Ive been without power a few times in the past several years that ended up being days at a time. Most recently we were without power for two days and it reminded me how much I hate it so I made the calls and will never have that happen again.
Surprisingly we have had some random outages over the past year. We had one at night but the genny kicked on and we didn't know until we woke up and the oven clock was off. I checked the generator and sure enough it has kicked on and run the house for a few hours that night. I was really happy.
Now no matter if Im home or not my collection is taken care of. Also with my line of work I feel better knowing the wife is taken care of at home and not having to pull start a small generator and hook things up. I almost went with a movable one and installed a 220 plug to power the house but in the end I thought it was to much of a hassle.
I think I made the right choice.
The little Honda models BCR mentioned are really good.