POWER OUTAGE PRACTICE - Saturday, March 30

Just a reminder that Saturday night is your Earth Hour opportunity to test your power outage preparation skills - At 8:30PM your local time, turn off anything and everything that requires mains power, get out your flashlights and lanterns, and dig in for an hour of blackout entertainment.

When the power goes out, do you know which lights you'll use in which application in your house? Or who will get which light? Do you know where the local news station is on your radio? Have you actually practiced/tried any of these things? Now's your chance! For an hour you can turn everything off and see what actually works and what doesn't in practice. If you value *being prepared* and want to know ahead of time what to do the next time the power goes out, this is the crash course you've been waiting for. I'll be relaxing with my family under the ceiling-bounced warm-tint glow, listening to some entertaining talk radio..

Some ideas for your one-hour power outage:

The Battery-Powered Radio: Once you're in an actual power outage, there's no TV or internet to get updates from - How many people are affected by this outage? Is the cause over, or is another problem headed your way? Are there special instructions for staying put or evacuations? If you have a battery-powered radio and you know where your local news station is, you can remain informed up-to-the-minute without skipping a beat. You might get better reception in one area of your living space than another, or one station might provide more updates than another; you won't know until you experiment - it's a good thing you're doing a practice power outage to find out!

When you've found your news station, you probably won't want to listen to it nonstop for this drill, so tune around, see what's out there. There are lots of talk and entertainment shows you probably don't know about, and over on the AM band, you can receive stations from many hundreds of miles away, see what's playing in other states. You can have the radio on in the background while you're doing anything else, so find something fun and enjoy.

Board/Card Games: Been a while since everyone sat at the table and played a game? A lantern or ceiling-bounced light and it's on! (Don't forget the physical copy of the Scrabble dictionary..)

Fondue: No utilities needed for a steno burner; grab some chocolate and some fruit/cookies/whatever and dip in. Everyone feels a lot better about power outages once you get chocolate involved..

Glow Sticks for the Kids: A few minutes in the dark will show you how completely useless glow sticks are for just about anything (something I learned during an actual power outage!) but kids love 'em and are endlessly entertained by them. A fine distraction since they're cheap and don't last that long anyway.

Family Photo Album: A nice quiet time to flip through family pictures by the lantern/EDC light.

Stargazing: You'd be amazed how much better you can see stars just by having your own local lighting out, and not everyone has time/realizes you have to sit out for at least ten minutes before your eyes truly adjust. Be sure to keep count of satellites and shooting stars.

I remember a few years ago you made a post like this, because I remember that the power was out and I asked you if this was mandatory, because the power was out in the whole town lol.

Now's a good time to inspect those primary cells and see if they're holding up to their "long life" storage claims. Maybe a good time to practice using MREs by lantern. Think that's what I'll do for dinner Saturday night. I've always got a light in my pocket when home. Only time it's not in my pocket is when I'm showering or in bed. If the power goes out, I'm always ready to go. Wouldn't take but a few seconds to go get a bigger light when needed. Plus I always keep forgetting there's a light on my cellphone lol.

I think ill pull out my led flickering candles, crack open a MRE and scan the shortwave band on my Grundig. I can already smell the FRH warming up the entree pouch and taste the peanut butter spread and crackers :laughing:

Gearing up..

Growing up we was dirt poor and much of the time we had no power .but as a adult I like when the power goes out

raggie33 said:

Growing up we was dirt poor and much of the time we had no power .but as a adult I like when the power goes out

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I'm glad to know I'm not the only one that's like that. I always kept it to myself lol. I don't mind it to much at all in the winter, but I hate it in the summer. I tolerate cold a lot better than I can tolerate heat. It hit 74 here today and I was already thinking about starting the central air.

Frijid said:

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one that's like that. I always kept it to myself lol. I don't mind it to much at all in the winter, but I hate it in the summer. I tolerate cold a lot better than I can tolerate heat. It hit 74 here today and I was already thinking about starting the central air.

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O2Cool battery-powered fans; they come in a range of shapes and sizes, I like the 5" model powered by 2 D cells (or two Eneloop AAs in D sleeves,) perfect for setting on the table you're sitting at or ottoman in front of the couch - presto, a nice breeze with no cables regardless of where you are. And it's battery-powered, so it doesn't matter if the power's on or not. $8.

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Great minds must think alike. I have two of those from the same brand and same size. Only difference is mine are white. I bought the first one from Amazon for around like 12 bucks I think. I found the second one about 3 months later in a Goodwill for 2 bucks. The only thing wrong with it, was that little plastic piece that "clicks" when you adjust the fans position was broke off. It stays in place when at a 90 degree angle, but won't any other position, which is fine by me because blowing straight at me is the way I would use it anyways. I find the performance subpar on low, but high works ok. Works just as good with the D adapters, minus the shorter run times. I do usually keep a 6,8 or 10 pack of D's for them. I do need to get me some actual eneloop D adapters again after I lost mine. The ones I've got, I bought at rite-aid, 3.99 for a 4 pack. They work good, but I only use them for alkalines, because they go in from the top, and "clamp" around the negative end. It's a solid hold and they work as intended, but they tear the wrapper around the battery upon removal, so I only use them on alkalines. I do need to pick up a set of eneloops ones that won't affect the wrapper so I can use my eneloops AAs....

I have seen at, I believe it was Wal-Mart, a bigger fan that ran on like 8 D batteries. That just sounds like reverse charge hell with eneloops and that many cells lol