Huge freakout yesterday after a very tiring day: Just before 8 p.m. we had a power outage. Manitoba Hydro's help line held a message saying 226 subscribers were without power in our area, they didn't know what caused it, they didn't have a time projected for restoration. I threw a heavy polarfleece blanket over the Brinsea to slow down cooling, and headed for the shop to set up my new little 950 watt generator, purchased a month or so ago knowing that sooner or later this would happen. Of course I had not even tried it out, so wasted time reviewing the instructions, filling the fuel tank and locating the controls. It all probably took half an hour, I was too rattled to check. I carefully carried the Brinsea with its precious developing cargo of Silkies-to-be out to the shop, feeling like Charlie Brown carefully carrying Snoopy's supper dish. (Well? The incubator normally sits on a low table beside my bed in the basement. Can't run a gasoline generator in the basement.) When I got power restored to the incubator the temp was only down to 30-ish from the correct 37.5, thanks to the blanket. After about an hour and a half of fretfully wandering back and forth between house and shop, not knowing how long the gen would run on one filling and not able to hear the gen from anywhere in the house, wondering what I'd do if the outage lasted all night -- the power came back on. I heaved a sigh of relief, waited another five minutes to be sure it was going to stay on, then shut down the gen and carefully carried the Brinsea back to its accustomed spot at my bedside.
With any luck at all, we should be okay. I don't want to candle again; those eggs have been through enough as it is and I'm content to await hatching day. I need to think about this and find a spot or build a small shelter beside a basement window, so I can run a short extension cord inside and monitor the gen more easily the next time this happens.
There seems to be so much anxiety attached to all aspects of "hatching eggs."