A Million Little Pieces Of My Mind

Our power has been off for the weekend, but today I learned how to get it back on.

As you know, we have 25 solar panels and a bunch of heavy duty storage batteries. But even though the panels generate electricity under any intensity of light, it's true they generate the most under full sunlight.

So one of the workers on the cottage has an electric car, and had an emergency in which he had to plug it into our power. But that's when the Kona Low storm hit and we spent days wihtout any direct sun at all. And those car batteries take a lot of electricity. So, as a result, Keith and I spent two days in the dark, hoping the food frozen in our refrigerator wouldn't thaw before we got get it back on.

The panels were continuing to charge up the batteries; it's a device called an inverter that turns itself off if the batteries are too low, and that I therefore had to turn on. Somehow.

But since we had no power we had no phone. So we had to drive into town where there's a cellphone signal.

But once there, I could call my grandson, Zach, for instructions. And it really turned out to be quite simple. First, I had to shut off the circuit breakers and then back on. This was probably to make sure none of the circuit breakers had tripped.

Then, I had to use the main panel and find the Inverter button, then hit the on-screen button to turn it on.

And that did the trick! So tonight: Pirates of the Caribbean!