Blessed by the Potato

Life in the new house has been pretty good so far. Our first few utility bills have been pretty sobering though. The gas bill came first, and it was quite a bit higher than we were expecting, especially since it only covered a few days where we actually lived in the house, and most of that time was unseasonably warm so the heat was barely on.

Our electricity bill came yesterday, and it was even more of a shock. We really weren’t expecting the hydro bill to be too much more than it was in our old place. We have a few more lights, and a few more appliances (dishwasher, clothes washer/dryer), but other than that all our stuff is the same (computers, lamps, microwave, etc.) and the fridge and stove are pretty similar to our old ones. All the other new things in the house run on gas (water heater, heat). Yet somehow we roughly tripled our electricity consumption. And this was for a 12-day period where we only lived in the house for 4 of them!

It’s driving me batty trying to figure out what’s eating all the juice. Is it a faulty device somewhere? Does the fan on the otherwise gas-powered furnace really use that much electricity? Is the change from using mostly natural light in the day and having 4-5 incandescents on at night to using 1-2 incandescents during the day (the house doesn’t get as much natural light) and 6-10 at night really use that much more? (A quick calculation says that lights alone, especially since we’re good at turning them off when not in the room, should only be an extra 6 kWh/day or so; we’re trying to account for a difference of more like 30 kWh/day). Does a once-weekly run through of the dishwasher and washing machine really bump the daily average up that much? I happened to have a load of dishes to do so I checked: I ran the oven for about 20 minutes, and then the dishwasher plus whatever else in the house was on (a few lights, computers, but no TV or anything) and checked the meter on the side of the house. 3 hours with that consumption ran me 8 kWh, as compared to an average of 15 kWh for the whole day in the apartment…

Unfortunately, it’s really hard to keep up the morale to conserve when the bill is going to be astronomical no matter what. Why save 30 cents a day by turning off the lights when some mystery device in the house is just going to burn through $1.50 no matter what we do?

So I got home tonight in advance of my dentist appointment in the morning (stupid broken tooth) and find a brand new Sony Bravia HDTV in the living room. It was quite a surprise since, as far as I knew, my parents weren’t in the market for a new TV. Typically, they would have consulted me on something like that (and most likely, would have waited until I was home to connect the wires for them). It’s not as though anyone would have actually bought them a TV as a gift, but it just goes to show how very difficult my parents are to buy for around the holidays. Here we are, not 10 days from Christmas, and they run off to make an impulse buy like that. They do that for everything: ask them what they want, and they can’t think of a thing. If they do think of something, they’ll just go out and buy it then and there…

I’m really not looking forward to this Japan trip. The closer it gets, the more terrible it sounds. I really hope I can get out of this nonsense.

I just read the instructions, and this year there’s a fee to submit an abstract (to dissuade those who submit abstracts for their CVs without defending them at the conference), and it’s almost certainly going to involve having to pay it myself and then wait months for reimbursement. But more annoying are the travel arrangements. From the sounds of things, Kanazawa doesn’t have an international airport, so all of our options involve bus or train rides from other airports from 1 to 4.5 hours away… and even then it’s another 20 minute bus/cab ride from the city centre to where the conference will be. With this many links in a strange country that uses devil runes as a form of written communication, someone (probably me) is sure to get lost.

So, the big question is: how do I say no way to this trip?

I saw this short story and had to share. Originally found via Boing Boing.

Also, found a smashed pumpkin in my parking lot today. What the hell is wrong with people? (Our lot is a dead-end off the alley, so it’s not even like people would be walking through and accidentally drop a pumpkin… that thing was brought/thrown in and smashed there). Plus it’s December! Who has a pumpkin?

After calling for 10-15 cm of snow yesterday, we got a very pretty, wind-free but heavy and steady fall that lasted all night, dropping about 30 inches (75 cm!) in 24 hours. We’re completely snowed in now. I shovelled out the front walkway with my tiny car shovel (a mere 34 inches long), and now I’m beat. I have no idea how I’m going to clear a (longer) path to my car around back. I don’t even think I can open the back door since it doesn’t have an overhang like the front.

It was hilarious when Wayfare decided to try to make a snow angel. She climbed around the side of the porch so there wouldn’t be any footprints leading to it, turned around, and fell into the snow… only to sink in the really deep, light powder so that just a little bit of her face was left showing. She couldn’t get back out without help :)

The heat issue made the news.

And today of all days, with no one at work, hospitals in chaos, and a travelling nightmare… today I manage to lose a filling in my tooth. It’s not hurting at the moment, but I’m a little afraid to eat anything…