Hurricane Irene was downgraded to a tropical storm by the time it hit us last week. Even so with high winds and rain, more than half the population of the state lost power, some for more than a week.We were without power for three days. The 25# of ice in blocks I froze in preparation wasn't enough to keep our refrigerator cold long enough to avoid losing most of what was in it. It was no great loss.
The deck looked like a whole tree had been shredded. We had two trees come down in the yard and a fence was blown down. We were lucky. The picture above is a tree in one neighbor's yard that fell and landed on another neighbor's house.
There is no public water in our area so we have a private well. The water is pumped from the well into the house. No power, no pump, no water. And no flushing toilets. You can flush by pouring a bucket of water into the tank but you have to have that water available, too.
We were fairly well prepared. Paul had filled a container with a few gallons of drinkable water, and I had bought three gallons of bottled water. We filled up two other containers which probably held a total of ten gallons to flush toilets with and wash with.
It is amazing how little water we used. We did the usual washing and brushing of teeth. Paul heated water to take a half cold bath/shower a couple times. I went to my mother's once for a hot shower. She had running, hot water.
We managed to cook a few meals. First on the camp stove in the garage while the storm was going and then on the gas grill later. I used regular dishes and heated water to wash them.
When the lights came on after three days we had only used part of the utility water and were no where near using all the potable water. We were stunned by how little water we had used.
Even though we think we are fairly conservative and try not to waste water, it was amazing how little we managed to exist on. I guess we should try a little harder.
