Monday 24 November 2008

Still saving the planet

I know some people were really worried over this post about me giving up on saving the planet. I would like to inform you that I have done my bit to make up for using planet killing dishwasher tablets. We went 10 hours without using any electricity. I'm not talking about no TV or cooking on the BBQ, I'm talking about not a scrap of power to our entire house. Fridges -OFF, TV- OFF, computers- OFF, the lot, not standby, OFF. We didnt even use our car!

It was not by choice of course but I do think that I have paid the price to our planet. Our power went out at about 2pm, just as we were going for nap time. The boys got to sleep, I couldnt. I called my sister to see if we could come and use her carbon emissions pool and airconditioner. So as soon as the boys woke up we disengaged the garage roller-door motor...

DISENGAGED the garage...

DISENGAGED the...

oh forget it we called grannysaurus to see if Wolf could drive the ute over and pick up her car so we could all get to Chimera's. We had a great time, we swam, sat in the nice cool air con, worried about our fridge full of leftovers getting wasted, ate dinner (some of the leftovers that I had thought to bring with us) and then felt we had imposed long enough. I kept ringing the faults line to try and get an idea about when our power would be back on but they were giving me no hope.

The boys were excited by using torches but a bit freaked out by all the darkness. we eventually got them to sleep and it got hotter and hotter and hotter and Wolf went and pitched the tent in the black backyard. He left the fly off and it was heaps cooler but not big enough for us all so we moved the boys out there (who really were not going back to sleep after we moved them into a super exciting tent) and I stayed inside and did sudoku's by candle light and had some alone time. I have been craving some alone time lately so I guess that was as good as I can expect for now.

MIDNIGHT the power came back on, 1am the tarriffed power (aircon) came back on and we all slept happily for the next 6 hours.

Some things I have learnt from this...

I am so glad I put together a decent Cyclone Kit last season and knew where it was.

I do not cope well with heat.

Wolf does not cope well with heat.

Kids do not cope well with heat.

It was still 33C in our kitchen at 10:30 last night.

There is no breeze going through our house at all at night.

Rich suburbs get their power back on first and derro suburbs like us have to wait (we have a great area in a generally derro suburb).

Candles give off a lot of heat.

I am really tired today.

I wanted to put a photo with this but I am too tired to bother.

I am thankful for the huge chunk of "creeping ice" in my fridge that kept my milk and leftovers nicely chilled for 10 hours.

My kids are finally asleep so I am going to go do the same.

4 comments:

  1. That didn't sound like it was much fun. But at least the stuff in the fridge wasn't spoiled. I hope there's no more blackouts for a long, long time.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Not fun at all. Hope you could catch up on your sleep!

    ReplyDelete
  3. You should have said about the humidity. It's like trying to sleep in sauna.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Wow. You have certainly done your part for the environment this week--now crank that air conditioning to cold, cold, cold!

    Blessings!

    ReplyDelete

I'd love to hear from you, even if it's just to say "Hi, I stopped by for a read today"
We love comments, we don't love spam. Too much spam means I'm moderating comments now and have put on an anti-robot word verification doo-dad, sorry.