In these days of no electricity, it is only prudent that we save as much energy as we possibly can. Electricity is so scarce, if it were possible to fill basins with it, I’d strongly encourage you to do so. I do however have some tips that will help you sail through these dark days relatively unscathed by the miserly ways of the power-generating company. Here, I share with you a few things to use to help you beat the energy crisis.

Charcoal iron

This handy device will come into play to remove creases from your clothes whenever power goes back to Jinja in your house. The modern charcoal iron is so versatile it allows you to use other stuff besides just charcoal to produce the heat; you can use almost anything. Old furniture, old newspapers, empty beer bottles, the microphone in the noisy church next-door, anything.

Hot comb

This work of pure genius eliminates the need to drive to the saloon, queue for three days, get into that hot helmet-like thing they put on heads in saloons, only for power to go off 17 minutes later. With the beauty that is a hot comb, you can do all your hair-styling at home. All you need is a mirror and an honest friend. The latter will warn you if you look like a wet chipmunk.

Scissors

For guys, trips to the trusty barber are useless if he has no electricity. Buy yourself a pair of scissors and whip them out every month to do things to your hair. The advantage here is that you can draw fancy lines in your hair, things even your barber cannot do.  I’ll caution you to first practice thoroughly before attempting your first trim. Find a willing friend to try on. If your friends are true and are not scheming free-loaders who are only with you because of your money, they will willingly offer themselves for your experiments.

Send hand-written letters

SMS and email have since taken over as trusty methods of sending information, putting carrier pigeons out of work. The downside of these methods is that they need electricity. Hand-written letters do not. Instead of wasting precious phone battery typing ‘lol,whr r u nw nw?’ while waiting at the venue of an appointment, write a letter and hand it to your trusted carrier pigeon for delivery. Naturally, some weeks will have to be taken off to train the pigeon to identify the recipients of your mail. You’ll need to feed the pigeon too, and clean up its droppings. All these are small prices to pay. For the mail, you’ll need to re-learn proper spelling, punctuation, grammar and standard mail jokes. You’ll also have to write a few song dedications at the end of the mail.

 Published on October 9, 2011