Hurricane Sandy in Central Maryland

When I came into my office this morning (Wednesday) - the moon was shining through the window. That was a very good sign since we’ve been under heavy cloud cover since Sunday. Even though it was just a break in the clouds, it was more sky that we’d seen this week and it started my morning out on a positive track.

The next positive to the day is that we regained electrical service yesterday so I could turn on lights and fire up my computer this morning. Our power was out for 19 hours. Kudos to the people at the utility company; they prepared well for this one and then got to work as soon as the winds died down! We had planned for a longer outage after our experience with a 5 day outage last summer when a derecho came through our area so getting power back quickly was a very pleasant surprise.

Aside from length, this outage was different in other ways. First - the time of year meant that we were in darkness more. Even during the day the clouds were so thick that there was barely enough light to read. I was glad my Kindle was fully charged when the power went out. Second - it was cool rather than hot like it was in July. Our house got down to about 60 degrees - not bad with layers of clothes but not pleasant for showering. Third - we slept in the basement on Monday - not like in July because it was cooler - because the wind was howling outside and we figured if a tree blew over into the house, we would be safest in the basement.

When we got up Tuesday morning, more leaves had fallen and the dahlias had been blown over. The turtle sandbox that I have mint and parsley growing in had been scooted across the deck - stopped by the railing. Our oak tree had a few small limbs around it. We had lived through Hurricane Sandy! I cut the dahlias to brighten our indoor celebration while a light rain continued for the rest of the day.

10 Years Ago – In September 2002

Many years ago I started collecting headlines/news blurbs as a way of honing my reading of news. Over the years, the headline collection has been warped by the sources of news I was reading…increasingly online. Reviewing the September 2002 headline gleanings - I forced myself to pick 10.    

1. Jordan is hoping to save the Dead Sea from dying completely by channeling in water from its large and less-salty southern cousin, the Red Sea
2. Millions of Muscovites have been advised to stay indoors as thick smoke from forest fires shrouded the city.
3. A Pennsylvania judge has imposed an injunction against Hershey Foods from selling itself
4. Military jets have resumed round-the-clock patrols over New York and Washington as the anniversary of the September 11 attacks approaches.
5. World Security Tight Ahead of 9/11
6. Milk and other dairy products can be as effective as some conventional fungicides in controlling powdery mildew in vineyards
7. Using DNA extracted from the dung of wild elephants in Africa, biologists have determined that three different types of elephants exist on the African continent
8. The Pyramid Rover -- a robot the size of a toy train -- took two hours to crawl through a narrow shaft in the Great Pyramid outside Cairo, drill through a door at the end and push through a camera to reveal: another door.
9. A top Russian space official has proposed temporarily shutting down the International Space Station (ISS) because the cash-strapped country can no longer pay its bills
10. "Vampire" appliances cost consumers $3 billion a year -- or about $200 per household. 

Life without Electricity

We were without power from Friday, June 29 about 11 PM to Wednesday, July 4 about 4 PM - that’s 4 days and 17 hours or 113 hours. This posting is a first installment about the experience.

This is the longest time I’ve ever been without electricity at home and the first time to have a prolonged outage when the temperature was getting above 90 degrees Farenheit every day. The first few days were quite difficult because the outage was widespread. On Saturday morning we bought ice at a grocery store that was running a small part of the store on generators and bringing out pallets of ice. The next morning they didn’t have ice so we went to another store that seemed to be fully operational but they must have been on generators since all the stores around them were without power. We settled into a rhythm to go out to buy ice every morning before 7:30 getting more frustrated with our situation every morning; by Wednesday we knew that we were in the last 10% to be restored. The refrigerator items went into ice chests on Saturday morning and the freezer items (minus ice cream which had to be trashed) went into ice chests on Sunday. We managed to save everything except 3 eggs that broke (out of a dozen), the tortillas that got waterlogged from ice melt, and the cherries that absorbed water and cracked/burst. I’m in the process of cooking all the meat. Yesterday I cooked a brisket in the crockpot, barbequed pork chops in a casserole dish in the oven, and a meat loaf. Today I have to do something with the chicken. The ice chests have dried out and I’ll put them away today.

There were some things I came to be grateful for: 

• We have a finished basement. It never got above 78 degrees Farenheit although it was humid and the air was very still.
• We are on city water and never had a problem with water pressure. People with wells had quite a challenge.
• We have a gas hot water heater. It was so hot, cold showers would have been tolerable but it was nice to have the heat.
• The grocery stores made a valiant (and successful) effort to make ice available.
• I had a good supply of physical books to read. 

I always go into some level of self-analysis during and after an abrupt change like this. How resilient was I? In some areas I did well: switching my reading to physical books rather than e-books, staying still and drinking more water and herbal tea in an attempt to stay cool, and doing what had to be done to preserve our food. My daily sleep/wake cycle was almost unchanged.

So - looking back to the outage days - the two things I can point to as ‘accomplishments’ are 

• 9 books read (and 2 partials)
• Majority of food from refrigerator/freezer saved 

Blog Note

My blog went silent while we were without electricity from Friday, 6/29 about 11 PM to Wednesday, 7/4 about 4 PM. The storm only lasted a couple of hours but its impact was pretty horrendous.  I’ll be catching up over the next few days and will include more about our adventure without electricity once I can be a little objective about it.