Those with the money for the installation are typically too old to get
the payback... for me at my age it would be like kootchie at his age
spending more on a roof than his entire house cost. When they did the
survey they quoted me a price for the panels and installation of
$240,000. If we live to be 100 our electric bills won't equal that.
There are better ways to keep one's electric usage low. I've been
frugal with electric all my life, I don't turn on lights on a sunny
day, I open the shades and I automatically turn off lights when I
leave a room. And recently we changed all our lighting to LED, cut
our electric bill to less than half, especially with all outside
lighting LED on at dusk off at dawn fixtures... those lights last a
long time (15-20 years) could easily outlive us, no bulbs to buy and
no climbing ladders to change bulbs. We have all the creature
comforts, more than most... four TVs, two refrigerator freezers, two
cars, all the food we can eat. We're simply not wasteful. We gave up
eating at restaurants, they are all way over priced and their quality
is the lowest possible. I have no problem doing all our cooking.
Makes us ill speding over $100 on a restaurant dinner for two and
leaving very disappointed and hungry, even the service stinks, what
service, there is none. And restaurants are especially rip offs on
bar drinks. Their salads are wilted greens out of those plastic bags.
It reached the point that we couldn't find anything on their menus
that we wanted to eat that I couldn't prepare at home for half the
price or less and of far better quality. For dinner yesterday I made
center cut pork loin chops on the bone, thick cut 1 1/4", seasoned
with fresh ground white pepper, fresh ginger, soy sauce, toasted
sesame seed oil, pan fried. Then in the same pan stir fried slivered
garlic and a big mess of Swiss chard fresh from our garden. We
couldn't finish those huge pork chops so we have half for tonight with
a bigger batch of Swiss chard. When we decide on beef steak I'll make
a quick trip into town and ask the same butcher at Tops whats good, he
never fails to produce high quality steaks, much better than any
so-called fancy schmancy steak house... it's no big deal to cook
steak... probably one of the simplest foods to prepare. And for 1/3
the price of a fancy schmancy steak house. And I never minded pouring
our own booze. My wife has her Belizean rum and coke and I have my
Crystal Palace and sugar free Sprite with a big lemon wedge. The same
butcher prepares our pork chops, also extremely easy to cook. Lately
I prefer pan frying rather than on the outside grill. We're not in
the least concerned about grill marks. I prefer to pan fry meat and
then to immediately stir fry the veggies in the same pan, much more
flavor. The veggie garden is now producing full tilt, yellow and
green summer squash, Kirby Cukes up the kazoo, mixed salad greens, and
tons of Swiss chard... soon tomatoes and peppers... already melons and
pumpkins are set, we have people to gift with ovearge. We grow
pumpkins for decor.