Ron says there is a dark cloud hanging over this house since the day we bought it. A month or so ago they went through the park and replaced all the electric meter pedestals. Normally they site between the homes with four meters on each pedestals. Last night just before dark our back yard camera alerted us there was motion and then we noticed the power fluctuating. Turned out our neighbor had called the power company because they had problems. They were out there for hours until the power went out.
Then they left about 2 PM. Ron uses a C-Pap machine and so he was up all night. I offered to get one of the back up batteries but he did not want me to do that. This morning he contacted the power company and was told they shut the power off to the pedestal because the company the park used screwed something up and they needed to come back and fix .
So this morning Ron got the “Beast” out. It is a very large powerful generator. He ran a few heavy extension cables around to run the fridge, the living room TV, living room A/C The coffee maker and Ice machine. He ran another cord to my office to power all my computers and internet stuff. He went to the park office and they knew about the issue but did not know when they could get someone out to fix it. That means it could be days with out power running on the generator. So we will need to get the hot plates and small microwave out so we can cook. No way to do laundry. This sucks.
As Ron was up all night he is very tired. He brought his C-Pap out to the living room. At night we will run the cords powering the living room to the bedroom to power his mask and the A/c. We are waiting for a call from the vet to bring the cat in for a bolus of fluid. He has not eaten in days nor drank water. She gave us medication to make him eat and some stuff to get his stomach going. Hugs
Best Wishes and Hugs,
Scottie
Scottie's Playtime 
It seems someone could have made a courtesy notice of the power outage. I’m sorry that’s happening. It seems worse than inconvenient, to me, but I know you two have dealt with it before, just not the same situation. Take good care!
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Hi Ali. Thank you. But apparently the original company that replaced the pedestals made a mistake that caused some of the lines underneath the ground to burn themselves up / out. So we had some nice guys come and not only fix that but fix the pedestal mistake. They had to run a bunch of heavy new lines from the main heavy voltage box to the pedestal. They are laying on the ground for another company to come and bury them.
As for the generator it is called the Beast. Yes that is the name on it. After Maria we were out of power for a week and Ron was suffering. So he demanded I find a generator that would fit our needs. I lucked out. Home Depot had this large Sportsman model on sale. It was normall$1000 but they were selling it for $600. I bought it.
After Ian the Beast not only powered our fridge, a dual hot plate, a small microwave, two window A/Cs, our coffee maker, my computers, Ron’s C-Pap, a few lights, and the neighbor’s fridge and a couple lights. The only problem with it is loud. But it puts out power so I don’t care. During this short outage of only most of the day we had all our comforts.
The generator does bother the electricians and we have to reassure them it is not connected into the electrical system so they won’t get electrocuted by it. It is that powerful. The bad part is running it full out takes about a 40 pound tank of propane almost every 2 days. Hard to get during after a hurricane, but it also will run on gas, so as James works for the county we have access to that also. Hugs
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Those are really hard knocks.
Take care you guys. We truly admire your perseverance and courage
Roger & Sheila
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Hi Roger. We have been lucky. With Ron’s skill and knowledge of construction he has been able to fix the structural problems wrong with the house, the biggest problem is having the money to do so. We just had to take $800 out of our small savings to give our inside cat an emergency vet visit and treatment, then there were more costs for medication and it is iffy if he will live through the weekend. He will either decide to again eat / drink or on Monday we will have to help him on the way across the rainbow bridge. Please read what I replied to Ali about our generator. It is the biggest one I have seen in the park and I lucked out getting it. Hugs
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That’s a heck of a lot of work to face at this time of year Scottie.
How is your little cat?
Take care
Roger & Sheila
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Hi Roger. I know I was late replying but the cat decided it was his time to pass. I wrote a post on it. Hugs
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🙏❤️
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“Own a home”, they said! “It’s Great! No more pasky landlords!” they said 🙂
Going on 32 years now of owning a 72-year old house 😎 I think we’ve finally replaced the last big system to fail catastophically just last year, so I’m assuming it will soon to be time to start replacing any of them for the second time.
(and while it’s our house and we love all 1462 square feet of it, It is most definitely not a “charming old house”…it’s just old with a weird layout..seriously the outside perimiter looks suspiciously ‘fractal-ish’, and all the walls interior and exterior are cinderblock which makes things like ‘updating the electrical’ a lesson in demolition. “Hang a picture”? LOL!!!
When we bought it it had a 60 amp electrical service, by way of the previous owner upgrading the original 30 amp one by ‘sticking in bigger fuses’. That was the very first thing to fix…)
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Hi Bruce. I so understand what you are saying. We bought this home in January 2007. The prior owner forgot to tell us they had termites that they had treated for. The first week we moved in the refrigerator started to fall through the floor. After Ron fixed that, I went to walk into one of the bedroom closets and the floor gave out under me. It got to be a joke with the neighbors how much floor damage we had so that one neighbor told Ron to stop me falling through the floor he should chain me up in the front yard when he went to work. We asked around and found out the roof had been torn off during a hurricane and the house took massive water damage. Would have been nice for the new owners to tell us.
So Ron redid the flooring, he upgraded the electric which you mentioned was an issue for you, and he has worked on this house since 2007. He is now 70 and he says he is getting tired of it. But if we can figure out where the water is pouring under the house then the remodeling will get back to being smooth sailing. That is the issue we have not solved yet.
Our home is a 1984 double wide which is before the 14 wide each sides. So it is like 24 wide. Ron has had to replace all the exterior walls except one and all but one interior wall. But that is OK because he moves them. Ron took the front room that the other owners had enclosed with heavy acrylic windows and he removed them and made it a built in part of the house. He used those windows to enclose the carport. So our home is 56.5 long and 24 wide with a side room of 37 long by 15 wide. Off the enclosed carport is a large shed built into the home. If we can ever get the construction done it will be a grand house.
Ron has changed the floor plan five times and he has made a huge kitchen with so much storage cupboards and a huge island. He just has to finish off the things he has started. But every time he gets fixing one thing some other crisis comes up. Hugs
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Life has a way of jumping up and biting you in the ass. Often at the worst possible moment.
I wonder if the contractor who screwed up will see that happen to him/them? Being Fla. I kind of doubt it.
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Hi Shell Digger. I have often been so happy to read your self sufficiency and ability to figure things out. You remind me of Ron in that regard. You can make things work. That makes you like Ron, my husband. He often makes things work when I have no clue as to how to move forward.
In the early afternoon a couple of people showed up and I went out to talk to them. The reason was I wanted to reassure them the generator was not hooked into the system as I can understand why they would worry it would be feeding back on them. They thanked me for that.
If you read the replies I made to the others you can see both the screwed up trouble we have had with this home and also the wonderful grace of Ron being able to do construction, plumbing, and electric.
The former owner was a chest thumping bible Christian. He failed to tell us of the damage to the house we found out he knew about because he had painted a wall all the way to pulling up the floor rug to paint down into a large hole. He actually painted the hole in the floor. I do not understand why some people are that way, I thought we were friends.
The electricians fixed the problem and got our power on, they checked with me before turning the power back on worried if what we had the generator running on would harm our devices. He explained that they had to run a bunch of high voltage power cables from the large power company box to the pedestal and that they would hazard tape those off but please don’t go near them until the people come to burry them. I really thought these guys were spot on in their work and how they dealt with us. In fact when the one guy came to my door to talk to us after the work was done, he was surprised when I thanked him and his coworker and offered my hand to shake. He gave a large smile when I shock his hand. I wonder if these guys don’t get thanked enough. Hugs
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Every story deserves a happy ending. Glad that all worked out.
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