We've just had a pretty good power outage in my area and today at Lowe's I casually asked how fast generators are selling and one of the people said they're cleaned out and there are two trucks headed to the store loaded with presold models, probably more than half half of which are ever likely to see action.
I bought my little portable for $50 at a garage sale in a still factory sealed unopened box. I aslo grabbed a pretty heavy duty extension cord, a quart of oil and a good extension cord and a heavy duty plug, male and female on the way home. I already had some chain and a stout padlock.
When I got home the first thing I did was to go to the AC wire leading into the furnace and cut it. I installed a male end of the plug to the furnace and the female end to the feedline and put them together.
Then I tested my system and it ran the furnace with a little power to spare. My stove, hot water heater and dryer are gas fed so I had heat, hot water and a stove so all was well and I was prepared for the next outage.
I also had 3 each 5 gallon gas cans I rotated by dumping one can in the pickup every time I needed gas and refilling it when I refilled the pickup so I would have fresh gas.
A piece down the road the power went out and I grabbed the genny and put it on the back porch and chained it to the railing, gassed it up and lit her off and then hooked up the extension cord to the furnace and I was back in business.
When the power went back on I secured from operations after draining the tank and running it until it ran out of gas. Then I checked the oil and put it back in storage.
The whole operation had run flawlessly and I did again a couple of times over the years.
I am no rocket scientist, just a man with a blue collar background that has a basic understanding of how many things work. For the past 35+ years half my life has been lived using homebrewed generator supplied electricity. There are no extension cords running out to boats and we had to grow our own electricity.
Now lets take a look at Joe Suburbanite and his thrilling adventures in suburbia weathering a storm.
Bam! The power dies and Joe and family spend an uncomfortable night shivering under a pile of blankets for a day or two and Joe decides "We need a generator!" and off to Homeless Depot he goes and buys whatever the salesman recommends. Then he takes it home and parks it in his garage and if it goes unused for a year or two he sells it to someone like me for $50 at a garage sale two weeks before the next power outage.
Of course if he had kept the generator it would have done him no good because he hadn't even taken it out of the box and filled the crankcase with oil and doesn't have any gas on hand. It's off to the gas station where he stands there agape because he has just discovered the gas station doesn't have electricity either and can't run their pumps.
Back home to another night of freezing in the dark. Wife is mad at him. Kids are disappointed.
As soon as power is restored it's off to the gas station for a trio of 5 gallon cans which he dutifully fills and stores in a safe place somewhere for future use.
A year and a half later the power drops out again and Joe promptly pulls the generator out into the driveway, fills the tank and the damned thing won't start because the gasoline has gone bad and turned into varnish. In addition to not running the carburetor is now clogged.
When the dust clears Joe discovers it is out of warranty and carts it off to the small motor repair shop who take Joe's generator and put it on a growing pile of generators that also have plugged up carburetors. A month or two he takes it home and parks it in the garage.
This time he starts rotating gas through the trio of gas cans and sure enough later that winter when an ice storm drops the wires he parks the genny in the driveway and hooks everything up. It's going to be cold that night and he actually has done some homework. Unlike many, he's figured out how to run the furnace on auxiliary power!
As the storm out side rages he and the family have the furnace warming his happy home and even have the refrigerator, a few lights and even the TV going as the generator runs happily away in the driveway.
Until things suddenly go dark and the lights and TV go dark.
Maybe it's time to refill the genny, thinks Joe and he looks out to window to see a thug toss his generator into the back of a pickup and hop in as the driver puts it into gear and the duo drive off.
With the temperature predicted to plunge into sub freezing Joe's wife calls Aunt Trudy who lives forty miles away and has power. The kids get stuffed into the family car and an hour later they're camped in Aunt Trudy's living room for a few days.
A day or two later there's a thaw. They stay an extra day or two and Joe checks his home thermostat on his cell phone app. It's 70 degrees back home and all seems good.
Back into the family sedan and homeward bound! They pull into the driveway and push the garage door opener and are met with a foot high wall of water flowing out because the pipe have frozen and burst!
A call to the insurance company and it takes weeks for the plumbers and sheet rockers to arrive. The homeowner's insurance rate goes up and Joe finally throws in the towel. He sends out his resume and takes a job in Arizona and they whole family moves. They buy a lovely house there.
A month later on a glorious Saturday morning Joe steps onto his porch and looks around to enjoy the glorious morning the Lord has given him and is overjoyed and grateful to be alive. He feels a sharp prick on his right foot and looks down.
He's been bitten on the foot by a rattlesnake.
