Power to the People

Six years later, another weekend of Cinco De Mayo loonacy at the camp with the construction-minded Loonatics.

Yep.  Cinco de Mayo and still snow remaining in the massive pile
that gets created when the weight of the roof drift
overcomes the friction on the north side of the garage.

Don't ever stand here.

Look at all that debris emerging from the snow.  Forgot all about having to take care of that.  In honor of Cinco de Mayo, and the brave and outgunned Mexicans who repulsed the French, that will be dealt with...mañana.

Pretty much sums it up.

Each of the Loonatics has received a fabulous team logo hat, which also features his camp name, so that death and destruction do not result from ownership confusion.  To be completely truthful, each Loonatic except Chowdahead has received a hat.  He whines incessantly about not having one, even though he did not join the fowl band until after the most recent distribution.  Perhaps patience will be rewarded in the future.  But is waiting with whining really patience?

The two you see adjacent the sign are for Thing 1 and Thing 2.  These are provided to honorary loons during the time they are on-site.  

We often joke, "A bunch of amateurs with power tools and beer in the woods. What could possibly go wrong?"

Now we know.

Don't stand here either.
Windstorms like the one we endured Friday evening
have a habit of knocking trees down,
occasionally with ill effect.

This is not a backwoods religious symbol.
See the ceramic insulator on the left end of the yardarm?
See one on the right?
Gone with the wind.

The windstorm took down the lines and the power went out for the weekend. The damage was not limited to this one little pole. Since we're near the end of a dead end road with very few residents, the power company elected to go to other poles of priority long before patching our pickle.

Since we're not Amish, we rely on electricity to work. And most of us drink beer, but that's just an evil side effect of electricity, as the Amish will tell you. So off went the provisioning party to petition the purveyor of impermanent power. The ride out of the hills was rewarded with a brand new Champion Generator from Tractor Supply.

Just moved the snowshoes to the garage last week.
This generator was the preferred model because it came with a free t-shirt.
Upon seeing the shirt, Mary said, "Let me know when you're going to wear that thing
so I can be elsewhere."

A fine addition to the wardrobe,
which contains much worse.

Though we had to do a bit of juggling to run power to multiple buildings, we powered tools and the fridge, so all was well. Except the for the pump in the well, but who needs a shower, anyway?

Make one of these, and all of your troubles will be over,
especially if you put your fingers in the wrong place.

Remember to flip the main breaker to off so that the double-male contraption above can carry the power from the generator to the panel and the house without trying to power the grid.  Or have the generator all wired in and automatically substituting for the grid so that you hardly even know there is a power outage.  Hah!  Where's the adventure in that?

The answer is that the adventure is in your bank account.  There have been enough of those adventures lately.  So this expensive wired-in, auto-switching, auto-cycling (gotta run every so often, too) solution can wait.  At least 'til some figurative mañana.

Since any generator can only create a limited amount of power, numerous opportunities for creative solutions arise.  One such solution is shown below.

This ancient radial arm saw was placed on casters
so that it could be rolled closer to the generator.
At 2 extension cord distance, there was not enough current to start the saw.
A single cord away, the blade lazily ramped up to cutting speed
in a few seconds.

Yes, of course, we could have moved the generator, but that would have meant putting the fridge on the long cord run, or not powering it at all.  Remember the part about us not being Amish?

And yes, certainly we could have skillfully placed the beer in the remaining snow, but that would have meant walking ALL the way to the back of the garage when thirsty.

And yes, unquestionably, we could have dug snow out of the bank and filled coolers or other containers full of beer, but that sounds like work.

And yes, undoubtedly, we could have purchased ice on during a trip to civilization, but that melts all over the refrigerator and makes a mess (it did).  And there was food in the fridge as well, although a secondary concern.

Both hungry and not Amish.
Also quite brilliant when that headlamp is on.

What else could go wrong?

Really not what you want to see when you're many miles from a garage.
Yeah, the spare did not look much different.

Thankfully, the generator-compressor combination
made the this problem less of an issue.
And since there were other vehicles around,
sloth and lethargy allowed this fix to be done without the generator.

Since misfortune tends to happen in threes, the triad of calamity was completed by the last minute scratch of one of the members.  As a responsible owner of commercial property in far away New Hampsire, Mr. Bud Lightnin' had leased a meeting-place building to a Church Congregation.  The Pastor had prepared a powerful sermon which brought to life the travails of Noah, who with his family and non-human friends, braved the cleansing flood of the earth.

So powerful was this sermon that even before its intended Sunday delivery, a similar cleansing flood inundated the building (via a burst pipe). Our own diligent Bud Lightnin' subdued the longings of his heart and dutifully remained where the citizens live moisture-free or die, cleaning the building after the flood, just as Noah and his family must have done for the ark.

But even with all these tribulations, a good deal was accomplished.

Basement entry door upgraded to a steel exterior door.
Fie upon the rodents and drafts.

Lovely flashing has been applied to the underside of the deck
to divert water elsewhere.
Now the space can be used for storing fireplace wood,
or for spreading out a blanket and singing the Drifter's,
"Under the Board Deck."

"This knotty pine in the garage upstairs room looks really great," said the blind carpenter...

...as he picked up his hammer and saw.

Shortly before all arrived, a matching metal insert was fashioned
to provide a finished look over the fridge.

And the leftover material provided augmented tanning capabilities.

All in all, a confusing and tumultuous but productive weekend.  The power returned just after all the work was completed.  Later, the tale of the triumph of the Loonatics was related to Mary. 

"Oh sure.  You get a generator for your Loons, but not for me during all those times I've suffered through outages."

"All you had to do was pick up a saw!!!"