Yup! Nice day. We went on a drive about. Like a walk about but driving.

Careful Randy, John Kerry might have his boys watching you.

They can watch all they want. But… And I still don’t like him. I mean he even looks like a Socialist/marxist.

Good afternoon, Yard.

Good afternoon Ray and the rest of the Yard. A pretty but windy day out there, but I still plan on working on our garden area. We're making it smaller this year but will still use the 25 tubs behind our deck as well.

Afternoon Yard!

We got hit with a whole bunch of heavy wet snow. Snapped power poles all over the place. We lost power at 645am and thankfully only lost it for about 14 hours.

Part of my chicken coop collapsed but its fixable once I can dig it out of the snow.

Otherwise it was a nice relaxing day. We stayed warm and I wouldn't have needed supplemental heat if I wasn't running a brooder with some chicks that are about a week and a half old.

It did teach me a few lessons on things I need to tighten up.

I didn't need my gas generator. But I had also forgotten to drain the fuel when I last used it. So as soon as the snow clears I'm dumping the fuel and try to clean up the carb. I would be surprised if it wasn't gummed up.

I had a couple older battery banks and was able to keep my phone charged. My wife, not so much. She likes her tablet and phone when she's bored. To keep phones charged I need a bigger power bank. Not to mention FM radios and GMRS radios for extended events.

I was pretty pleased our gas fireplaces still fired up. Even though the blowers didn't work the two fireplaces kept the house at a comfortable temp.

I'm ordering a solar generator and a 100 watt suitcase solar panel to keep things charged up for longer term events. More at the wife's reasoning than mine. But it will give me a way to run a GMRS base station in the house.


I have been able to plow and keep ahead of the snow.

I wish we had a gas stove/oven. But a Coleman stove did the trick for cooking meals.

We may get a few more inches of snow. But I think we are past the worst of it.

M/B, glad you're all OK. I keep a few extra 12 volt deep cycle batteries and power inverters on hand for when the power goes out, and a Camp Chef oven / cooktop for emergencies even though we have a gas cooktop and electric oven. We are able to have lights, watch television, listen to our BayGen crank radio, and stay warm with our vent free propane heaters. I have some solar panels for extended periods of blackouts but have never needed to use them................yet. You might consider a couple of these ideas.

I've never seen the oven before. That's pretty cool. We use a Dutch oven for bread and , well a whole lot of other cool dutch oven stuff. But that kind of oven opens up a whole lot of options.

We have a bunch of lights that run off of batteries, power banks and solar chargeable lights (Waka). We also use rechargeable AA and AAA batteries that we can recharge with a range of folding solar panels from 6 watts up to 20. Its handy.

I have been wanting to build a 200 watt solar setup for our chicken run. I have an inverter already for that. I just need to pick up panels and a couple deep cycle batteries. I've never had great luck keeping deep cycle batteries longer than 3 years. That was partly why I got a solar generator. 5 year warranty and supposedly 4,000 full cycles . That's daily o to 100 for 10 years. Plus its the equivalent of 2 or 3 deep cycle batteries. Newer tech batteries. LiFePo4. Is what the battery type is. It looks good on paper and I have heard good things about the type.

Well, my debit card got hacked, AGAIN. Fraudulent charge declined and a new card issued. I STRONGLY urge everyone to have all their cards with a fraud alert put on them.

Good morning Yard. Really windy today and possible storm later, but we got some good work done on our garden area.

M/B, I think I got that oven at Sportsman's Guide; sounds like you have a good game plan.

Randy, sounds like good advice on the cards.

Good afternoon, Yard.

Sorry to hear that, Randy. I had that happen to me once.