Text 7000, 103 rader
Skriven 2006-10-27 21:22:50 av Barbara McNay (1:382/48)
   Kommentar till text 6997 av JOAN MACDIARMID (1:123/140)
Ärende: Shoutout to NYS!!
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 >  Hi, Barbara,

 >>  BM> Why do the basements there flood when the power is out? Must they be
 >>  BM> pumped continually to prevent flooding?

 >> You missed the later mention that I do live
 >> in a swamp! Amherst some time ago was a
 >> shallow lake, and the water table is near the
 >> surface.

 >  BM> Well, no, I didn't miss it, but sort of assumed that if it were that
 >  BM> bad, they wouldn't have built there.

 >  Amherst is an old community with some
 >  history, but originally was a rural
 >  community where the houses were built on
 >  the more solid ridges and formations.
 >  It includes a village of Williamsville which
 >  perches on a natural escarpment. Near me are at
 >  least two old homes which date back over
 >  150 years (one over 200 years) so must be
 >  in feasible locations. But when people
 >  were starting to migrate from crowded
 >  Buffalo to nearby towns, I guess the developers
 >  built in the areas they shouldn't have

Isn't that always the case!

 >  based on the natural drainage. Near my area,
 >  they dug some little drainage lakes. Of course
 >  in my recent experience, we had also had a big
 >  snowstorm which was melting fast, so the area
 >  was extra soggy.

 >  I mostly grew up in the South, where they
 >  don't have the automatic assumption that
 >  there must be a basement, at all. In
 >  Huntsville, AL, few houses had basements
 >  because you would have to blast through
 >  layers of limestone and shale to build one.

I don't believe any houses here have basements, either; either they're built on
a slab, or up off the ground a little, on short pilings or a foundation with
short walls, for access to anything  underneath that might need attention.

 >  Northern US assumptions include a basement
 >  for homes because you used to keep the
 >  furnace there along with the winter's coal
 >  delivery, and because the basement served
 >  as a "root cellar" for the preservable
 >  vegetables and home-canned goods. It isn't


Yes, yes, and yes.  Also, ISTR the meters were down there in our basement, too,
so the meter readers had to come inside.  Paraffined rutabagas, carrots in
dirt, I think, canned and frozen foods.  Clotheslines and a ping-pong table.
Soapstone sinks beside the washing machine.

 >  so necessary now, but habit seems to demand
 >  it. I think it would be better to skip the
 >  basement in soggy areas like mine, put the
 >  gas heater at surface level like my Mom's in
 >  Alabama, just off the garage, and eliminate
 >  the need for sump pumps!

Agreed.

 >>  BM> I wonder if we in the south drink more bottled water than you in the
 >>  BM> north.  I buy bottled water and refill from tap the ones I carry aroun
 > d
 >>  BM> with me, and I've begun accumulating bottles around the house, under
 >>  BM> tables or other out-of-the- way but readily accessible places.

 >>  I doubt it. Bottled water is a big business locally,
 >> though I think it's ridiculous most of the time.

 >  BM> I have mainly bought "individual" bottles of water to replace those
 >  BM> that broke, lost their caps, or whatever; I refill those I use
 >  BM> regularly with tap water.

 >  I habitually kept plastic gallon bottles
 >  of tap water on hand, unsealed, because I
 >  used to keep aquariums and needed
 >  unchlorinated (aged) water to refresh the
 >  tanks, so always had pretty good water on
 >  hand for washing in emergencies. Now I do
 >  freeze a few pint or half-pint bottles in
 >  either Rubbermaid bottles or the ones I
 >  got from the Red Cross after blood donations
 >  for emergencies and also to carry along
 >  on my weekend bike trips. That keeps a
 >  little drinking water by, at least. I am
 >  fortunate in that my local tap water is
 >  almost always tasty and tested as safe.

I keep some water in my car, too.  I learned the hard way that those gallon or
2 1/2 gallon containers of bottled water won't stand up to local temperature
extremes--mostly the 120+ degree heat in a closed car on a broiling day, I
should think.  The ones that come in six-packs intended for individual
consumption seem to do all right.

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 * Origin: T E X A S ! (1:382/48)