Friday, December 26, 2008, 05:26
The Information Age, Toaster Ovens and Solar Lights
I thought this was supposed to be the information age? What with the Internet, and cell phones and whatever else there is to transfer information quickly, it ought to be the information age.
Wednesday I had gotten a bee in my bonnet that I wanted some white compact fluorescents for the house. The regular compacts, with their orangish-yellow light, were driving me crazy. It is bad enough that the days are short and it starts getting dark at 4:30 p.m., but then to have to spend time in the house in the evening with sickly dim orange light (even with compact fluorescents that were the equivalent of 100 watt incandescents) was just too much.
Randy had the afternoon off from work because it was Christmas Eve, so he came to town with me. We have not had a toaster since last spring when one of the kittens, Henry, Katerina or Dora, stepped on the lever, started the toaster, started a kitchen towel on fire, melted the toaster and nearly burned down the house. We didn't want another toaster and had been thinking for some time we ought to try a toaster oven. While we were in town, we decided to look for toaster ovens. We found one we liked. There was only one problem. The only one left of that model was the display unit on the shelf.
Happily, we were able to get it for 20 percent off. It's an Oster. There was no box, but there was a manual.
Or maybe what I should say, is that there was a rudimentary manual. About four pages in English, and the remainder in various and sundry languages. Randy figured it wouldn't be a problem and that he could go to Oster.com to find out more about the toaster oven.
Right. All that was available at the Web site was the same exact manual we had in a PDF format. The long and short of it is -- we will have to figure the thing out by trial and error. (sigh)
You would think that the least Oster could do is put a more complete manual on their Web site. Lots of other companies do that. They give you the basics. But then if you want the "all you ever wanted to know" version, you can download it from the Internet. Apparently Oster has not gotten that far into the information age.
Toast for Breakfast
For the first time in months, however, we had toast for breakfast Christmas morning! It was cold here at Rural Route 2 Christmas morning at six degrees below zero. But it was surely wonderful to smell toast again! I had baked some raisin bread earlier in the week.
After our toast on Christmas morning, we went to church, and then, even though it was kind of cold outside, we got some sunshine. Randy and I took Pixie for a walk in the afternoon up the dirt road. It was maybe only 18 degrees with a wind out of the south, but it was warm enough that Pixie could walk without limping and holding up her feet. We've had some fluffy snow, and the trees along the old dirt road were covered with snow.
Peach Cobbler
In the evening on Thursday, I used our new toaster oven to bake a peach cobbler. It worked quite well, except after 10 minutes (I had set it for 25 minutes), it beeped and shut off with an "E-1" on the display. What the heck does E-1 mean? We have no idea. It's not covered in what passes for a manual. And Randy couldn't find anything about it on the Oster Web site.
I reset the toaster oven for 350 degrees again and set the timer for 25 minutes. The default is 30 minutes, but I figured the cobbler didn't need another 30 minutes. Once again, after 10 minutes, it beeped, shut off and displayed "E-1." Never mind. The cobbler was done by that point.
I can see that we really are going to have work by trial and error here. But at least we've got a device that will make toast!
Solar Light
Christmas night, by 8 p.m., it had started to snow. The wind that was out of the south had turned to the southeast. Randy and I decided to go down to the barn after it started snowing to see how my new light works. Randy got me a solar powered "garage/barn light" for down in the barn for Christmas.
The barn has never had electricity, and I have to rely on my trusty wind-up flashlight to see my way around at night when I check on the horses, give them more grain and hay, give the kitties more kitty food and put out more warm water for the kitties.
Randy mounted the small solar panel on the outside of the barn, ran the cord through the top of the small door and then hung the light in the middle of the space where I hang my halters and lead ropes and bridles. That way, I can just reach around the corner and turn the light on when I get down to the barn.
The light itself is maybe eight or ten inches long. But it is bright enough from that position that I can see to make my way around the barn. If I have to, I can unplug the solar panel, take the light down off the wall and carry it with me. It's magnetic, so I can always stick it on the tractor if I have to.
Daylight
As for the daylight/white compact fluorescents, it was really an eye-opener when I put them in Christmas Eve. Suddenly the house was filled with bright, white light. I did not replace all of the compacts. The bedroom still has one of the old orange-yellow lights. And the basement has them yet too. The basement isn't so bad because I don't spend a tremendous amount of time down there. The bedroom isn't so bad either. I can certainly tell the difference, though, when I walk in the bedroom and turn on the light. There it is again -- that sickly orange-yellow light.
It was kind of funny because I got the last packages on the shelf of the daylight compact fluorescents. They're kind of expensive, too, at $3.50 for each bulb. There were plenty of other compact fluorescents there. And the daylight fluorescents were not on sale. But apparently lots of other people had been buying them as well. I will have to remember to pick more when I think of it so I've got spares in case I need them. I won't need spares soon though. I cannot remember the last time we changed on the compact fluorescent in the dining room. It's been years.
LeAnn R. Ralph
AUTOGRAPHED BOOKS MAKE GREAT GIFTS!
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Monday, December 22, 2008, 14:59
More Bitter Cold
It was very cold out Monday morning -- 18 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. The sky was clear. And there was little wind. But it was very cold. Not as cold as Sunday morning when it was 16 degrees below zero with a windchill of 30 below zero. But it was still in the frigidly cold range.
Pixie knew it was cold, too. She had a difficult time going outside to take care of her potty business. Well, she did not have a difficult time GOING outside. But once she was outside, she kept trying to walk on one foot while holding up the other three.
You know it is cold outside when the dog is trying to walk on one foot. Poor Pixie. It takes her twice as long to get finished when she cannot decide which foot to put down and which ones to keep up in the air. When she was finished, she was very much ready to come in the house. Me, too.
With the windchill on Sunday morning, I noticed while she was eating her grain that Isabelle was shivering. The snow from the day before had plastered down her hair and was not providing much in the way of insulation. We filled her hay net with hay and also put out hay for her behind her shelter, out of the wind and where it would be in the sun when the sun came out. By the time she had eaten her grain, got a drink of water, got out of the wind and started munching her hay, she was not shivering as much. Thank goodness.
The average daily temperature last week, with the windchill factored in, was 2 degrees below zero. Without the windchill factored in, the average daily temperature was 1.65 degrees Fahrenheit.
We usually do not have average daily temperatures around 1 degree or below zero with the windchill until sometime in January. The cold weather has started early this year, and I am afraid to find out what the weather will be like in January and February.
We are still in a weather pattern of storm systems moving through and weather changes every 12 to 24 hours. Usually we like to say that it will "warm up and snow." But it is not getting very warm when it snows. We've had snow lately when it is only zero or a few degrees above zero. And of course, not very much snow at a time -- a few inches of light, fluffy snow that does not contain much moisture.
LeAnn R. Ralph
AUTOGRAPHED BOOKS MAKE GREAT GIFTS!
Click here to order the Rural Route 2 Cookbook
My new book, The Coldest Day of the Year, is now available.
Click here to order LeAnn's books