How Much Did the Power Outage Cost You? See How Much it Cost Eddie

If you lost power after Saturday morning's crippling storm in South Jersey, have you taken the time to figure out how much money it cost you?

My family lost power until Tuesday ...afternoon, about 3 1/2 days in all.  I've been doing some calculating about how much it impacted me financially and I think  it's about $500.

We didn't get a hotel room or do anything extravagant during the outage  nor did we sustain any property damage, so I would guess that most families that lost power for a few days spent easily that much.

Here is a breakdown of my power outage expenses:

- Meals eaten out that we would have eaten at home.  Cost  =$205.00  Eating out is fun and a nice change of pace, but its expensive!  We ate three meals in restaurants we would normally have eaten at home.

- Miscellaneous items = $37.00  Add up the ice with batteries, candles, etc...

- Re-stocking refrigerator =  $250.00, so far.  I threw everything in the fridge & freezer away when the power finally came back on.  Condiments, cheese, butter, milk, ....all the  the basics you have in the family refrigerator.  The bill to replace what got trashed was almost $250.  That doesn't include several pieces of meat in the freezer which I didn't replace yet.

Total: $ 492.00

Think about that.  $500 in a little over three days and nothing to show for it!

You can make me feel better by itemizing your expenses in the comments section below and showing me you spent than I did!