I've lived in The Dandenongs (Melbourne East, up in the Hills) for a fair time. Power outages are common but often fixed quickly. Today it seems we are going to have to wait for power to return.
So I got the genny out of hiding. Always good to stretch it's legs. The mercury here has dropped to 4.5 degrees, or, quite cold!!!
So I'm watching the news, charging my phone, got lamps going, and the electric fan on the wood fire blasting out the heat.
I remember, when I bought the genny for travelling, balking at the price. But it's been invaluable so many times in 2 years.
it was Jules47 that said "always have 2 purposes for whatever you have on your travels" .
What do you have that serves at least 2, if not 3 purposes?
Heres a pic of what I use all the time. multitude of uses in the garden for hedges etc. And it holds my BabyQ, with room for plates etc either side when cooking ( it's sturdy so I got rid of a weak camp table) I can extend it to clean the car roof and it has enough height that I can clean the roof on my pop top.
2 weeks or so and my Gorilla ladder (not to be confused with Big Gorilla) and I will be on the "Frog and Toad", with my dog, caravan and all the dual purpose things ;)
Many years ago I made a Quillow , it has a permanent home in the Prado, we have used it as an extra blanket, a picnic rug, it folds into a pillow or cushion should you need one,
goes over a wooden picnic seat for a bit of comfort when required, the granddaughters have used it and a couple of camp chairs to make a cubby house, its been used to protect the inside of the vehicle when we had to transport large objects, its even been used for protecting the kayak when loading in a particularly rocky area. We strapped it on to backpacks and found it invaluable when travelling around Europe. A multi purpose article we wouldn't travel without, Its pretty old now, might be time to make a new one, the old one has definitely given faithful service!