09-04-2026 — Tormss

Howdy all. Yesterday went from drizzly and humid to Big Arse T’storms around 5:30-7:00 pm.

I got this at 5:49 and it just had started thundering. But that was the start of no good.

Yes, there were tornadoes in the area.

Power had been down a couple blocks east of here most of the day. Well it dropped for me about this time. And, I switched over to battery backup. After shutting down AC, I would have made it through the night on batteries.

Being a good citizen, I tried to report the outage to the power company. Their servers must have been overloaded. Couldn’t complete the report on either the computer, nor on phone by text. I kept trying, and maybe 10 minutes later, I got it in.

And, as I sat back, so proud of myself, I noticed I wasn’t hearing the loud generator that someone uses a couple houses north of here. It was raining so hard, I couldn’t see out the window to see if the houses across the road had lights. So, I checked my outside security cameras. The street lamps were on. They are on the same circuit as the houses.

Power had resumed before I even completed my outage request. Oh well, there were still 55,000 others without power in the area (per the electric company’s website).

I was able to switch back to street power, and charge the batteries to full. They’ve drifted back to 95% or so by this morning. I really want that one more 6KW expansion battery on the EcoFlow DPUX unit. Was lucky that I could save power by not using AC this time. Just wish EcoFlow would do one of their sales. It would save me a couple hundred dollars.

Oh, speaking of dollars, did I mention that the Dental insurance company decided it would cover one of the two extractions/implants? Yeah, strangely they paid a percentage for the old implant extraction, and the implant of the tooth on the other side. Overall, the surgeon sent back a refund of over $1000. That won’t cover the battery, but it may cover my costs on the new crowns for one of the teeth. The checkup by the surgeon is the first week of October, and then I’ll quickly schedule the impression appointment at the regular dentist’s office.

On the productivity front, I am continuing to do some stuff. Yesterday I did something that was on my list for a couple years. I moved some furniture out of the way, and was able to lift the 3 × 5 foot clear floor mat that “protects” the carpet in this desk’s area. There was “crud” under the clear pad somehow, and the carpet hadn’t been cleaned for years. I did clean the pad, and the carpet beneath, before putting the pad back down. Now it doesn’t look icky.

And this morning, I swapped out the showerhead in the master bathroom. I hated the old, low-flow, showerhead. I certainly don’t agree with The Donald the T-Rump often, but he is correct that these low-flow heads are a waste of money, and water. It took me less than 30 minutes to get the new hose and sprayer showerhead installed, WITHOUT any apparent leaks. And more importantly, my shower this morning took less than half the time as previously, because I was able to rinse off any soap/shampoo in seconds, instead of many, many, minutes. And my hair feels cleaner too.

Gee, could I be wrong about Tariffs? NO - Not a freaking chance.

I don’t know what’s in store for the rest of today. The two or three major items on my Handyman To-Do list, are either things I cannot do, or things I am afraid (physically unable) to do. Like change batteries in the smoke detectors. My forked up feet, and ladders, do not work well together. And, fixing that cable / power cord tunnel run in the upstairs hallway, would require someone to kneel on the floor. That someone is not me. My knees are worse than my feet. The last item is stabilize the raised garden bed walls by pounding in 3 foot long metal posts on the outside. They need to go a foot into the ground (at least). I’m not sure I should be outside with a sledge hammer…

Of course there is the planting of the flower bulbs I want done. But that should really wait another month or so to guarantee they don’t try to grow this year. Digging holes with a shovel, isn’t something I can do easily either.

Maybe I’ll just finish my laundry today and watch some Tubes. Just relax and Enjoy Life