I decided to take a run to Sams. I was really thinking about that generator.
As I got there I noticed the line for gas was only about 50 cars. Now that may sound like a lot, but believe me it's not. That's the shortest line I've seen for gas in awhile. I had just over half a tank but decided it was best to fill up now. Plus I had two five gallon tanks in the car I wanted to fill. It took less than thirty minutes to get to the pumps. Sams had employees along the line, handing out drinks, sandwiches, bannas to people waiting in their car. When I filled up with gas three days ago it was $2.75 a gallon. Today it was $2.99 a gallon. It cost me almost fifty dollars to fill up my car and the two gas tanks.
Now that I had gas I was going to go get a generator. Sams no longer was making people wait in line to get in. I went and got the smallest generator, it has a capicaity for 3500 watts, the bigger ones went up to 5500 watts. The problem is that I don't know what that really means. After getting the generator home in the instructions it lists different applicances and how many watts it takes. A light takes only 100 watts, the charger for this laptop less than that. A small air conditioner unit uses almost 1700 watts. The generator is supposed to last at least 12 hours. I couldn't have gotten the bigger generator, the small one was almost too heavy for me to lift and carry. But I've got it set up now on my porch and I have a lamp burning and my fan running and am typing this with the charger. I almost feel like a normal person again. The only drawback is that the generator is loud....very loud. But that's a small price to pay. I'm thinking I may still use the battery and the power invertor to run the fan at night, so it won't be so noisy and that way I can use the generator during the day to run the fan or whatever else I need to. I can even use my microwave. Even a small refrigerator only uses something like 500 to 600 watts. My only worry with getting a small refrigerator is that I don't know if I'll be able to keep the generator running all the time, and than everything in the refrigerator would go bad. Gas is going to be the problem with the generator. And making sure when I leave that I put it inside my house. I could see someone coming by and stealing it.
The neighbors that came back today have a generator too. I've heard it all day long. That's how noisy they are, I can hear theirs across the street. I'm sure tonight when it really gets quiet outside you'll be able to hear it for quite a distance.
Also coming home from Sams today I checked my cell phone again. I've been keeping it in my glove comptment turned off, to save power since it is so hard to charge it. Wonders never cease! I got service! I couldn't believe it! I had a bunch of messages from people trying to check to see how I've been doing over the past week. I was surprised to hear a voice from someone I haven't talked to in years, Paul Stewart. Paul and I used to work together years ago, and we became pretty good friends. He moved to California and get remarried and we kept in touch and than we just stopped like some long distance friendships do. I don't think it was either of our fault or intentional, it just got longer and longer in between talking. He was trying to get hold of as many people as he knew from the area, my voice mail was the first actual voice he had heard so far.
I decided to call Heather and see how she was, she had left a couple messages on my machine. She was actually the last person I talked to on my cell phone. She had called me as we were driving up to Memphis the day before the hurricane. Right after we talked is when my cell phone stopped working. I got her on the first try. She is in Alabama with her family. They are thinking of coming back towards home Wednesday. They may go to Baton Rouge. College restarts for her Thursday. She goes to college in Hammond, which is going to be too far for her to drive back and forth from Slidell to school with the problem of getting gas. Baton Rouge is closer, so she might try that. Plus she talked to someone at work and they told her if she wanted to she could work at the Baton Rouge store until she gets back to Slidell. The company is going to pay all the associates for this week.
I didnt' get much more accomplished this afternoon. It took me awhile to get the generator together and running. I just can't believe that I have a lamp on. My living room is lighted. It is so awesome.
Today was a good day.
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