The Café (There is no Topic)

  

I've just had a week from hell, Wednesday at 2am all my batteries went flat! That's 35Kw for those who understand the numbers. Luckily the battery protection software had kicked in but I couldn't get them to come back on line. Only on Friday afternoon did I discover that the problem was not the batteries but the Inverter! The battery input was short circuit, zero ohms for the uninitiated. A bit disappointing since this inverter is only a month old after the original (2 years old) got struck by lightning. Amazingly the suppliers got the new inverter to me in 24hrs (very unusual here, Customer service, what's that?). The supplier fixed the dumb struck one, just on half its original cost! And my sister picked it up. So yesterday Mary and I took the new, buggered inverter to my sister, picked up the repaired one and drove back, 4hrs there, 4hrs back.
The fixed inverter in now in and running although it'll take several days to get the batteries up to 100%. Luckily although they were flat for a couple of days they weren't damaged.
Sissy will deliver the buggered, new inverter on Tuesday, then starts the argument about whether it's under Warranty or not!

Ah, those were the days, tell the kids of today and they'll never believe you!

And to add insult to injury, the repaired, replacement inverter is still faulty, it won't generate 220V from the batteries.

I recall walking around the housing estate with a gallon can, looking for the Esso paraffin wagon, because we had run out, and the coalman hadn't turned up either. I must have been eight or nine.

I remember the Esso blea dueler.

Well, 5 minutes after yesterdays post the whole thing went off when the power utility went off and only came back on when the utility came back on at about 6pm.
Yes Tony, we played in the street, played cricket with stumps chalked on a wall, it's funny, I don't ever remember it raining!

Yes, the Esso blee dooler!
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I remember it raining,  and snowing.
Different household - VERY strict (Victorian style) mother. Sit still and be quiet, (stop fidgeting, keep your feet still, stop twiddling your fingers) or go out - but don't get dirty! - no matter the weather. So I used to go and hide in the 'coal-hole' if it was TOO extreme, and hunt through the cobs for the streaks of gold in them (iron pyrites!) and wonder why there was never any gold in the fire ashes when they were emptied!
When I was about 10, I was given a bike for christmas, by my Dad - sadly long gone, he never made it to retirement age,  (weird to think I'm 30 years older than he ever made it to) and once I'd figured out how to ride and mend it, I'd go out for hours on monster journeys around the area, taking hours, getting lost - and finding my way back again. (Not many cars about in those days!)
As I've said before on here, when I had finished school, I was given an ultimatum - get a job, or go. So I did both, and joined the R.N.
In my later years, I began to wonder if I was an unwanted child, a result of unavoidable after-war night-time activities, (Dad had been in the army, as most men were) as I never felt any connexion with her, and never got any real affection from her.

Don't forget those street lights went off at 10pm.