Thanks L vus, I think you are right. One of my neighbors went out the 3rd day of the outage and bought some el cheapo generator. The thing was so loud that all of us who didn't have generators, thus no air conditioning, had to close our windows because it was like having a truck idling right under our windows. So if I get one it will have to be QUIET.

gasoline or propane fuel? what do you do?

And this is just SO dramatically off topic.... and no one is deleting messages. ahhhhh......