Powerless

Last night our whole neighborhood lost electricity right as we were about to give Sam a bath.  Sam was across the room from me when the power went out, and he was so quiet that I had NO idea where he was.  I called out his name and searched for him in the dark.  He thought we were playing hide and seek and quietly hid behind his crib.  Terrific. 

After I found him, we went into another bedroom that was lit up by the full moon shining moonlight into the room.  The dog, freaking out, joined us and we all played together while Brad searched for the flashlight (I now know to keep the flashlight in an easy to find location!).  Unsuccessful in locating the flashlight, Brad began lighting candles everywhere.  Our house looked very Halloween-y!

I suggested that Brad go to CVS down the street to buy flashlights and he reminded me that our garage doors are electric and weigh a TON to open with the emergency handle.  Right.  I forgot how much electricity rules my life!  We quickly abandoned the bath idea and searched for Sam's warmest pajamas in case the heat didn't come back on (it was supposed to get down to 39 degrees last night!). 

Once we got Sam to bed around 8pm, Brad and I had no idea what to make for dinner other than cereal or sandwiches (our stove is electric).  Pizza Hut to the rescue! YUM.  My friend has since accused me of causing the power outage so that I could have my beloved pizza.  Not a bad idea for future pizza cravings!

Other than playing with our blackberries, we were like - what are we doing to do now?  It's hard to read a book or magazine without a flashlight.  As much as I love going to bed at 830pm (I LOVE my sleep during pregnancy), I have learned that I can't really sleep more than 8 or 9 hours because I then wake up at 5am which is not so fun.  

Missing my Thursday night tv shows, I asked Brad if the tivo will still record my prgorams?  Isn't it connected to the satellites or whatever? Maybe there's a battery back-up that will work without electricity? 

He cracked up and immediately began making fun of me.  In a facebook posting, he wrote "our power went out. my wife just asked me "will tivo still record?" I'm going to ignore that question."  This of course elicited MANY comments by friends laughing at me.  Today at work, I told two of my colleagues who are both very smart attorneys about this incident and they both asked in complete seriousness, "the DVR won't record the shows without electricity???" One even went online to look it up!  I'm not the only one who doesn't understand DVR technology!  Brad's response was "OMG - they are electronics.  They require...wait for it....electricity!" You can only imagine where I told him to shove it.

I then asked if we could use the laptop on battery power and access the Internet through it?  Hulu.com, here I come!  This promptly led to more eye rolling and another facebook status making fun of me.  Lovely.  Others saw his status update about it - and asked me, why wouldn't it work?  Again, I'm not the only electricity moron!

Bored, I began worrying that Sam wouldn't be warm enough in his crib with only his fleece sleep sack on him since the heat is electric.  I'm normally not a fan of co-sleeping, but decided that he would be joining us in bed if the power wasn't back on before we went to bed....

Entertained by our blackberries, I noticed that several of my neighbors were also on facebook posting about the power outage and we began communicating back and forth on FB through our smartphones about which number to call at Dominion Power and what Dominion Power was saying about the outage.  Gotta love technology that can operate on a battery!

Thankfully, the power came back on shortly before we went to bed.  It's amazing that we survived the 2009-2010 snowmaggedon storms and this summer's crazy thunder/lightning storms without losing power AT ALL - and yet now, on a clear, beautiful fall night - we lose power? What's up with that?  I seriously have no idea how my friends survived days on end without electricity during the snow and summer storms.  Hopefully, I won't have to find out!  An evening without power was enough for me.