Saving Money as Prices Increase

[newbury]

making the actual power cost around $4./kWh (not a typo!).

At $4/kWh I'd probably start burning wood for heating. But with electricity at $0.09584/kWh, and our bills rarely over $100/month (including about $20 of fixed charges) it's not worth the effort.

 

[sea2summit]

Open your eyes....reread my post.... The government has no control on the price of my milk.... My cow does !
Need I spell it out for ya ?

There’s a difference between “the” and “my” cow. Having said that whatever you need to tell yourself to make you feel good is cool by me.

 

[sea2summit]

I see you're new here so I'll explain.. I go get my cow. Bring her into the barn. I milk her. She controls the milk. Not your government.
A cave man can get it, can you ?

Wow, glad I haven’t been around long enough to go back to grade school? Bugger off.

 

[kenmac]

tell you what. I'm not going to stoop to your level.

 

[Jstpssng]

Today I drove 200 miles to my mother's house and back. Rather than traveling at my normal speeds of 5-10 over the speed limit (60-80 mph) I obeyed the signs. As near as I can tell it saved me about 2 gallons of gas and took another 1/2 hour each way.

I also POed a lot of people who didn't like me obeying the law.

 

[ultrarunner]

Moderate steady driving easy on car and pocket book and avoids citations

Driving West Coast nowhere have I encounter the level of scofflaws on the road as the SF East Bay...

Wild West and I guess frugality is out the window?

Cars ripping past on surface streets blowing past traffic lights and signs and pedal to the metal weaving in and out of traffic at ver high rates of freeway speed.

For the most part LEO not interested in ending career over traffic enforcement.

Washington State a pleasure to drive in comparison...

At time if you saw this kind of driving you would have thought a bank was robbed or stolen car...

 

[newbury]

Since it seems we are on driving speeds -
I grew up in Vermont, where the STATE speed limit WAS 50MPH at least until the early 1970's. Not 55, not 65, not 70. (They also banned car CFC a/c for a while.)
So when I started driving in the 1960's I was accustomed to "slow speed" travel.
And being relatively young and relatively poor my first several cars were good for low and slow.
I was used to watching traffic back up behind me.
To this day I don't mind cars stacking up behind me when I go the speed limit.
/edit - should have mentioned I've usually about a 5 car limit for cars behind me if I'm not towing a trailer. Anymore and I'll try to pull off and let them all pass. But towing a trailer i's more difficult to pull off and back on.

 

[daugen]

I absolutely despise tailgaters and have done a lot of experimentation about how to get them off my tail or prevent them
from doing it to begin with. Now that I'm retired and drive a thirsty truck, I know slowing down will help. I use cruise control as much as possible.
But what to set it at? Put it on the speed limit and you'll be tailgated immediately. I usually set mine at 4-6mph over. That shows whoever is behind me I'm not just dogging
it at the speed limit to make some ecological statement (don't you hate that in the left lane?). Most folks are happy to drive at 5 over even if they wanted to do 8 or 10 over, like
I used to. But now I knock at least 5mph off. My Ram hemi is quiet and comfortable at 70.

btw, no brake checking, half the world has a dash cam and anyone who does that to anyone else is risking a catastrophe and letting their emotions get out of hand.
I watch a lot of youtube accident videos, have found them to be helpful in learning new defensive driving techniques.

Newbury, I leave one full car length between me and the car in front at a stop light. Drives some folks behind me nuts, who are already six inches off my bumper.
Well now I have a big chrome tri-ball hitch back there with a nasty looking chromed hook on it for towing. If you want some friend, this is what you'll get...

 

[Jstpssng]

I don't generally let tailgaters worry me, my only action is to back off the vehicle in front of me to allow more stopping distance. If I feel they are endangering me I will find a safe place to pull over, but prefer not to do that. This also gives them someplace to go should they decide to do a stupid pass and run out of room after getting by me. Between work and personal I drive about 50k miles/year and all that I want to do is to get where I'm going safely. Playing games the way that some people do, including speeding up when the tailgater can pass, then slowing down when they can't is counteractive to my goals.
That 400 mile day trip to my mother's, usually with a few hours working while down there can be a bit tedious.

To tie this back into the original topic; getting in an accident isn't going to save me any money, and I prefer to spend it on other things rather than a new pickup.

 

[Torvy]

Milk prices here are controlled, vendors can't sell them below a set amount.

Maybe in Maine?

 

[Jstpssng]

Maybe in Maine?

Yes. Maine Milk Commission: History and Background
Because of this we aren't subject to the Federal Order. Federal Milk Marketing Orders | Agricultural Marketing Service.

