Shave or a Haircut, and an opinion...

...or one month's-worth of electricity: that's what you can buy with $0.52! In truth, the two-and-fifty cents was to pay the taxes levied ($.23) and the Miscellaneous Gross Receipts Fee ($.29). We didn't pay for ANY electricity for the period 14 November to 14 December, and, in fact, have a balance in the energy "bank" of 150 kiloWatt hours: what we generated (251 kWh) minus what we used (101 kWh).

Nice news indeed on this gray, rainy day during which we probably won't even generate 2 whole kiloWatt hours. As reference, yesterday was bright and sunny and we generated 24.1 kWh for the day. Right now, at 3 pm, I'm looking at a forlorn wave of yellow and the sum of 1.2 kWh. (Home usage so far today: 4.8 kWh.) The PowerWall never even had a hope of fully recharging today.

And that's... okay. It's all part and parcel of the whole solar-powered experience.

Corrected 4/2018: Conversation at my quartet's rehearsal came around to the ditty "Shave 'n' a Haircut: 2 bits!" (as it does), and having corrected my Tenor as to the lyrics, I realized I'd better correct myself too!

The actual lyrics are: "Shave 'n' a haircut: 6 bits. Tip the barber: 2 bits. Altogether: 1 buck!" Same melody throughout.

Our Bass was astonished to learn that dollar coins were once cut into eighths and those 8 bits were used as currency (hence the 2 bits that made up 1/4--one quarter--of the dollar). She's so young.

Having never seen the actual breakdown of a barber's rates back in the days when we literally broke a dollar, I'm guessing fifty cents would get you either a shave OR a haircut, but not both.