What storms like this are good for

I had a huge maple come down in the backyard and take out the neighbor's fence, so this morning I set on getting it off their property and went to work with the Stihl 026. I could have easily been out there all day and not made much of a dent just cutting up the top, but one by one my neighbors wandered over, and before long we had five guys, two saws, a truck, and chains working to clear the small stuff out and buck the large branches. Since no one has power I told them to go home, get cleaned up, and come back with the wives and kids for dinner-we cooked burgers and dogs on the grill, had some beers around a backyard bonfire, and roasted some marshmallows for desert. Despite the misery of no power, cold showers, and chilly houses (well, not mine ), a good time was had by all.

Funny how adversity sometimes brings out the best . . . and sadly (but not in this case) the worse in folks . . . some take an opportunity like this to rally together as a community and help their fellow neighbor . . . while others will no doubt take advantage of the opportunity to help themselves.

In this case . . . looks like everyone was a winner . . . you in getting help cutting the tree, your neighbors in the free meal and all of you in getting a sense of community. I love stories like this!

We have something similar here, except when the power starts flickering, I think about cooking my neighbors on a bonfire.

"good neighbors" put up only a minimal struggle....you know, for show.

Of course you will have throngs of people who are completely unprepared. I had a casual acquaintance call me before the storm and ask to borrow a flashlight in case the power went out. I did loan them one but i thought that was a little presumptuious
to borrow emergency items instead of buying them,were talking about a 100K a year income person.

I'm glad to know you have spare flashlight. After we lost power I lit a few candles and my neighbor came over to ask "how do you still have lights on with no power?"....firstly, I explained to him the triangle of fire, and then....

My neighbor had a poplar tree come down during Irene. I offered to cut it up and remove it. They didn't even thank me, sooooo that's the last time that will happen! KMA

Your lucky they didnt charge you for the firewood.

Very nice of you to help out and cook for your neighbors... Its nice to have good neighbors and it seems they are getting harder to find these days.
It always seems there are people willing to give the shirts off their backs and even more people willing to beg/steal to get it from them.

Just got a call from my wife-the same folks are all at my house right now with the Englander cranking away in the basement I'm stuck working so I'm glad she has some company and that they're getting warm. They were using sleeping bags last night...

They are building houses all around me. They just put up 10 more just down the lane and not one has any sort of backup heat...electrical only. Why do I have the feeling I will be meeting some of them the next ice storm we have....

Funny how ppl work, they panic, buy a generator, other emergency supplies and then it all winds up on Craigslist next week.

Re: The last two posts . . . seems as though a lot of folks do develop short term memories and as stated that "must have" purchase of a generator soon ends up for sale . . . but not everyone is this way.

I still have my generator from 1998 -- I think a Coleman brand and I more or less faithfully fire it up every month or so to make sure it's ready to go . . . just in case. And following the Ice Storm back then I knew that some day I would end up with a woodstove . . . just took the high oil prices a few years back to finally motivate me financially as well. Some of us learn.

Burning wood is all about thinking long term, actually, most things are better when viewed in the long term, although when your power is out and the contents of your freezer are defrosting, it's not always easy taking a long term view.

That's when you find out that groups of neighbours working together in teams can get things moving, particularly if one of them has the means to turn that defrosting food into a meal.

And Jake, I wonder how many people will see all these trees lying around, look at their fuel bills now, and get motivated into buying a wood stove..........

Precisely why i dont want generator. Having to fire up and maintain something for years on end month after month, in the off chanc i may need it someday(In 20 years here i never lost power during a storm) its one more chore i dont need. I do however like the idea of keeping an inverter handy and pull the truck up alongside the house,and running it every few hours to keep the batteries charged. MY truck has 2 large deep cycle batteries.So far i never had to do that either.

It's all good . . . I just don't find firing it up and letting it run for 5 minutes while I go putter on another project that problematic . . . plus I've benefitted by having it portable on at least one occasion when I wanted to run some power tools and running a bunch of extension cords wasn't viable.

Im sure if our power went out in almost every storm as i does for some of the members here i would re think my position. I actually got the idea for using my truck with an inverter from one of the other members on this site. Seems like a great idea. He only has one battery in his truck and it works quite well. I have practally new generator, but it wont start due to sitting idle too long,gas varnish im guessing.

Not to be a broken record, but I had the same concerns/issues. In 7 years I haven't really needed a genny until this week....during Irene we got lucky and never lost power.

I am opting for an annual rather than monthly maintenance schedule...
--I buy ethanol-free gas and add 'stabilizer' to it...figure its good for a year (or more), then dump it in my car and refill the can.
--the HF genny has a valve in the fuel line so I can shut it off there while running to drain the carb. I have now left a half tank/gallon in it (with oil/stabilizer) for >6 mos and it started right up on the second pull. I figure I'll fire it up annually...
--if the gas in the genny gets too old, I figure I can always run it dry (about 4 hours for a full tank under max load).
--not as loud as the contractor gennies, and I shut it down at night.
--figure the biggest risk is the hoses letting go and dumping 1/2 gal of gas on the floor...I suppose I could keep it in a metal pan, haven't got a pan yet.

I was lucky none of my trees fell over but my next door neighbore lost about 5 big ones. One fell on his work truck and crushed it. He got an estimate for $ 5,000 from a tree service company not including the one on the truck. He declined.

Over the summer I had an estimate to take down nine trees and the lowest bid was $3,500. I just hope I can get the same price was this is all over.

Last year I had a pretty big Ash fall over and I had a guy I found on craigslist come over and take all the "nice" stuff and left me with all the little stuff.

My Honda 5500 was one of my better investments. I use sta-bil but I don't fire it up every month or whatever. It's a Honda- hard to kill that with a sledge hammer.

I lose power for more than a day every year- several days the past few years

Just a guess but I don't think generator maintenance is the reason you don't want/need one.