Regarding the recent Sandy storm, I wanted to share some ideas that worked well for us and may help others.
We lost power for 5 days and ended up doing all our cooking outside since our stove is electric. Last year my wife bought me for Christmas the Cabela's camp kitchen. We set it up outside under an easy-up canopy. I set up my 3 burner stove which runs off a BBQ grill propane bottle. (available at Sportsmans Guide). We used the outside stove for 5 days and did not deplete the propane bottle although it would be a good idea to have an extra bottle in case the power is out longer. This setup was simple and only required a little extra work than normal. This is a good time to have disposable plates, bowls and cups to cut down on cleanup since we were without water from our electric well pump. We filled our 7 gallon water jugs before the storm hit so we had enough water to keep us going. I keep extra water in milk jugs in the spare refrigerator which cuts down on how often the refrigerator cycles and means I always have potable water available when we loose power.

Regarding home defense during power outage. The threat to us came from an unexpected source. An individual near us raises Hybrid Wolves. When trees started falling during the storm, the fence retaining the wolves was breached and the wolves escaped. 3 dogs/pets were attacked and one owner walking his dog was attacked. Having a shotgun nearby while cooking outside provided peace of mind, especially with small children running around.

Lastly, regarding generator use. If you are like many people, when the power comes back on, the generator is put away and forgotten about until the next storm. If you leave gas in your generator while stored, it may not work properly next time due to built up deposits in the carb. This happened to a friend during the storm. His generator would only run on high idle even without a demand. When he switched to the economy mode it would die. He purchased a product called Mechanic in a Bottle and added it to his gas following the directions on the bottle. Within a couple hours his generator was running better and the economy mode started working again reducing the amount of gas he was using. Important when you have to wait on line for gas.

A little preparation goes a long way towards surviving a power outage. Hope this info is helpful.