# Life Goes on - Summer 2024
**URL:** http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765
**Category:** Off Topic
**Tags:** life
**Created:** [March 29, 2024, 4:40pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765 "2024-03-29T16:40:30Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 40
### Author:  [@madflower69](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/madflower69)
#### Post date: [September 30, 2024, 9:27pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/781 "2024-09-30T21:27:09Z")
Our utilities have outage maps online and they tell you where they are working as well as kind of sorta where they are going to work next.
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### Author:  [@ForbiddenTuna](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/ForbiddenTuna)
#### Post date: [September 30, 2024, 10:15pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/782 "2024-09-30T22:15:25Z")
The one from Rutherford does show what’s been worked on and what’s out, and the rest is detective work on your own part. My street has some fallen trees on the lines. Some people are saying by Friday everyone should be back online.
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### Author:  [@DanNH](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/DanNH)
#### Post date: [September 30, 2024, 11:22pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/783 "2024-09-30T23:22:27Z")
Hope they get your power back soon. It looks like there is a large area out of power from the hurricane so the biggest problem will be how fast the mutual aid from other places like up here in New England can get down there to help. When we have winter storm outages they come up from pretty deep in the south. I alway feel bad for those guys who come north in the ice and freezing rain.
> [@Marty](#):
>
> I was without electricity for about a year after our transformer blew up
That is enough to make a man leave the grid with their own solar system.
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### Author:  [@ForbiddenTuna](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/ForbiddenTuna)
#### Post date: [September 30, 2024, 11:53pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/784 "2024-09-30T23:53:07Z")
Apparently even the Canadians are making their way down to help. They shut down a lot of roads due to flooding and sinkholes. One of my friends lives in Weaverville NC and was stranded with no gas, no food, and no water. His brother in law came up from Bessemer City to pick him up.
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### Author:  [@madflower69](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/madflower69)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 12:17am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/785 "2024-10-01T00:17:01Z")
Do you guys have smart meters? That speeds up things tremendously. Because they can ping the meters to pinpoint where the lines are down. I remember way back we had a storm, and the guys stopped by for a minute to ask if we knew where the lines were down because they knew my dad. They drove around the township just trying to spot them with their eyes for -hours- if not days. The meters can also detect when someone has their generator plugged in wrong and is pushing power back to the grid, and I think they can shut them off.
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### Author:  [@ForbiddenTuna](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/ForbiddenTuna)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 12:51am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/786 "2024-10-01T00:51:46Z")
Yeah we have smart meters, I only know that because I haven’t seen a power company guy go down our long driveway in a few years unless it was to repair or replace the transformer.
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### Author:  [@kmrland](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/kmrland)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 7:41am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/787 "2024-10-01T07:41:16Z")
YOU wont have far to go when it is time too get out of dodge or flee to the mountains.I agree most butifull pictures.
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### Author:  [@kmrland](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/kmrland)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 7:42am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/788 "2024-10-01T07:42:57Z")
I think I had smart meters 3 or 4 years ago,
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### Author:  [@kmrland](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/kmrland)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 7:48am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/789 "2024-10-01T07:48:00Z")
THAT some crazy flooding in western n.carilina, bidon just sent piles of money to ISRIAL, and Ukraine, and said on TV he got no more aid money for North Carolina.WORST flooding in 100 year records.Finding bodies in storm drains, up in trees,ECT,over 1000 people unaccounted for.
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### Author:  [@madflower69](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/madflower69)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 8:06am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/790 "2024-10-01T08:06:44Z")
> [@kmrland](#):
>
> I think I had smart meters 3 or 4 years ago,
I think everyone is supposed to have them by now. But there were some exceptions for cooperatives.
It is kind of like the cablemodem, I don’t know how many times they were called because the service wasn’t working, and I upgraded to a newer modem that they can read the values of the signal strength without coming to the house.
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### Author:  [@tcholton717](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/tcholton717)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 11:26am UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/791 "2024-10-01T11:26:20Z")
How hard is it to store enough food, water and fuel to sustain you for at least a week? People are about to have a rude awakening.
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### Author:  [@Marty](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/Marty)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 1:05pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/792 "2024-10-01T13:05:08Z")
The banking system is very fragile. They just lowered the standards for reserve requirements so that banks could pass the stress tests. If it goes, all trade will freeze up. There will be no credit available to anyone, even businesses. You will want at least 2 months of supplies, more if family or friends show up. Most people on this forum are self sufficiency types and should fare well, but I worry about city folk.
I have a friend in NYC who I have been nudging over the years to get out. His apartment is so small, I can’t imagine storing enough water, never mind food. At least he doesn’t have to worry about fuel, no place to run a generator. And even if he did, it would advertise to thousands around him that he has supplies.
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### Author:  [@DanNH](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/DanNH)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 1:37pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/793 "2024-10-01T13:37:00Z")
I was thinking the same thing as i have been working on fall canning and freezing. Though without energy independence the freezing wouldn’t do much good for people as most depend on the power grid.
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### Author:  [@ForbiddenTuna](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/ForbiddenTuna)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 2:12pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/794 "2024-10-01T14:12:16Z")
Power came back on last night, but now there’s going to be strikes at the Ports. Big runs on grocery stores already and they JUST started recovering from the storm panic buying.
I thank God that I wasn’t affected as much as my fellow Carolinians and Tennesseans to the west. I wish I had more storage for gasoline and I wish I’d had an interlock or transfer switch to power the house and well pump.
