The next day I had the pre-dawn alarm on but I clearly had bronchitis. All night I’d been hearing Jethro Tull’s Aqualung in my head and I’d coughed enough I probably had black eyes.
I was pissed. If I’m going to have a respiratory system this weak, I should at least have the fun of being a chain smoker!
Once again, the furnace gave out. It was -30 that morning. Mrs. Curmudgeon and I were both shivery. “Well, it’s been a good run,” I thought, “but now we’re gonna’ die.”
Instead Mrs. Curmudgeon cranked the stove (I’d forgotten I’d hauled the wood!). We both sat near it. Barely warm enough and totally miserable.
After a while, I bravely went back into the basement. There was still a trace of fuel oil. A puzzlement.
With more investigation I discovered the laundry room lights, kitchen lights, and the freezers (!!!) were kaput. Also, the oven’s clock was reset to 12:00 and the fan in the bathroom didn’t work.
What fresh hell was this? We had some power but not no power and not all power? Is not home AC power a binary construct. What the hell is indicated by “half power”? I was baffled.
Back in the basement I started mucking about with the circuit breakers. None seemed tripped. Yet checking appliances and two dozen staggering trips up and down the stairs verified that some circuits which were ostensibly ON had no power but others (which were also ostensibly ON) did.
I flipped circuit breakers and checked lights and couldn’t figure it out. No heat or smoke from any threatening places. No clearly tripped circuits, it was very windy outside but that would cause a “power outage” not unspecified localized inside-the-house brownouts.
My working theory was that the -30 morning had chilled something somewhere and that shrunk it just enough to sever a few contacts. It seemed a stretch but I had no better ideas.
Mrs. Curmudgeon told me to call an electrician. I complained that I’d never yet coaxed an electrician come to my house without weeks of begging and I’d tried many times. She made the call. I went back into the basement and swore a lot, then the furnace and the lights went on. All hail the power of swearing!
One of the kids showed up, sussed out that the heat was on (which matters not one bit to the lad) but the Wi-Fi was down (which is a DEFCON 4 tragedy). He grabbed the car keys and fled. That’s how it’ll be in the zombie apocalypse. Me and the dog will try to hold the fort against overwhelming odds (and fail), Mrs. Curmudgeon will be trying to call for help from a service guy that’ll never come, and the kids will split for a Starbucks somewhere.
Clearly out of my league, and too sick to rally either body or brain, I collapsed in the chair by the fire.
Later, something interesting happened: I fixed everything. I cleaned mouse droppings out of the breaker box with my shop vac and was having a fine game of pitch with my loving family. This made no sense because I was about to play a joker on Trump and there’s no earthly reason why you’d play pitch with wildcards. Also, my shop vac is out in the shop beyond snowdrifts and I was in no shape to brave -30 to get a fucking vacuum.
Then I woke up. So much for that. Even in my dreams I work like a dog.
Once again, the furnace was off. So were some (not all) of the lights.
Careful to make sure I was awake lest I set something on fire, I lit one of my many oil lamps. (It’s better to light one in the daytime than try it at dark.) Then I muttered something about poltergeists and crashed in bed.
Relative time of 90 seconds passed (4 hours by the clock) and an electrician came. An electrician came to my house! Holy shit! Mrs. Curmudgeon came through again!
I took him to the panel and explained the anomalous information; no power to the furnace, no tripped circuit breakers, no pattern to the dead circuits, intermittent power on and power off.
We heard a sound.
“Does that sound like sparking to you?” I asked.
He whipped off the panel cover and we both got a clear view of the 100-amp main breaker sparking. I was delighted! The easiest diagnostics you could ask for.
He explained that interrupting the “B” leg of the A/B 240 line in would affect “every other” circuit. The sparks were on the B leg and not the A leg. Bingo! I love simple explanations!
It’s a ten-minute job to replace a breaker and he was costing a mint just standing there. So of course, he didn’t have the part. We spent an hour working the phones (him and me both… cell phone only because my landline phone was off it’s rocker due to power surges). Eventually he procured something and installed it. I haven’t yet gotten the bill but I’m sure it’ll cause a coronary.
