Date: Sun, 21 Jun 1998 23:37:11 -0700
Reply-To: Old Volks Home <jim@OLDVOLKSHOME.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: Old Volks Home <jim@OLDVOLKSHOME.COM>
Subject: And How Was Your Weekend? - No Power No Lights, etc.
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Well, the subject says it all.
It's so much fun living here in rural Northern Calif.
I've been told my phone service won't be back up until at least Tuesday or
Wednesday at the latest. If you try to call, you will most likely get a
BUSY signal. BUT you can still contact me via E-Mail - read on -
Saturday started out OK, doing some parts pulling, getting some backorders
packed ready to ship during the morning hours, then Marc Edwards
(duelist@azaccess.com)(our venerable VintageBus/Type 2 Server Admin from
Flagstaff AZ, now residing in the Bay Area) and his buddy Jake shows up to
get a bunch of stuff for his recently acquired 80 Westfalia.
Didn't have a Hall style coil on hand at the moment, so we packed into his
car to head over to the local Pick and Pull around the corner from the
house to see if we can spot on in one of the "hulks" over there. Found a
good used one in a late model Quantum for a few bucks. Get back to the
office window to pay for it and find they just lost power. OK, if they
lost power, I knew power was out at the house too. We pay for the coil
(and other stuff) and jump back into the car to get back to the house - we
were driving back to overshoot the house to the local mini market for some
cold drinks, when we see everyone in the neighborhood staring at the power
pole in front of my house. Seems the transformer blew up and started a
small fire at the base of the pole - neighbors got it put out. It was
rather warm that day, so I figured the transformer overheated and blew (I
was partially wrong on that one).
On top of that, the water main in front of the house two doors north of me
busted at about the same time and it look like a river flowing front of my
house and the neighbor's as well. Believe it or not, this was related to
the power outage (more details below).
So we decided we'd go to a local "watering hole" I frequent for pizza and
beer. Went into the house to change and call the water company about the
outage (someone with a cell phone reported to PG&E about the power outage),
but the phone was out too! Again this was related to the power outage -
more details below). At anyrate, I grab Jake's Cell Phone to call PacBell
about the phones and tried to call the local water company as well. Then
we head off to pizza and beer and eventually Marc and Jake were on their
way back home. Got home, power, phones, cable were still out. I still had
water pressure and took a shower and spent the rest of the late afternoon
and evening at the Shasta County Fair, couldn't get much accomplished
without at least having some power for the computer (and the
accounting/inventory package). Got home late that Saturday night and found
they had restored power (was out about 6 hours), but still no phones.
What originally set off this chain of events was someone (drunk driver? -
dunno) had run into and snapped one of the main power/telephone poles about
a mile up the road, throwing a considerable part of East Redding into minor
chaos, shutting off all the power, phones and cable to the east side of
town (I'm on the eastern side of Redding, bordering Palo Cedro), as well as
the main power to the pumping substation of the water district. When the
power went off operating the water district's pump, a backup pump had
started (I guess with it's own power supply/generator? I dunno) and surged
so powerfully, that it busted the junction across the street, thus two
houses were without water and the rest was flowing down the street. Water
district truck came by and capped the leak, but couldn't fix the connection
right then, so they asked if I could connect one of their heavy duty hoses
from my house to the immediate next door and I won't have to pay for any
water from Saturday afternoon until they fix the junction either on Monday
or Tuesday. No problem I say, that's what neighbors are for. Too bad I
didn't have a swimming pool to fill up ;-)
So, how am I sending this? Well I have a friend in Redding where I
temporarily installed my E-Mail software back in February when I was having
the "El Nino" related problems with my phone lines. I haven't downloaded
any mail from over the weekend (I will do this on Monday morning), but you
can still contact me at my regular E-Mail address - leave your phone number
and best time for me to call you. I apologize for the inconvenience and
appreciate your understanding. And I apologize to those who have been
trying to call me this weekend and getting nothing but a "busy" signal).
I've been here for five years this past weekend and never had so many
utility problems/outages that I've had in the space of only 5 months. I
hope this is not an omen of things to come. Guess it's part of putting up
with the "rural" living here. Maybe it's time to look for some place a
little more reliable in the power and phones dept.
Cheers!
Jim Thompson
84 Westy 2.1 * 62 Sedan * 90 Fox Wagon
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PO Box 176 * Palo Cedro, CA 96073-0176
(530) 221-5342 (Voice or Fax)
jim@oldvolkshome.com
jim96003@c-zone.net
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