. Keep it closed else, too.

Try to order dry ice as long as the cell towers still have emergency power.

You do have something to cook with when there’s a power failure, don’t you?

There’s always the grill…

If those failures are common, you should consider buying a generator.

When we still lived in my parents’ house, there was a power failure for a few days in the warmer season… The power-line for our side of the street was broken, and since it was under the rose garden of a private person who wasn’t home then it took a while until it could be fixed.

A few years ago the power-line for the street where we live now was cut by a excavator. Fortunately, no-one got hurt. Took a while until it was fixed, too. We have small Korean cookers for the table. No problem in our flat.

BBQ time, with charcoal and sitting under a tree in the shade by a pool!!! Yeah very Powerful!!!

You have to flip the different light switches at least 9-10 times before you finally get the idea.

My hamshack computer & lights will run for about two hours on the backup batteries, more than enough time to fire up the generator. (DSL internet connection doesn’t drop, since the phone company uses batteries, too.)

bought a battery back up for modem with lap top.

Long term issue gets the generator, in a short term (4 hours or less), I have a solar set-up in the camper.

His great-great grandpa was baffled by a flat tire.

Tip for all:

If the power goes out, make sure you unplug your PC and all the peripherals. Otherwise, when the power comes back, there could be a power surge that can fry your computer’s CPU. I speak from experience.

Gotta love our utility. When you call to report the outage Ms ComEd tells you to report outages and check for updates on their website.

FACE PALM

Not exactly the same, but I just had to call the cable company and a bank about issues getting “online” and the automated system says go online to handle your issues.

I just make sure there is very little in the freezer when hurricane season starts. Peak is 9/10.

We had a generator installed when we built this house. The power comes back on within a minute of its going out. We can use internet, watch TV, and all the other great things, like flush the toilet.

assuming he has back up power for his Internet router

I have to admit I’ve done similar things. You just take some things for granted.

We were out for a week with hurricane Isabel a few years back. In 2018, we had a couple of close calls. I had a CD coming due so I decided to splurge on a whole house generator and not have to worry any more. It’s come on a few times, once for a day and a half when a storm took out trees on the next street over.

You can certainly “watch TV” on your laptop until the battery drains.

Umm – he’s on a laptop (which probably runs on a battery). And he might be able to use his phone as a wifi hotspot (or have his modem and router on a UPS, as we do). So he could “check the utility website”. And if not from the laptop, then from his phone in any case.

This reminds me to plug in my phone’s battery backup I bought to see if it is still charged up all the way…Thanks!