Industrial action to the national grid

lostinrates

ChocClare wrote: »

If you fill plastic bottles (coke, juice, milk) that you've washed out well with water, you could put those in your freezer now to fill up all the gaps. Not only will it make your freezer run more efficiently, if the power does go off, you'll have solid blocks of ice in it which will keep everything colder. And you'll even have a fresh water source in case they go on strike as well! :rotfl:Once it's all over, you can just sit them to defrost in the garden and use 'em on your plants - and all for free!

ATM..its pretty full....try to keep it so for efficiency...but no terrified it will waste all the food there in cuts. My freezer is huge and there is a lot of $$ of food in there.

So....run it down and replace content with water?

Lily-Lu

Oh heck; that's all we need:(

We've got a camping stove with extra canisters, so heating food and water shouldn't be a problem, but like a lot of others here, we have GCH which relies on electric as well. It's mild at the moment, so heating isn't needed, but what if this happens when it gets colder? We have no other form of heating, so I'd like to buy something portable just in case. I've had GCH for donkeys years, so have no idea what portable heaters' are available nowadays.

Years ago, my mum had a big paraffin heater, but I really wouldn't fancy one of those in the house. Does anybody have any suggestions, please?

Fruball

pollys wrote: »

I found the power cuts during the 3 day week, exciting. I remember one night sat playing board games by candle light with our elderly neighbour. There was a knock at the door, a friend asking why our lights were still off, the electric had come back on, we were having such a good time we hadn't noticed. We do Earth Hour here the children love it.

Pollys

Earth hour.... now that IS a good idea and will get the kids used to being in the dark too - thanks

Paulie'sGirl

Hi all,

I'd not panic just yet. Working to rule and not doing overtime doesn't mean powercuts and 3 day weeks. Remember that Unions don't have the ball hold they did in the 80s, these days share holders and the consumer are king.

I wont be losing any sleep, I'd suggest no-one else does either.

PGxx

Loanranger

In the bad old days of the three day week, the power went off on a rota basis for three hours at a time.
We had an all electric house, same now.
We knew exactly when it would be going off so we prepared for the cuts in advance.
We used the timer on the electric cooker to cook braised steak etc which would, in theory, be cooked nicely by the time we returned home from work.
I couldn't figure out how to set the timer properly, doh, so a hot meal was somewhat hit and miss. (The cooker was a very old hand me down from the MIL and had no handbook)

TBH, it was a horrible period and am very disappointed that those bad old days may well return.

mardatha

I lived 7 flights up in a multi storey flat, and had to haul a high pram with a newborn in it and a whiney toddler on it in the pitch dark stairwell. I was a lot fitter then LOL

fedupfreda

Yep I remember those days too - but I was 5 then and sitting by candlelight seemed fun I only wish I had a coal fire like we did then I only hope the weather holds off. Blowing a gale atm - thankfully no snow. I cant be the only one who has had enough of the white stuff for one winter - time to restock the storecupboard I think

mardatha

I'm the other way round freda. Now I got the coal fire and the calor gas cooker and enjoy knitting by candlelight !

newleaf

Oh God! 3 day week and power cuts :eek:
I was a teenager last time around.
My (single) mom worked in a biscuit factory at the time (food production = considered a priority industry) so things weren't as bad as they could have been. I never thought I'd live to see those days return though

bluebag

Good lord, it's like the clock has turned full circle. When we had new heating put in the engineer wanted to remove my old gas wall heater and was a bit bemused when I said no, he's about to find out why.

Just dragging stuff out of my memory, a freezer is fine for 24 hours if you keep it closed.

Life won't end without electricity for a few hours, but it's annoying. Shops will probably shut for the power down time as the tills won't work without it this time round, neither will the security tags. Should be fun.