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Sunday, June 6, 2010

Power failures and Manu Ginobili

Seems there was a big storm in San Antonio a few days ago and the basketball player lost power in his home.
He said on Twitter : “ I had 2 run 2 HEB 2 buy candles! Can u imagine changing diapers w/ just the light of a cellphone & a small flashlight? Tough! ”
http://momento24.com/en/2010/06/03/this-is-how-manu-ginobilis-yard-looks-after-a-heavy-thunderstorm/
Ginobili's bakc yard in San Antonio after the storm



Pretty sure Manu can afford a better setup :-) but I think that what he said about changing diapers using a cellphone as a source of light illustrates well how troublesome it can be if you don’t have a good flashlight.
Seems so unlikely for those of us that literally have months or years worth of light thanks to several LED lights and pounds of AA, AAA and 123A batteries and LiIon and LSD (low self discharge) rechargables.
There’s people out there that simple don’t plan for these common inconveniences. Something that you



can avoid with A 20 pack worth of AA and a couple single AA LED flashlights, for a grand total of maybe 30 bucks if you buy a couple good 80 Lumen flashlights, like the Tank 007 or Akoray.
I think the changing diaper in the dark experience is yet another strong point in favor of headlamps and how convenient they are for when you have to keep doing chores when there’s no power.

Funny how he mentioned candles, so typical of Argentines to use those when there’s no power, specially in the old days like I’m sure Ginobilli did when he was younger. Power Outages were a daily inconvenience during Alfonsin presidency ( no LEDs back then and the incandescent flashlights just didn’t last as long or illuminate as well) It became common a couple years ago too, but LEDs help a lot these days.

Anyway, thought it was funny to picture Manu changing diapers with his Iphone light (and some other small flashlight, probably not very bright one too). If someone lives near by send the guy a nice Fenix light, he’ll appreciate it next time. :-)

FerFAL

5 comments:

Joseph said...

I live in San Antonio, and we lost power for 3-4 hours. I told my roommate "now you know why I have all these flashlights." I stay away from candles, as I consider them a fire hazard. Buy a decent LED flashlight (Maglite is ok) and keep a couple of sets of batteries on hand.

DaShui said...

After Katrina knocked out power for 3 days, my father put a natural gas generator on his house. it turns on automatically and ng doesn't go bad like gasoline. Only thing neighbors come over when they see we have power and they don't.

dc.sunsets said...

As for lights/headlamps, get a two-fer by purchasing a Fenix headband and a Fenix L1T flashlight. I have an LD10 but like the on-off switch of the L1T better (it can be turned on momentarily without "clicking" it, unlike the LD10) even though the L1T is not quite as bright on its high setting. With the Fenix light in a Fenix headband you can change a diaper on a low setting or do search-and-rescue at night hands-free on a high setting. You could even put two lights on one headband if you wished (it comes so equipped). For a video of this setup try: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q95VrEh4tmM

Pop N Fresh said...

love my fenix, nightcores, and inovas. Just wanna through a good headlamp out there for ya: zebralight.

they run off one AA, have great even flood light with no hotspot and weigh almost nothing, use mine all the time

Anonymous said...

Hm, where did i leave that headlamp of mine...