I woke this morning to the sound of rain on the roof…
…and since it really clouded up overnight the temperature outside wasn’t even freezing. Which meant that for the first time in days I had nowhere I had to go, nobody I had to meet and nothing that had to be done first thing. Yeah, chicken chores but their water would still be liquid and they had food and they’re not laying eggs to any great degree so I could do that at my leisure. Which, finally, meant I could do something I’m not at all in the habit of doing: Reclining on my unmade bed with a book and a cup of coffee and indulging in a morning of complete sloth.
That lasted until about 7:30, when the stunted little angel on my shoulder woke up, stretched, yawned, and reminded me of something I had completely and conveniently forgotten…
Yesterday I was over at D&L’s helping to unload a pallet of wood pellets. And while I was there D said he planned to go to town this very rainy morning, and I specifically asked if I could come along, because…
…as of yesterday morning I was officially half out of propane for the bedroom heater.
Bother! I really did not want to get up, put some pants on, and do all the necessaries before heading to town in the rain. I grumped. I moaned, swore, and cursed what gods there may be. I may have whined just a little. Nevertheless I never seriously considered begging off, because…
You can put off things that don’t really need doing. But you better do the things you gotta do at the first opportunity, because doing anything else is an open invitation to Uncle Murphy. And Murphy shows up uninvited often enough as it is. Do it in a mild rain, or do it in a shrieking freezing wind – or huddle next to the woodstove wishing to heaven you hadn’t put it off when you had the chance. Not really a choice.
Anyway, now every single propane bottle is full or near enough – and that’s a really nice feeling.
I’m going to assume the answer to my question is going to be “cost”, but I’ll ask anyway. Any reason you cant get some of the larger propane tanks up there, or even one of those big 250- or 120-gallon jobbies? If you did have one of thoe in-place tanks, would the propane guys even come out there to fill it? I’d imagine something like the 120-gal. could be monted onto a trailer and taken into town once a year for refill. Or is it a matter of not wanting to futz with connecting/reconnecting the thing? Just wondering.
Portability, mostly. And cost. No propane truck is ever going to make it to the Lair with any hope of return so one of those big implanted tanks is never going to happen. Couldn’t afford to fill it if I had one. And anything much bigger than a 40# is too big for the Jeep and too heavy for me. So I have a couple of 40# bottles on the kitchen regulator and six 30# bottles for the bedroom. It works for me.
The line toward the end about putting things off is going in my quotes book. That’s golden.
“Portability, mostly.” Which is shorthand for “They are getting too heavy”. For exactly the same reason, I replaced my five gallon gas cans with 2.5 gallon cans.
May as well face it, we lose muscle mass as we age.
Beats death.