The Electric Nomad
How to live off the (electrical) grid
For every choice you make in your life, there are always two paths: you can think it over and over; otherwise, you can just face it.
This being said, that’s how I’ve decided to tackle the electric energy consumption of my household. I’ve followed these two roads in order to understand how much electric energy I waste, therefore how much I can save.
In this first article I’m going to introduce you to The Electric Nomad*.
When I had to face the electric energy consumption of my household, I was overwhelmed by numbers and data, I just wanted to free my mind. That’s when I decided that the best course of action to start reducing my consumption was a clean cut with electric energy in the house. It actually took me and my housemate a few days to get ready for the challenge: we had to finish everything that was in the fridge and freezer and get a huge number of candles on Amazon.
At this point we were ready to turn off the power at the electrical service panel and get off to sleep… within minutes we were already complaining because the wi-fi wasn’t working obviously. It wasn’t a great start to our challenge, but we had everything figured out.
In the morning I went to the gym ignoring all the water on the kitchen floor that leaked from my warmish freezer. As soon as I got to the gym, I plugged my phone into the electric outlet (that really made me feel like an electric junkie) later on I had a warm shower, because I knew I couldn’t have had one at home.
Actually my day went on just as any other day: I got to uni, I studied and did homework on my laptop; had lunch at the Chinese restaurant just around the corner; in the afternoon I kept on studying; had aperitivo with my housemate and then… Then we got back to our sad, empty, dark electricless house.
The evening is the part when we most struggled: we actually really enjoyed ordering food (even though we could have used the gas stove), but we couldn’t have dinner in front of the tv. Although the atmosphere was very cozy: the two of us talking, sharing a bottle of wine in the candlelight, after a while we turned on a laptops and watched a series together. The pc battery lasted way longer than I would have expected, by the time we got to bed the computer wasn’t flat yet.
This is the end of my first day as an Electric Nomad, let’s see what my mother will think of this when I get back home with all my dirty laundry.
*Electric Nomad (name pending): An Electric Nomad is a person who finds way to use electric energy outside of his household.
E.g. If you want to save money on your electric bill you should consider being an Electric Nomad.
