Ruminations while watching a digital display

(For the record, I typed the bulk of this over at Ian’s place – because he’s got juice. Only logged on to post it when my battery voltage got back into the happy zone. Now I’m going to turn everything back off and let the batteries soak while they can. Just saying hi.)

It’s been wet. It’s been soggy, not for days but weeks. I have literally never seen it like this in eight years. Keep waiting for the yucca to die and be replaced by ferns. I left my clean stump socks out to dry for two days, and every morning they were soggy all over again. A week ago we got ten solid hours of rain, the clay was soaked deep, and it still hasn’t dried on the road. Unheard of.

Woke up at 2 this morning and saw moon shadow on my blanket. Haven’t seen that for a while – I scrunched up against the loft’s little window and could see the moon and a star, just a little hazy, almost sharp. I didn’t get excited about it, the sky has played me enough mean jokes lately. But I noted it, and then went back to sleep.

Live with any solar power system, especially a little one with no backup generator, and you’ll become a connoisseur of sunshine. Got out of bed and there was fog, like there’s been the past three or four days. But above the fog was a hint of blue, not the usual gray. Went out to give the chickens their food and water, looked up, and saw a contrail. Normally they leave me cold, but this one was a pretty sight. Blue sky above the fog, not completely clear but clear enough to see the leavings of that jet is clear enough to make the batteries happier than they’ve been for days.

I said before that I don’t get bored, and that’s mostly true. I never said my life is exciting. Excitement, in my mind, is overrated. It’s roughly synonymous with terror, of which I do not approve. Out here excitement usually means something is trying to kill something else, and I might be either of those things so I really prefer to give excitement a miss wherever possible. For a guy who was never a thrillseeker, old or young, I sure do have a lot of scars. I know excitement, and we are not good friends.

I say that as prelude to the fact that I was perfectly happy to make watching the Lair’s new indoor voltage readout the high point of the morning’s entertainment. At ten minutes to eight, the sun broke over the nearest ridge top. It wasn’t clear sun, there was a ribbon of thin cloud and a few junipers in the way. But I’d been waiting for it, and as soon as I saw it I reached up and flicked the switch on the new/old box that held the three LCD seven-segment displays.

They pull a tiny bit of power, which is why my older brother thoughtfully gave the box that toggle switch. 11.7 volts is as low as I’ve ever seen it read, first thing in the morning. Not dangerously low, some people around here would consider it perfectly acceptable. Some people around here consider batteries to be expendable commodities, easily if expensively replaced. I am not one of those people. The death of my two old scrounged batteries last winter was a calamity. Their replacement with brand-new, better batteries was a stroke of luck I do not assume will be easily repeated. I’m sure my ex-wife would testify I cater to their health and happiness more carefully than I ever cared for hers. I don’t know about that, but I will say they’re easier to please. I like to see them fully charged daily. I have not seen that in three days. They haven’t had a good long soak in nearly two weeks. Some would call that use: I call it abuse and I sincerely hope today they’ll at least get a charge.

After eight minutes the right-most display flickers between seven and eight, as if it’s trying to roll a heavy load. The sun is at a hard angle and still shining through cloud and juniper, but the solar panels are seeing the first useful photons of the day. And I’m sitting, sipping coffee, watching the show.

It takes almost half an hour for the display to read 12.0. I pause in my study of the display only long enough to feed more wood into the Vogelzang. I’ve sure been using it a lot, to keep the inside of the cabin dry even when it’s warmer than I really like it. I normally shoot for a range with its top in the mid-sixties. Otherwise I’m constantly having to remove and replace layers every time I go outside, which I do a lot when I’m hanging around the Lair. I go out to deal with disputes among the chickens, unwrap Little Bear from his tree, check out noises and dog alarms or to run some chore. Getting dressed and undressed for or from the cold is a hassle, and besides it costs fuel to heat the cabin so why do it more than I want, just out of some sense of convention? Put on another sweater and be done with it. But I’ve got a lot of abused joints and hate the damp more than I dislike the overheating, so I’ve been going through wood even when the outdoor temps are well into the forties.

By this time the sunny spot on the wall opposite the desk is starting to get hard edges. The sun is breaking free of the junipers. Oh, could it be we’re going to have a sunny day?

I have occasionally considered cutting those junipers down. They serve no earthly use, and in winter the minutes they cost my solar panels could be important. The Lair is down in a hollow, tight against the eastern ridge. Even now, most of my yard is still in dark shadow. I’m not a hippy-dippy “sunshine on my shoulder makes me happy” phony, but neither do I subscribe to the Soviet pragmatism that says anything without hard utility must be swept out of the way. I’d rather look at those junipers than at their stumps, so even though sometimes they’re in my way they’ll stay right there.

I give up my study of the voltage and get to work on First Breakfast. Even in winter, which starts its days hours later than summer, this is a bit late but I’ve been having fun obsessing about the voltage. I slice freshish bread and toast it on my griddle, then slather it with margarine and this great raspberry jam I got from Neighbor J. One of J’s virtues is that he’s always starting new diets. And then he cleans out his pantry and throws away luxuries he had decided to deny himself for a while, until he gives up on the diet. Those interludes can do wonders for my own diet, which is normally somewhat bland and monotonous. But right now I’m rich with raspberry jam and soup far superior to anything available at the dollar store, and oh my god Jimmy Dean spicy sausage. Of course Ghost is determined that I will not suffer this burden alone, because he’s just that kind of guy and he’s there for me. I am not fooled: He spends so much time at S&L’s that he eats more sausage than I do.

At about ten minutes to nine the voltage reads 12.9, and there it stays for another fifteen minutes or so even though the sun is now clear and getting usefully high. Now, I think, we’re doing more than just ticking off numbers. Now the push from the solar panels is working against the chemistry of my half-depleted batteries, transforming sulfuric acid into stronger sulfuric acid and lead sulfate into lead – an alchemy of which I highly approve.

Maybe later it’ll be cloudy again, but for now it looks like it’ll be a good day. The last good day we had was four days ago, and even that didn’t last. It’s been so very gray. But I’m a penniless hermit by choice, and I work at being content with what I get.