Power Out

I rolled out of bed at 6:30 AM and looked at the thermometer. It said 18°F. By noon the temperature had climbed to 27°. At noon, I was on a Skype session with CD when everything stopped. The electricity had gone off. This wasn’t just an inconvenience; my home requires electricity in order to have heat. The house would be in cool-down mode until the power came back on.

I called the power company to report the outage. They said they hoped to have the power back on by 5 PM. Hmm … 5 hours without heat in below-freezing weather. I showered while I still had hot water in the water heater. I dressed and decided to drive to Wally World to pick up groceries. As I walked out the front door, it occurred to me that the garage door opener would not function without electricity. Oy.

I entered the garage and squeezed between the back end of my Jeep and the garage door. I was barely able to reach the manual release cord and disengage the big door from the chain drive. I walked back out of the garage and around it to the outside of the garage door and raised the big door manually. Now that it was disengaged from the chain drive there was nothing to hold the door in place and it wanted to close again from gravity. I used a 1” by 1” jammed  between the garage floor and the door to hold it open.

I backed the Jeep out of the garage, stopped, got out, removed the prop that was holding the door open. I drove to Wally World. All the traffic lights on the way were dark. Police directed traffic at some intersections. At other intersections, including a major one, no one directed traffic. I approached and stopped, then nosed my Jeep into and through the intersection.

Wally World had electricity. I shopped. I paid for my purchases. I drove home. Traffic lights were still out. But when I entered my house, it was warm, and I heard the boiler in the cellar running. I had electricity.

It was good to be on the grid again.