[lizardlady]

I love living in the boonies, really, but there are times....

We got one humdinger of a storm yesterday. I was turning the oven on to start dinner when there was a loud noise out side and a flash. I about pooed my drawers. Power went out. For those of you who live in the city no power out in the boonies is a major pain. It not only means no lights, A/C, etc it means no water. Gotta have power to run the pump.

This happens often enough I have the power company's power outage number programmed into my phone. It took four attempts to complete the call because the signal kept dropping out. (Wind and rain means rotten cell reception in the boonies too.) It took four and a half hours to get the power back on due to a series of SNAFUs. Yeh, power = water! Hopped in the shower. I was totally covered in soap suds when the water flow got really slow, then none at all. Well crap. Wiped off the soap best I could and went out to check the well. There I am dripping, still had soap on me while ants and mosquitoes tried to eat me alive while I checked out the pump using emergency lights. Looked like the points were blown. Should have been a simple fix, but couldn't get it done last night. Finally decided I'd deal with it in the morning.

Dipped water out of the horses' trough and carried it in the house. Heated some on the stove and rinsed off the soap residue. Not the best way to get clean, but better than leaving the soap on me.

Point replacement today required TWO trips into town for parts. Again it was a series of SNAFUs trying to install them. I've done this a zillion times before. It's an easy half hour job usually. Not today. Murphy's Law ruled, if it could go wrong it did. Finally got the new points installed and still no water!

Gave in and called the well guy. Bless his soul (that's a Southern thing). He came out and got things fixed. It wasn't the points. It was the capacitor. Might have been the storm yesterday or it could just be rotten timing. He said the capacitor was ancient.

Bottom line is I have both power and water tonight. I am looking forward to a nice long hot shower tonight.

What's all this have to do with country living you ask? If you live in the city and the power or water go out you call the appropriate agency and they fix it. If you live in the boonies you have to do most repairs yourself. I take pride in being able to look after the farm, but the last couple of days have been a trial.

[*Laurie*]

That sounds so stressful. I really give you credit for managing country living, liz.

[unaluna]

They been selling white painted horse troughs to us city folk as fancy bathing tubs, ya know.

[eskielover]

Even with all the headaches of the DIY fixes I wouldn't trade country living for city living ever.

After 54 years of city living I hated since a kid these last 11 years of living in the country have convinced me it is the way to go.

I don't have a well but when the electric goes out so do the pumps on the water towers. I am lucky because I have a running creek from springs across the street that runs very close to the front of my farm & right across the back of my 10 acres just on the other side of the woods so if I get desperate for water hauling buckets will work.

My 2nd winter here we had an ice storm. I was in the process of changing my heat pump over to electric & was using up the last of my propane on my water heater before changing it over to electric too. Great timing.....I ran out of propane the 2nd day of the ice storm so no electric or propane that whole week. Then getting the water heater installed took longer than that week.

I have the outage line programmed in my phone too. I am on the very end of the line so anything that goes out along the way makes my power go out so they get calls from me quite often.

It is definitely worth it to live like we do & being able to fix the things we can is a really empowering feeling. May be frustrating at times but worth it completely

[Nammu]

I love how you use humor to talk about the "trials" of country living. Hope you have a long hot soapy shower.

[unaluna]

Well Im in a medium size city highish rise apartment and funny thing is i got the app for my electric power company on my home phone screen too! But all i can do is fan myself and wait.

[amicus_curiae]

Damn!

That ud make me lose my religion! (And that’s a very Southern thing.)

[lizardlady]

Thanks everyone.

I had a nice long hot shower last night. It felt like a luxury.

Eskie is right. I wouldn't trade living here for the city. I love where I live. It's just days like yesterday that wear on me.

[WishfulThinker66]

I both hear and feel for you. I lived briefly on a small hobby farm and yep, a power outage is more than a nuisance to sit around a few candles with. Gotta keep the animals watered yes. But I found the worse was not using the toilet.

[Travelinglady]

I grew up on a farm, liz, so I know what you mean.

[Sometimes psychotic]

Why not get a generator? My parents have one that just boots up when the power goes out....and they live in the city 🌃 well suburbs but still they don’t want to lose ac/refridge or tv.....

[eskielover]

They are really expensive to get one wired to run the whole house.....at least everyone here in Ky says they are expensive. Many have geothermal heat pumps & others use back-up propane to run their heat pump systems (AC & HEAT there is a switch in the unit) but to run appliances it is expensive to retrofit something like that though not as expensive when initially building

[Sometimes psychotic]

Originally Posted by eskielover

They are really expensive to get one wired to run the whole house.....at least everyone here in Ky says they are expensive. Many have geothermal heat pumps & others use back-up propane to run their heat pump systems (AC & HEAT there is a switch in the unit) but to run appliances it is expensive to retrofit something like that though not as expensive when initially building

There are two kinds, you can get a cheaper one that will run an ac or pump or whatever that you can run an electric cord to, and then there are the whole house ones that are a lot more it just depends on what you actually need...we got by with the cheaper ones for many years....something to consider...

[eskielover]

I know living alone I could never move my large refrig to run a plug to it. I have a small gas powered one I got during the ice storm we had my 2nd winter here. It was basically good to run light off of, charge my cell phone & run a 2 burner cooking appliance off of so I could heat water (or melt snow/ice) & cook mostly heat up canned foods because I really didn't feel like messing with anything more just for me. I had it set up on my front deck so the fumes wouldn't come into the house but had to run the cord through a window that had to be slightly open for the cord. It got me by for $300+ I paid for it. The small one I have won't handle the 220 that is needed for my heat pump

[Fresia]

I am so sorry for your ordeal. You have my deepest sympathies. I know Murphy can be real bugger. It sounds like though you got O'Reilly's Law that night, heard of him? O'Reilly is the one that said Murphy is an optimist.

I am really going to miss living in the country for many, many reasons even for all the headaches. I wish I could have afforded to stay. I did break down last year and installed a permanent generator. The power was going out enough that was tired of it and having no water If it were just lights, because with the wood stove I had heat so that's one thing that's fine, but the water got to me. It made things SO nice and was well worth it. 2 mos after installing it, the power went out in the southern half of state for 12 days and another 6 days a few months later...as far as I'm concerned it paid for itself in peace of mind.

Knowing this, you reminded me I need to do this at the new house too before winter comes. First call I will make today when they open. Thank you for the reminder. I am sorry you had to go through that. Enjoy the repairs and peace of mind that it's fixed!

[lizardlady]

Thanks again everyone.

I've considered getting a generator, but it would not have solved the problem last week. The problem with the well was that a part that controls the pump wore out/broke. Even with the power on there was no way the pump was going to work.