A day without power...
Of course, my day without power is not today, or I would not be publishing this! Yesterday we had quite the little storm blow through, just as we were sitting at the table eating breakfast. The wind kicked up, the rain came down and WHOOSH! Slam, bam, ~ thunder, lightening, wind and rain sent us reeling! The storm lasted less than an hour, but knocked out power all over the suburbs. Trees were down everywhere, but not in our yard, and we couldn't see any real damage on our street, just a few small branches were scattered around. But electricity, we had not. Aaron went to work at his usual time and was back about 20 minutes later. He had seen trees down in several places along his route to work, and with no power at his office, they sent everyone home. Jim finally left for work around nine, not knowing if the power was off at the library or not. As it turned out, there were pockets of power around town, but most of the town was out.
The Library and a neighborhood about 10 square blocks was on, so they were bursting at the seams with people trying to use the wireless internet to work, and many more people just looking for a cool place to hang out. The temperature that morning before the storm was a sweltering 75 humid degrees, but after the storm it dipped lower and then the air gradually dried out a bit. I think it topped out around 87 after the sun came out that afternoon, and while it was humid, it was not as bad as it had been overnight. Without air conditioning it was bearable in the shade or in the house. We opened the windows to have some air flow and were okay.
After a couple of hours, I was wondering WHEN the power was going to come back on! I tried to call ComEd, but of course I couldn't get through. I noticed some of the neighbors outside, so I went out to hob-nob and see if they knew anything.... The word on the street was that there was such a huge area affected that the power company was telling everyone it would be 2-5 DAYS before all of the power was restored! YIKES! Fortunately, I found out that the other side of our street had power!
My main concern was the cold food. I didn't want to have to pitch everything in my refrigerator or freezer! So I strapped on my gumption and went across the street to house where I didn't know the people, knocked on the door and asked if I could "plug in". They were very nice and let me string an extension cord across the street to plug in my refrigerator! What a blessing! I was not so worried about the freezer... it is down in the cool basement and I didn't have too much in it. If we lost everything in the freezer, it was not going to be horrible.
I got a 'day off" from my plans -I can't do laundry without a washer, and while we had water (and hot water, too) I had no intention of hand washing a week's worth of clothes, thank you very much! I might have been able to do my shopping, but Aaron knew that one grocery store was closed as he had driven by to get to work, and there were so many accidents happening with all the traffic lights out, that I decided we could manage a day or two longer without groceries.... So we read, and I knitted and played my harp and it was quite a nice, lazy day. The only real work that I did was to unload the dirty dishes from the dishwasher and wash all of them by hand.... no big deal. We also made a nice supper - I made chopped coleslaw from a red cabbage, and used colorful yellow and orange peppers that I had on hand. Tasted just great! We also had cottage fried potatoes, brats and fresh fruit. Since we were out of propane and couldn't use the grill, we had to cook on the stove (gas) in the house, which make the kitchen hotter... so we ate out on the shaded deck. Quite nice actually.
... And then, Hallelujah! The lights came on! Ours was a lucky neighborhood and had power restored about 6:30pm. We were only without power for about 11 hours.
Many places are not yet restored. We heard that at one point, 750,000 homes and businesses were affected throughout the Northwest Suburbs, and by last evening, not quite half were restored. I have friends that are still without and only a lucky few have generators. I am thinking that it would not be a bad thing to get a generator for the next time - we may not be so lucky again!
Aaron's work is still not powered up, and my dog training club is still off, as well. So since I don't have to to teach class this morning, I started on the laundry. Load #3 is ready to hang out and I hope the first load is dry enough to give up it's space on the lines! Aaron made a run to the grocery store - he found one in town that was open, using generators, so the shopping is done, too.
And now I am caught up here, as well! Blessings, and may we always appreciate our modern conveniences!
The Library and a neighborhood about 10 square blocks was on, so they were bursting at the seams with people trying to use the wireless internet to work, and many more people just looking for a cool place to hang out. The temperature that morning before the storm was a sweltering 75 humid degrees, but after the storm it dipped lower and then the air gradually dried out a bit. I think it topped out around 87 after the sun came out that afternoon, and while it was humid, it was not as bad as it had been overnight. Without air conditioning it was bearable in the shade or in the house. We opened the windows to have some air flow and were okay.
After a couple of hours, I was wondering WHEN the power was going to come back on! I tried to call ComEd, but of course I couldn't get through. I noticed some of the neighbors outside, so I went out to hob-nob and see if they knew anything.... The word on the street was that there was such a huge area affected that the power company was telling everyone it would be 2-5 DAYS before all of the power was restored! YIKES! Fortunately, I found out that the other side of our street had power!
My main concern was the cold food. I didn't want to have to pitch everything in my refrigerator or freezer! So I strapped on my gumption and went across the street to house where I didn't know the people, knocked on the door and asked if I could "plug in". They were very nice and let me string an extension cord across the street to plug in my refrigerator! What a blessing! I was not so worried about the freezer... it is down in the cool basement and I didn't have too much in it. If we lost everything in the freezer, it was not going to be horrible.
I got a 'day off" from my plans -I can't do laundry without a washer, and while we had water (and hot water, too) I had no intention of hand washing a week's worth of clothes, thank you very much! I might have been able to do my shopping, but Aaron knew that one grocery store was closed as he had driven by to get to work, and there were so many accidents happening with all the traffic lights out, that I decided we could manage a day or two longer without groceries.... So we read, and I knitted and played my harp and it was quite a nice, lazy day. The only real work that I did was to unload the dirty dishes from the dishwasher and wash all of them by hand.... no big deal. We also made a nice supper - I made chopped coleslaw from a red cabbage, and used colorful yellow and orange peppers that I had on hand. Tasted just great! We also had cottage fried potatoes, brats and fresh fruit. Since we were out of propane and couldn't use the grill, we had to cook on the stove (gas) in the house, which make the kitchen hotter... so we ate out on the shaded deck. Quite nice actually.
... And then, Hallelujah! The lights came on! Ours was a lucky neighborhood and had power restored about 6:30pm. We were only without power for about 11 hours.
Many places are not yet restored. We heard that at one point, 750,000 homes and businesses were affected throughout the Northwest Suburbs, and by last evening, not quite half were restored. I have friends that are still without and only a lucky few have generators. I am thinking that it would not be a bad thing to get a generator for the next time - we may not be so lucky again!
Aaron's work is still not powered up, and my dog training club is still off, as well. So since I don't have to to teach class this morning, I started on the laundry. Load #3 is ready to hang out and I hope the first load is dry enough to give up it's space on the lines! Aaron made a run to the grocery store - he found one in town that was open, using generators, so the shopping is done, too.
And now I am caught up here, as well! Blessings, and may we always appreciate our modern conveniences!
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