It's a three-day weekend for Labor Day. Not that it matters. The "time off," I mean, not the concept. Since I don't work, weekends are just like weekdays to me. I should be happy, looking forward to the cookout we're having with The Pony on Monday. But it has become extra "work" for me now.
Saturday evening at 5:25, our electricity went off.
It has been blazing hot all week. 103 in town, 99 out here in the country. That's actual temperature, not heat index. Hot enough to make the devil sigh (to borrow from a Tracy Byrd song, "Watermelon Crawl"). HOT. Hick got home around 4:30. The sky had clouded up a bit.
"Was there rain in the forecast?"
"I don't think so. Just a couple of sprinkles. But it rained hard down at my store."
Then the wind started to pick up at 5:00. DARK sky. Then a little rain. Then a LOT of wind. Whipping the rain sideways, twisting the trees all will-nilly. Then hail. Then lightning. The lights flickered off. Came back on. Then went off for good.
"Do you think somebody is reporting our power outage?"
"Probably. But they don't need to anymore. The electric company can tell."
"Huh. Well. At least there's still enough light for me to see my lottery tickets."
Hick counted his SUS2.5 money. Looked out the front door. Sat down to wait for his John Wayne movie "The Horse Soldiers" to come back on. It had just started.
We got an email from the electric company that there was a possible outage in our area. 95 homes affected. Reason unknown.
"Huh. I guess they'll have to send a crew out of St. Louis."
"Not anymore. They have some out on the highway, over towards the junior college. They'll send a crew."
"Yeah. On a holiday weekend."
"They have people on call. They like it. They'll be making at least double time for the holiday."
"They'll be taking their sweet time! To rake in more money!"
The Facebook page of our enclave had people asking if anybody knew anything. I'm sure they all got the same notice we did from the electric company. Hick told me I could call in and report it. I told him HE could call in and report it! Without electricity, we have no internet. No water, no air conditioning. No FRIG II, no lights, no cooking. One toilet flush for each bathroom. If Hick could get his phone to work, he could look up the number and call it himself. He did not.
Around 6:10, we got another notice that the estimated restore time was 8:30.
"I guess you're not having corn dogs for supper. Do you want a ham sandwich?"
"Nah. I'm not real hungry."
Hick saw on Facebook that people were saying not to take the county blacktop road to town. A tree fell on the low water bridge, and took down power lines. Which meant, according to Hick, that the tree-trimming crew would have to come out first, to clear away the tree.
Around 7:00, Hick went to bed. I was done scratching. I just sat at the kitchen table. Hoping. Sometimes it gets repaired before the estimated time.
8:30 came and went. 9:00, too. 9:30, 10:00, 10:30. I gave up waiting for power. I cracked open an individual can of Beanie Weenies for my supper. Followed by an apple for dessert. In the dark. Only the dim light of Hick's two solar lights on the porch rail seeping through the kitchen window.
At 11:30, I went to bed. Five minutes later, I got another update. The electric company was sorry that they did not have power restored by the estimated time. That's it!
At 2:30, another update. Estimated restore time was now NOON on Sunday.
At 4:20, the lights came on. The AC kicked on. I got up for a flush and some water. Sat down in my OPC. And the power went off again at 4:35! I immediately put my OPC down so I wasn't trapped. Good thing we have that battery backup, which was deader than a doornail within minutes, having been drained by the 11 hours that came before.
Hick left for his SUS2.5 at 6:00. I went back to bed. Hick had promised to manually open the garage door, so I would be able to at least drive around in T-Hoe to cool off if the house heated up. Thanks to the rain, it had been staying at 75 degrees through the night.
At 6:45 a.m., the electricity returned. You'd think I'd be celebrating. I now had flushes and water to go with my daylight. But I also had a whole FRIG II to clean out.
All week, I had been buying things for our cookout. That's because I can't carry in a lot of heavy stuff in this heat. And Hick can't help because of his surgery recovery. I'd just finished the shopping on Saturday afternoon, with two pounds of hamburger. The pre-made patties this time. 12 of them. To make my life easier. Hick had brought home 4 pork steaks from a buddy who had a hog butchered. He was really excited about those pork steaks. Now they're garbage.
According to my estranged BFF Google, food in a powerless refrigerator is only good for 4 hours. Not 13 hours. So today I have to go back to the store, and buy hamburger, pork steaks, sour cream for dip, bacon for the baked beans, hot dogs, slaw, cheese, and mayo.
I am not looking forward to the cleaning out, nor the carrying in. If we had known that the electricity was going to be off past 8:30, we could have gone to town for ice, to preserve our refrigerator foods. Or Hick could have started the generator for lights, and to run FRIG II.
You'd think the electric company could send out more helpful notices. Even to say that they don't know when power might be restored. Then people don't lose all their food. I'm afraid that some of those 95 homes will be hurting, having probably just bought their groceries at the first of the month. By the electric company not informing us right after 8:30 that this repair was going to take much longer, people assumed the power would be coming back shortly.
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