 

[Torvy]

Not a big fan of setting retail prices. Wisconsin does that with gas.

Stores here will just use retail milk (or gas) as loss leaders. Get you in the store to buy milk for cheap and you get you other groceries while there...unless you are like my mother, who would spend more money on gas driving to 3-4 stores than she saved on prices.

Federal price floors are for producer prices. Still not a fan, but I like the objective.

 

[daugen]

Yes. Maine Milk Commission: History and Background
Because of this we aren't subject to the Federal Order. Federal Milk Marketing Orders | Agricultural Marketing Service.

interesting info. Next time I buy milk am going to compare retail price of regular milk vs skim. By this chart supermarket should be charging less for skim
milk.
file:///C:/Users/Drew/AppData/Local/Temp/11-2021%20new%20retail%20margins.pdf
not sure you can open this ?

and speaking of milk...I pay a dollar more per half gallon to get organic 2% milk, because not only is it (maybe) a little bit better for me but the shelf life seems
twice as long, sometimes three times longer than conventional milk. I just bought organic milk with a pull date in Mid January. And I've never thrown organic milk out that
got spoiled, always the regular stuff. Seems counterintuitive, you would think more preservatives or whatever would make the milk last longer.
So to not throw out milk, since I live alone and don't drink it every day, though often with bran cereal, I buy the organic and pay more.

I also stopped buying bagged chopped salad, chopping up a head of romaine is pretty easy and lasts longer in fridge.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

Cost of Distribution has become significant.

Electrical Utilities used to just Get It Done here, at much lower rates. User-Pay is the buzzword that's been popular for a long time..... unfortunately, shifting the pain there enables other behaviour; shoddy management practices just being one.

Close to home (like your grandparents ur) allows you potentially to manage things yourself..... Wood is one option, if you live rural.

For Power, you'll see some examples on TBN and elsewhere of the classic path to going off-gird in remote areas..... once the line-in cost quote from the Utility shows up, all of a sudden totally off-grid starts looking better.

I recall one thread on here.... owner/builder got "irritated" with the Utility's "You can't pull that off" attitude........ "Hold my Soldering Iron, and Watch This" was his answer. Result was a fantastic off-grid system, @ or below that Line-In cost.

Big $ upfront to put that ^ in place, so not for everyone. Good suggestions/practices in this thread - I do many of the same, but not all....

Rgds, D.

The power company wanted $60,000 to run poles to a neighbor's new house site, so he went off grid. That was a decade ago, and I haven't asked him what he thinks of the new PE systems. He installed a diesel genset for high demand.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

Perhaps you should do a little research !

Heat pumps have resistive heating strips for low ambient temps. The more efficient units will run a little below freezing, at the expense of a lot of coil de-icing. I have a modern unit that they told me would sort of work down to 25 degrees, but I stoke the wood stove and don't try it.

 

[kenmac]

Heat pumps have resistive heating strips for low ambient temps. The more efficient units will run a little below freezing, at the expense of a lot of coil de-icing. I have a modern unit that they told me would sort of work down to 25 degrees, but I stoke the wood stove and don't try it.

Not all heat pumps have to use a ''back up heat'' source (ie) gas, resistance heat. Some operate in Heat pump mode only, and have no issues heating well below freezing .
I installed such a unit

 

[arto98607]

Not all heat pumps have to use a ''back up heat'' source (ie) gas, resistance heat. Some operate in Heat pump mode only, and have no issues heating well below freezing .
I installed such a unit

Are you saying this air source heat-pump works well & at a high efficiency at below 0 F (-17.8 C) temperatures as indicated in your post #118 earlier?

I certainly would like to find out more about it if possible.

Like make & model if you don't mind please?

 

[lman]

Are you saying this air source heat-pump works well & at a high efficiency at below 0 F (-17.8 C) temperatures as indicated in your post #118 earlier?

I certainly would like to find out more about it if possible.

Like make & model if you don't mind please?



View attachment 720874

I don't think it ever gets that cold where he's at.

 

[arto98607]

Yeah, I can see a geothermal HP working (at least somewhat) in a cold climate, air source not so much. Doesn't resistance heating kick in below 30° or so?

If the ground loop is properly designed & located (IE. pipe is long enough) the ground temperature near the loop remains relatively steady all your round, regardless of ambient temperature changes.

I have occasionally monitored our ground loop incoming liquid temperature and it's been pretty steady so far, but we've had it only since 2003 ...

The resistance heating in our system is only for backup in case of failure, and so far has never been used.

 

[Diggin It]

Anybody still use fillers in ground meat dishes? I can remember when meatloaf, meatballs and similar had about 25% rice or cauliflower added as a filler/extender.