Wow. So these storms that passed through the Midwest recently pounded the SNOT out of my town. I haven't had power since 3:30 on Thursday. I'm now at work and reveling at the marvels of modern electricity.
"Oh My God! LIGHT!"
"Music!!"
So, these storms were pretty bad. Apparently, our Mayor has declared us a disaster zone or something. And yeah, it's kinda bad. But...it could be worse. At least not in my town...it's not as bad as it could be. We're not waist deep in flood water, our homes are still standing, and not too many people were seriously injured.
However, having said that...
I've never seen anything like this before in my life. And I used to live in a far-west suburb or Chicago, and when I lived there it was all farmland. So out there, pretty much every time it stormed the sky turned green and we would have to go to the basement.
Let me break down what happened...
3:15-ish: Amy is "cleaning her room" this is code for playing her music loudly and singing in front of the mirror.
3:20-ish: Amy does a stirring rendition of "I'll Cover You (Reprise)" from RENT
3:23-ish it starts to rumble a little bit, the lights flicker. Amy looks for another song from RENT to sing.
3:24-ish: Lights flicker some more, Amy starts to sing "Without You"
3:25-ish: Power goes out (Cosmic commentary on Amy's singing?...maybe so.)
3:25 and a-half-ish: Huge crack of thunder and lightening, starts to pour, Jimmy (Amy's brother) runs outside to roll up his car windows.
3:26-ish: Jimmy makes it back inside, wind starts to blow really hard, Jimmy notices the umbrella over the table on the porch is open and blowing madly in the wind and thinks he should go close it.
3:26 and a-half-ish: Amy begs Jimmy not to close the umbrella because its lightening outside.
3:27-ish: Jimmy tells Amy she's a coward and goes to close the umbrella.
3:28-ish: Jimmy is back inside. Jimmy and Amy watch the storm for the back window for a while. We say, "Whoa!" and "Holy crap!" a lot.
3:30-ish: Jimmy says, "Let's go watch from the front window!" He goes and suddenly says, "Oh my God!" Amy runs to the window...sees the tree in her front yard has lost a major branch. The branch is lying across the road, blocking the entire thing.
Some Time passes. Amy and Jimmy watch the storm from the front window. Amy says several times, "Maybe we shouldn't be the window." Jimmy tells her several times to "Chill Out." Molly, the toy poodle is freaking out.
4:00-ish: One of the neighbors from down the block comes running to the downed tree in our front yard. She sees us in the window and gives us a look like, "What the crap is your tree doing the middle of the road." We give her a look like, "The storm. You're crazy." She moves to the tree like she is going to yank it out of the road. It is still raining and lightening. Not as bad as it was. But still. Storming none the less. So my brother and I aren't going to let this lady pull the tree off the street herself, so we go help her. Another neighbor from across the street comes to help and it literally takes all four of us to get this thing out of the way. Apparently, this lady was worried that the bus that dropped her kids off wouldn't be able to make it through. I was like, the bus driver will figure it out, we shouldn't be out here right now, crazy. The bus driver, will, god forbid, go around the block if he needs to. We go back inside.
4:15-ish: We see an old man go by in his rascal (which if you don't know is like a ride-on, electric wheel-chair). He goes up and down the street several times, surveying the damage. I am not joking. It is still raining. He is old. He is on a rascal, bumping over fallen branches and twigs.
4:20-ish: Mr. Dooley (our retired public works officer and man with way too much time on his hands also, his dog is a fat sausage) comes out to assess the situation.
4:21-ish: I call my Dad and tell him he doesn't need to worry because Mr. Dooley is assessing the situation. He laughs.
4:22-ish: People are starting to come outside, we go out too and speak with people briefly. We find out the storm has uprooted a large stoplight straight out of the ground a block away from our house. It starts to rain hard again, we go inside.
4:25-ish: Jimmy and I see the old man go by on the rascal again, this time he has thought to outfit himself in a yellow rain slicker and has placed a plastic blanket over his lap. He goes up and down the street 2-3 more times.
OK, so some more time goes by, my Dad comes home...it's raining lightly. I decided I think I'm going to go out and get us food.
6:30-ish: I decide to go get food. I go out and instantly realize my mistake. I only went probably a mile away from my house but it took me until 8:00 to get back home. I didn't get any food. NOBODY had power. Every stoplight was out, I drove through 2 feet of water at one point, and watched lightening reach and crack across the entire sky. It was DARK no street lights were up every store was dark...so eerie. So I make it home, thank God.
8:30-ish: My Dad finds a place that's actually open, we order food from there.
9:00-ish: We eat.
9:30-ish: We go to bed. 'Cause what else is there to do with no power?
Wake up the next morning. Still no power. Have to go into the city. Get in my car to go get gas because I need it to get to the city. Nobody has gas. Go back home, because I'm so low on gas, I'm going to run out of gas looking for gas. Plus, getting around is too hard, between the downed trees, and broken stoplights...it's damn near impossible.
So I go home and decide I have to take the train into the city. I take the train into the city, do what I need to do.
4:30-ish: I get home from the city. Still no power.
5:00-ish: Go to a coffee shop to check my email.
6:00-ish: Go to my aunts and eat dinner. She has power. Play with my good pal Owen for a while.
8:30-ish: Get home. Take out my clothes from the laundry that were half-done when the power went out. Hang them in my closet to drip dry. Take out my sheets from the dryer that were halfway done when the power went out. Stretch them over chairs to air dry.
9:00-ish: Leave to go see a movie, Superbad, with my brother. The first place we were going to go to has no power. We go somewhere else. They have power.
9:45-ish: Get to the theatre, sit down and have a 17 year old girl in the movie theatre who is going to see the movie, ask me if I'm actually 17. She tells me a long winded story about how she's 17 (going to be 18 in 40 days) and they wouldn't let her in because she didn't have an ID. I told her I did have an ID and yes, the checked it, and yes, I'm not only 17, I'm 21. She walks away and goes back with her friends, the laugh about something. Jimmy gets upset because he thinks they were making fun of me. I told him to not to get upset.
10:00-ish: The movie starts
11:45-ish: The movie is over. Realize you can't really expect much from a movie with a title like Superbad. Leave the theatre tired and disappointed. Realize it would have been a better evening reading by candle-light.
12:00-ish: Get home. Get into bed. Realize a neighbor has gotten a generator that sounds like 3-sooped up lawn-mowers. Curse them as I try to fall asleep.
All night-ish: Wake up constantly, curse then generator about 10 times, at some point have to close my windows because it's raining...AGAIN.
Wake up the this morning-still no power.
Go to work. Crazy day. Find a way to get my drip drying laundry properly cleaned (thanks to Mrs. Y letting me commandeer her washer/dryer for a while).
Go to other work where I sit right now wondering from whence I will be delivered from no power. It's weird to have power now-to sit in artificial light. To have a computer screen and Internet. I will say it has been difficult for me without the Internet. I can live without TV. But I am anal about checking my emails.
No time for a quote of the day or a word of the day. Will update again soon...I hope. Until then...living it up Puritan style.
