Hi, I'm Qardnall

You may recognize me from my various roles on the internet, including streaming licensed video games, scanning development used video game scripts on the internet archive, and being the Bird Pope™ with a soft spot for frugs

I have been without electricity for a month, and without it, I cannot heat or light my space, cook food, charge devices, or access my desktop. I need $1500 to hire an electrician to completely replace the meter box. Details below:

I'm having a rough year...Thanks to the community's extremely generous contributions, I was able to crowdfund an expensive moving operation. Though I was able to physically relocate, when I got there, I found out I have no power access.

Once I finally got relocated, I called the power company to to hook up the electricity to my dwelling (which is on a separate meter box from the house on the land where I'm staying, which is convenient because it tracks my power usage on a separate bill from the property owners, who are dear friends allowing me to stay here. However, this is the only way to get power to the dwelling because it's physically far from the house and their normal meter box). So I call the power company and have them turn on the power, but when I plugged into it, there was no power at all. I see that the meter is operational, so I call them back and they send someone out, they test it and they tell me "either your breakers or components in the box are bad, or the outlets are fried, maybe both, but we only service the side of the box with the meter (incoming power), the other side of the box (outgoing power) isn't our responsibility" and they took off.

After that, I opened the meter box and consulted a relative who works for a power company from another state, and after seeing it via facetime, he basically said 'don't touch it further, this is dire'. The outlets below the power box are toast, caked with insect detritus and dust, and the lines coming from the metered side are not only partially corroded, but the neutral line coming from the other side of the box is apparently non-existent (which makes it incredibly dangerous to tinker with I'm told), and to top it all off, the box itself isn't weather proof so insects have had their way in there for god knows how long, and water has seeped into the box and corroded some of the components. Before being told not to futz with it, I spent a little money to replace one of the outlets, hoping that the just the outlets were bad, but once they were open, the condition inside was not good (the new outlet didn't work when hooked up either), and the wiring ended up being taken out, as there was no component to add slack relief inside, and they had been partially exposed prior to my looking in the box.

It's been nearly a month without power, and I'm beginning to panic. I'm charging my phone and laptop at the main property here, but without electricity, I can't run a heater when it gets cold, I cannot cook food, and I certainly cannot return to streaming or many other online activities. It's taking a toll on my mental health. I've tried several avenues to restore power, and consulted a few people who know their stuff when it comes to electricity work, and It looks like if I want electricity restored, I have to call an electrician and have the box entirely replaced and set up, which could cost upwards of $1200 in coordination with the power company, but this is just a general estimate from the internet and may be unreliable, and may not include the cost of parts and labor for the outlets to be replaced, so I'm asking for $1500 to cover any hidden surprises/fees. I just want to return to a sense of normalcy, and any help would be appreciated.