I have one, but feel like a fool for buying it. I lived through three hurricanes in Houston where I had a generator, and all it ever did was increase the misery, as I attempted to manage my limited fuel supply long enough to last a three-week power outage. I always ended up throwing out hundreds of dollars worth of food anyway, and the first time I tried it, I destroyed a fridge from running it on insufficient power.
But I have to admit, it saved my home during the Big Freeze the year we moved here, when a 10 degree day shut down the nuclear reactor and wind mills that power the "oil capital of the world" and a million Houstonians had their homes flooded from burst pipes. I spent that day running around like a mad man with space heaters and light bulbs to keep my pipes from freezing.
So, fresh from that experience, and discovering that my new Florida home had natural gas, one of my first purchases was a portable generator big enough to run a fridge, a freezer, and a portable room air conditioner -- that could be run on natural gas. Then I never got around to hiring a plumber to install a valve I could use to connect it because I realized that it would almost certainly be a violation of Marion County's insane building codes and I'd never be able to find a plumber who would agree to do it
I also now realize that underground utilities and underground house plumbing makes the odds of a long power outage or my house freezing close to astronomical.
Boy, do I feel like a dummy. I ought to just sell the stupid thing.
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