Mom is finally listening to my ideas so at least I don’t feel like Chicken Little anymore. We still need to have some plumbing done to have a master water cutoff between the well and the house, and I told her when we get that installed we should use a Tee with valves to add a water storage tank. Even if it’s just 55 gallons, we can ration that easily. Drums would make it expandable as well.
This Predator Generator did great but it is a gas hog. I financed for a Westinghouse 10kw starting/7500W running inverter generator. Instead of 8 gallons every 13 hours it’ll consume 5 gallons every 12 hours. Huge savings in fuel. Also the inverter should be more usable with woodgas/charcoal in a more extreme situation.
I’m looking up an electrician to get either a transfer switch or an Interlock kit put in.
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### Author:  [@abreaks](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/abreaks)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 2:37pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/795 "2024-10-01T14:37:02Z")
Frozen food gets a lot of focus for resilience but in a real SHTF situation dry goods really shine: bulk dry beans, pasta, rice. Add some canned stuff like tomato sauce, canned fruit, mushroom soup, whatever… you can eat well and healthy for weeks with just a basic cook top / camp stove, no electricity needed. You can store 50 pounds of rice, 50 pounds of assorted beans, boxes of pasta on a shelf and just know you are ready for weeks of trouble.
If you can get eggs to crack into those meals (waterglassed or fresh from the chicken) I don’t even want to hear a compliant. I’d eat that on the regular, normal times. Keep a collection of sauces, spicy and otherwise, to add flavor and change it up?
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### Author:  [@SteveUnruh](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/SteveUnruh)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 4:48pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/796 "2024-10-01T16:48:35Z")
All of the things will help CodyT.
Yep, yep. Only true forced Grid-Downs ever convinces most folks of thier J-I-T (Just In Time) supplied dependencies.
A mistake, a mistake to try and give them from your own efforts DIY power equivalencies to any big Grid.
Giving them only minimals then forces them to acceptance/acknowledgements to the true GRIMS’ of the situations.
And that is what streches out pre-stocked resources.
You let the situation convert them for being J-I-T outside dependent to J-I-C (Just In case) Free. Saves a lot of wasted talking.
Don’t be the Hero. Be willing to be viewed as “barely adequate”.
I was just looking at the our newest Grid power bill: $3.84 US a day for our “normal”.
Be only ONE gallon of Washington State gasoline in cost.
Best case with any one of five of my seven gasoline mini-generators one gallon could give 10-12 hours of 1/10 the normal expected power.
My BIG 9500/8750 watt Harbor Freight inverter-generator unit that one gallon gasoline would give at best 1/4 normal expectations at balls-out for just one hour.
Ain’t no Free in energy.
It ALL costs. How much are you/they willing to pay for on an ongoing basis??
Ha! Ha! Me?? I’ll pay for my Sweetie to have twice a day: 4 hours of 2000-3000 electrical watts. With some generated hot water. Be ~$12.00 US daily if done with gasoline, or propane.
I’ve set up to do that for ~60-90 days. A Grim-reality transition period.
Then be on sweated out woodgas fueling.
Steve Unruh
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### Author:  [@sbowman](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/sbowman)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 4:51pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/797 "2024-10-01T16:51:58Z")
Cody,
Years ago, I wired a 220 outlet and plug into my water pump electric line, so I could unplug it from the house and plug it into the generator. They say to not do that, but it has worked well for 30 years in my case. With a gas cook stove and gas refrigerator for back-up, I can probably get by with 2-3 hours of generator electricity a day. I should add that I also have a small solar power system with 12 volt marine battery and small inverter to run electronics as desired during the 24 hour period.
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### Author:  [@madflower69](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/madflower69)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 5:31pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/798 "2024-10-01T17:31:27Z")
Honestly, I would be pricing out solar inverters and battery banks if you are that worried. How often does a storm hit? Not very. How long was power out? Not very long. Asheville is toast but you don’t live there.
In about 6-12 months, you will find all the emergency generators people bought up on craigslist for cheap as people are trying to free up garage space.
All I am saying is move forward towards your larger goals. Installing a transfer switch, is something would need for a solar system so make sure it is compatible so you aren’t spending money twice for the same thing. For instance, I am not even sure you need one with the off-grid inverters anymore, and those usually have charge controllers batteries and generator input. so that is 500-1000 dollars for a transfer switch that might be able to be used for the inverter which I think gets you closer to where you wanted to go.
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### Author:  [@tcholton717](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/tcholton717)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 7:06pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/799 "2024-10-01T19:06:58Z")
The main rule of prepping. Always appear as if you are on your last legs when dealing with the public.
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### Author:  [@FruitvaleFarmer](http://forum.driveonwood.com/u/FruitvaleFarmer)
#### Post date: [October 1, 2024, 9:51pm UTC](http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/life-goes-on-summer-2024/7765/800 "2024-10-01T21:51:18Z")
> [@abreaks](#):
>
> If you can get eggs to crack into those meals (waterglassed or fresh from the chicken) I don’t even want to hear a compliant.
Great suggestions. If it were me, I’d save the waterglass for refractory projects, and use lime instead.
[ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUYgguMz1qI)
They have a disclaimer about 18th century tests, which is wise on their part. We tried the lime, and the success rate for a year was nearly 100%. Of course, if you bump the jars and crack the eggs, all bets are off.
Not guessing 🙂
The Townsends videos are interesting in many areas. If you have a little space, and can build a fire, 18th century techniques are pretty useful if things turn to crud.
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