We're so helpless these daysFollow

Have you thought about putting groceries outside if it is cold enough? Instead of letting stuff spoil in the fridge, let nature keep it cold. We use our (unheated) garage as a giant refrigerator during the winter months if the temperature drops. Not for long, but say left-over soup has never made any of us sick by leaving it there for a few days.

For me I'd run out of water long before having to worry about my pipes freezing.

But still, 2-3 days with no heat shouldn't bring your home down to below freezing temperatures. I wouldn't bother draining my pipes until the last moment. Mostly because once I did, without any power, I wouldn't have water again until the power came back on.

Just make sure the hotel has power....

Well, I did assume people wouldn't live in something like this. And maybe I was wrong in where I thought Southern Ontario was, but I thought it was that small piece of Canada right in the Great Lakes.

I did say that if they were that worried about pipes freezing over a short power outage then they would want to invest in some housing upgrades. Definitely save a lot of money if a couple days of cold weather could freeze your house. I'm imagining all the heat loss happening there... your house isn't supposed to look like this during the winter.

I'm teaching mine to do it for fun.

[quote=JophielI'd think hotels would be booked around the holidays. [/quote]In resort destinations, sure. Otherwise, it's pretty much a ghost town in all hotels until post Boxing Day.

I'm guessing you're thinking they'd be busy with all the people traveling home to visit relatives. Problem is they're traveling home to visit relatives who insist that they stay with them.

I'll admit that my sole experience was talking into the Washington D.C.area for Christmas. It was pretty well booked up even when we made the reservations but that could have been a situation unique to that location. Maybe they sweep all of the Capitol interns out of the basement.

Also, you guys work in hotels which distorts your view whereas my clear sight of common sense says that I'm right.

Thanksgiving & New Years, for sure. Dunno what Christmas is like there, though. This being New England, most people leave Boston & venture up into the north woods for their Christmas'. Most of our business is business travel related & that doesn't happen much around holidays.

What disturbs me is how many people simply don't own any wool or thermal clothing, let alone entire outfits of it. When i was a kid, and we wanted the heater on in Winter, we got asked if we were wearing wool socks and and a wool jumper (sweater)? If the answer was no, we had to go put on woolen socks and jumpers and then ask again later if we still wanted the heater on. Most of the time we didn't, we were warm and cosy in the right clothes. When i was a kid, while we didn't have much variety in the way of clothes and shoes, at all times I owned: A set of neck to wrist to ankle Thermal underwear. A pair of fine weave woolen slacks, some woolen socks, a fine weave woolen sweater, a chunky weave woolen sweater, a woolen/Thermal scarf, hat and gloves.

Wool stays warm when it gets wet. Wool chars instead of bursts into flame when it gets overheated or exposed to flame. Thermal material also stays warm when it's wet. Machine-wash wool on the Cold-Cold setting, don't tumble-dry it, and it never shrinks. Or buy the pre-shrunk wool clothing.

I hope your lungs are better soon

Wooooo Power!

That would drive me crazy. No mummy bag? Even a regular sleeping bag + blankets would prevent the need for constantly stoking a fire. Unless you are doing it so that it's still going in the morning.


Edited, Dec 25th 2013 12:24am by trickybeck

I do think you're probably too dependent on electricity. There are other heat sources that are good to have around as a backup - propane fireplaces are great for heating and I always keep one of those round kerosene heaters and several gallons of kerosene to run it out in the shed. We were without power when the hurricanes came through here and I can't tell you how great it was to have that little 23k btu piece of nostalgia.

I keep a couple candles around but the best, if you can find them, are those little kerosene lamps for lighting. I love those things. And of course the propane for the bbq and you can get little stoves that run on it too.

You might want to consider throwing some stuff like that in the garage for emergencies.