The box in the hallway cupboard we hope to never need
We had a short power cut in the spring, an hour and a half of no lights and a dead phone, long enough for Nấm to ask several times whether the whole world had run out of electricity. It hadn't, but it made me think about what we'd actually do if it lasted longer than that.
I bought a portable power station, the kind meant for camping as much as emergencies, and it's lived in the hallway cupboard, charged, ever since.
What's actually inside the box
Four ports across the front, two of the faster USB-C kind and two regular USB-A, enough to keep phones, a tablet, and a small lamp running at once. A little screen on top shows how much charge is left, which I check more often than is probably necessary.
We took it on our first camping trip with it this summer, more to test it than out of real need, and it kept Kẹo's tablet charged for the whole weekend along with a string of small lights over the tent. It charges back up quickly too, most of the way in a couple of hours plugged in at home, which meant it was ready again before the next trip rather than sitting half full for weeks.
It's heavier than it looks in photos, closer to the weight of a large kettle than a phone charger. Worth knowing before you plan to carry it any real distance.
It hasn't had to prove itself in a real outage yet, which is exactly what I'm hoping for. Some purchases earn their keep by being useful every week. This one earns its keep by sitting quietly in the cupboard, charged, in case the world does run out of electricity for real one evening.
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