I'm hoping someone can help me turn a miserable past two weeks into something better…
So as an underpaid, overworked music teacher I was looking forward to our mid-year four week holiday. Plans were to catch up on some work, spend some time on my composing hobby, practice lots of piano and visit some friends I haven't seen in ages.
The Friday that the school closes I get that "coming-down-with-something-feeling", but it feels very mild and I'm still optimistic (despite the fact that one of my music co-workers were visiting with family the week-end prior whom all got sick and tested positive for Covid, and she was ill for the first half of the week and we passed lots of test papers back and forward for end-of-term moderation.)
Comes that night I got a fever which basically lasted for three days and kept me away for as many nights. Next day it was fever all day and deadly tiredness. The Sunday the throat ache started. Seven straight days with the worst sore throat I've had in years followed.
As bad as this was it wasn't all. We're no strangers in South Africa to load shedding where we'd sometimes not have power for two to four hours a day due to failures at power stations and what not. Basically as a result of a decade of state capture where our previous criminal president of the country appointed his crooked cronies in key positions at all state enterprises which includes the power utility which followed ten more years under Apartheid-free SA where the government in a bid to win votes sacked all the previously experienced (white) engineers and craftsmen to appoint under-qualified black personal. So with all the robbery and maintenance failure coupled with our ongoing population explosion our power network is extremely stretched.
Just as the holiday started the workers at the national power supplier embarked on an illegal strike action which only got resolved a day or two ago (with a resulting backlog in work that seems to have no end in sight).
So on top of feeling miserable I had to endure between four and six hours without electricity for the past two weeks.
The only bit of good news I had was a sizeable tax refund which I did plan to use to stop a few holes but will probably have to be spent on some sort of power back-up system. (Luckily I have that available now.)
I need some advice on the power requirement I'm looking at…
I basically want to be able to run my laptop, my monitor (I cannot work on a 13" screen when working on big orchestra scores), my WiFI router and especially my electric piano (Yamaha P-250) for up to about four hours.
Keep in mind I'm not at all technically minded.
My piano has a late at the back that says 230V 79W~50Hz
From what I understand one get these battery trolleys with an inverter that you charge at the mains and then that automatically kicks in when the power goes out.
But they come with different capacities and I don't want to get the wrong thing. I'm not sure what info to give to some store attendant with regards to my electrical piano. Most people get these to keep there PC's and TV's going I guess…
I'll appreciate anyone with knowledge or experience that can give some advice.