The situation had nuked my main Wi-Fi antenna. I still have (and run) the old router though. (Two Wi-Fi routers in my house! Two is one, one is none!) With the old Wi-Fi running, Mrs. Curmudgeon had Netflix which is a key component of her healing process. The kids had YouTube which is more necessary than air to a Millennial. Sadly, my squirrel stores were off line. I keep the squirrels on a NAS/RAID and had unplugged it in the middle of the electrical issues. It’s on a surge protector but so was the newer better Wi-Fi router that died. Also, I didn’t trust my addled self to reboot the precious NAS/RAID in my condition. All this is fine, keeping the family happy was highest priority and I couldn’t think straight anyway.
two is one, one is none…. truer words not spoken. i keep the same type of setup, oil lamps, woodstove, oil burning furnace. the backup electronics? keep ’em… i’m good with old fashioned paper books when the angry electric pixies no longer run thru the house. what i DO have, as a suggestion, is a goodly length of 3/4 arctic grade hose, a couple shutoff ball valves at each end. dripless quick disconnects, and a 12 VDC submersible bullet pump coupled to a length of pvc.. a couple 55 gal drums of oil and about 30 minutes total setup, pump & teardown and i save myself about 50 cents a gallon. pump runs off the trailer light 4 pin connector, 2 full drums weigh about a shade under 750 lbs so it doesnt hurt the truck. nothin worse than runnin out of oil at -40. i can email pics if ya want em….
Actually for the fuel delivery I have a homemade system with 70 gallon tank mounted in my truck and a 12v pump, but it is flawed. I made a miscalculation. It works perfectly to pick up oil (no trailer needed), bring it home, and pump it into my tank. However, it is a huge PITA to unload in the winter because snowdrifts make it hard to get the truck in the right place.
Rookie mistake eh? I designed and built a system in the summer and it has issues when I really need it. Live and learn.
figured an adaptive kinda guy such as yerself had a workable system. what i really need is a better way of shuffling wood. its not far from the shed to the garage rack, but its a pain doing it thru the man door and risky when it’s blisterin cold and i have the overhaed door open to unload the pickup….. bigger garage would be the answer.. just gotta clear the new acreage, build it, and move my soon to be retired self another 100 miles north……
There’s always something to do. I have a super “efficient” wood hauling setup but the whole thing depends on an ATV to haul a trailer full of wood and the ATV plow to clear the path. Lose that and I’m switching to alternate plans. (Including, when I’m sick, using a bit more fuel oil.)
“I designed and built a system in the summer”
You’d rather design and build at -30?
Our forecast windchill is -51. You’re a bit north of me, so um, don’t freeze, eh?
It’s -25 without wind chill right now. The wind did pick up and with wind chill the temperature is dead.
It’s not too bad by local standards but it’s supposed to get much worse and everyone is whistling past the graveyard.
Honestly, when it gets this cold everything goes into survival mode. Keeping the house “comfy” is out of the question and it’s more a matter of “good enough and wear a sweater”. So far so good, making sure the pipes don’t freeze, and all that. It’s probably a blessing in disguise that the furnace and oil situation was sorted a few days ago. Rather than beat up machinery, I probably wont even start my cars until a few days from now when the wind dies back down.
“survival mode” Yah, BTDT. Didn’t like it much.
What is this “comfy” of which you speak?
Tip: bread toasted over the naked flame of your plumbers’ propane lead pot burner has a unique taste best described as “inedible”.
From the book “The Adaptive Curmudgeon’s Positive Influence”:
We’re under a Winter Storm Warning and the windchill is sub-OMG. Came home to see the SHTF generator running. Uh-oh. Thank dawg the landlord had merely decided to see if it would start, having foregone the monthly test for six months despite me nagging him about being prepped. He said “it didn’t wanna start for some reason”. Duh. The day before, I had shown him the AC-approved coffee grinder telling him “You may freeze to death, hungry, in the dark but I have multiple-fuel stoves and WILL have coffee.” Thank you, AC!
Stay warm-ish.
“You may freeze to death, hungry, in the dark but I have multiple-fuel stoves and WILL have coffee.”
Epic! Outstanding! Well done! Tomorrow morning’s coffee will taste extra sweet for you!
Some years ago, I had half the circuits in my house go out, turns out that one of the lines buried in the yard fried itself, so I only had one leg working. It may or may have not had anything to do with someone having come a little close to it 2 years previously while using a post-hole digger and working from memory as to where the spray paint was the last time the lines were marked.
Then another year later, the other half of the house went out, and it was a pretty quick diagnosis that the other leg had a problem.
Speaking of electricity, there’s a little-known bit regarding breaker boxes, which is that lots of current leads to lots of heat. If you’re ever working circuits in a breaker box, stagger the 30-amp and larger along both legs and up and down the box. Place two 50-amp next to each other, as an example, and though they’re on different legs they’re running hot right next to each other. Eventually they sort of fail, usually when it’s really cold and you’re working them hard. Happened to me. If you’re lucky you just get a cold shower until they can be replaced. If you’re not lucky, you have a burnt leg in the box, electric heat working at perhaps half capacity, and a cold shower.
– Max