Wednesday, June 11, 2008

It Was A Dark And Stormy Night…And I Liked It!

Okay, the whole “open thread” thing was really just a lazy way of getting something up on the blog today. Ever since Gordon Mumpower put the word out that I wasn’t posting enough I’ve felt compelled to post more regularly. It is not that Gordon holds some kind of power over me or anything like that. It’s just that when I hear something like that, be it Gordon or some other acquaintance, I often hear my mother’s voice in the background.

Alright already mom, I hear ya. I’ll write a real post today.

My real post is about is last nights storm. It was a dandy. I should note here that I love a summer thunderstorm. Last night I stood just inside my open garage door and watched it roll into from the west. As the storm approached and the winds kicked up I could feel the air charged with electricity. Someone once told me something about the negative ion thing but all I know is that it just felt rejuvenating.

Around 8:30 PM our lights went out. Out came the flashlights and candles. I dutifully dialed the BGE Power Outage hotline and a live, real honest to god person answered and told me they were aware of the problem and that a crew had already been dispatched to fix it. No problem, the same thing happened a couple of weeks ago and the power came back on at 4:00 AM.

I got up at 5:30 AM to go for a run. It was a gorgeous morning. We still did not have power. The talk at the bus stop was all about the power failure. Several of the parents had phoned BGE numerous times. A few were getting agitated. That made me think of this article I read in the Washington Post this past weekend. Life without electric power takes an adjustment period for some I suppose. The latest word was that BGE expected to resume service around noon.

Perfect. I had to come back today at noon anyway. Today is one of three half days the HCPSS tacks on at the end of the school year. I drove to my office in Columbia, charged up my laptop and my mobile phone just in case and then left at 12:30 PM.

When I arrived back at the bus stop I quickly learned that the power still was not back on. I was even asked if I had heard anything. No, I hadn’t.

It is now 3:00 PM in the afternoon. I am sitting in my screened in porch. My daughter is across the street playing with her friends. It is quiet, sunny and there is even a gentle breeze. There is still no electric service so I can’t get on the internet but my laptop is fully charged so I can write. I’ll just post it whenever I can.

My mobile phone is also fully charged so I can call my sister Nancy in Raleigh, North Carolina. Yesterday was her birthday.

I think mom would like that too.

Post Script: The power came back on at 7:30 PM, approximately 7,000 customers of BGE were still without power at that time, down from a total of 78,000 last night. BGE expects to have everyone reconnected by 7:00 AM tomorrow.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

What I saw of last night's storm was great, but I'm still partial to the pop-up storm we had on Saturday. The lightning show from that one, at least in my neck of the woods, was one of the best I've seen in a long time.

As much as I love strong thunderstorms, I'm tired of cleaning up after them and am ready for some of a more garden variety. Oddly, the most hyped and damaging storm for the region -- the one from last Wednesday -- left my yard with the least damage. Saturday's storm, meanwhile, took the crown off one of my trees and yesterday's storm brought down a huge branch from my neighbor's tree, a branch that conveniently ended up in my yard.

At least I'm getting a good supply of wood for my fire pit. If only we could get some nights cool enough to use it.

Anonymous said...

let's face it wordbones,
there are those of us who have nothing better to do than sit around at night, read your posts and watch Achmed the dead terrorist on youtube. we missed you.
By the way are you still running?
Gordon

wordbones said...

gordo,
I am running my little irish ass off.

Achmed the dead terrorist?
I'll have to check that one out.
-wb

Anonymous said...

I'll be in St Pete this week and will get a couple of 5K's in from Isla del Sol to the Don Cesar and back.
By the way, not to take away from the Columbia Festival, tomorrow we'll be at the Honfest in Hampden. It's a must see if you have any nostalgia for the 1950's and 1960's.
That was when gas went to 29 cents a gallon and a few people threatened to park their cars and walk.
Gordon