Snow, Power, Wind…

02-16-08

Today was different, quite fun actually. The weather has been fairly quiet the last few days, sunny, calm, a little wind now and again, warm days (in the 40s & 50s), cool nights (30s-40s) but for the most part, uneventful. The humidity is generally pretty low, in the 20-30% range, higher at night, lower in the day.

Last night the humidity got up to 91%! I looked out the window and could see low clouds coming across the mountain tops, obscuring them. Today, it snowed, not much accumulation though, a couple of times it looked like we were in a snow globe and someone shook it up. :) I really enjoyed the snow falling and blowing, the snow fell for a short time, and as soon as the sun peeked out from the clouds, the snow that had accumulated, immediately began to melt. A couple of times, during the snow fall, there was so much snow falling and blowing, I couldn’t see the mountains around me, it was so pretty to see. Sorry I didn’t get any pix, but my cell phone takes terrible pix and with all the snow blowing, all it would have shown was white to light gray on white/light gray…

The snow is gone, but the wind stayed, it’s not that cold outside, but with the wind blowing and gusting, the heat that is generated by the wood stove is pulled out almost faster than we can make it. It also messed up movie night, it’s nearly impossible to hear the little computer speakers on the laptop, that is something that I overlooked before I left Best Buy, I wished I had known, I would have gotten a small set of powered speakers, but live and learn.

Power

We have been doing very well with the power, we have learned how much we can use and still have power left over, ie we don’t run out of battery power any more! We have a total of 4 deep cycle batteries, 2 are hooked up to one set of solar panels and 2 are hooked up to another set of solar panels, we use one set for the water pump on the sink and one light, the other set is for the rest of the lights, computer, fan (rarely used), cell phone and occasionally a small electric blanket. Oh, I almost forgot, we are now running a small cube refrigerator, right now we are leaving it outside, covered with a piece of plastic to keep it dry (just in case). It is in the shade (it’s on the north side of the cabin, so it never gets any sun), and for the most part, the outside temp stays cool to cold so the fridge doesn’t run very much, even so, I unplug it at night, and sometimes even leave it unplugged during the day, just depends on how cool the temps are. This summer, when we need to leave it plugged up all the time, we will have longer days to charge the batteries with the solar panels so that should not be a problem.

Wow, that was a big gust of wind, it sure is noisy and makes the cabin rock and roll, I hope I can sleep tonight, I took a nap today, if this wind keeps up, I expect I will be listening to my MP3 player all night in bed instead of sleeping. Oh well, I can always sleep tomorrow if I need to. :) I am sitting near the wood stove, it really feels good, it’s a comfort to hear the logs crackling and the stock pot full of water bubbling away. It’s only 39 degrees F outside (it’s just past midnight) and the humidity is still pretty high, at 68%, inside the temp is 58 and the humidity is 23% (it normally sits at 16%), but with the wind howling, it feels a lot colder tonight. I guess it’s time to shut this down, put on my pink pj’s and get to bed.

3 Comments

Anonymous said…

I enjoy your blog. I may be mistaken but I guess you are in Texas?? I have a few friends down in that part of the country. Having built my home and shops from recycled material I can understand what you are going through. Keep up the good work and I look forward to your next post. Chuck in Phoenix

February 19, 2008 9:41 PM

Dragon said…

Hi,I just stopped by to see how ya were doin.I hope all is well in your neck of the woods,Dragon

February 20, 2008 12:18 AM

Wretha said…

Chuck, thanks for your comment! Yes, we are in far west Texas, I used to live in Irving Texas, this is quite a change for me, though I have always dreamed of living in the desert AND on a mountain, I get the best of both worlds, :)

Dragon, thanks for your comment! We are doing great, I have been learning about bees on that Yahoo group, I plan on trying to find their hive this spring, and I might try to harvest some of the honey if I can, to my knowledge I am not allergic to bee stings, and these bees are very docile, I have learned there is a hydroponic tomato farm not too far away from me, and they use bees to pollinate the tomatoes, I believe my bees may be from there.

I checked our your blog, very nice!

Wretha

February 21, 2008 6:29 PM