Not So Electric Avenue

I woke up way too early this morning. I don't know if it was the sound of things clicking on and off, or that it was just really hot and still in my room, but I woke up to find that my electricity was off.

Then on.

Then off again. And it stayed off.

It was really hot in my room. The ceiling fan wasn't moving and the a/c wasn't blowing. And it was way too early to be awake and realizing that I had no electricity. But I still had to figure out how to get myself ready for work.

I grabbed my flashlight that I always keep by my bed (safety first, y'all). It was my Grandpa's flashlight that is probably 50 or so years old. He got it back when he worked at the paper mill. It still works and comes in handy when my house decides not to have electricity.

I went out to stand on my front porch to see if the whole street was broken, and it was. If it's more than just my house without electricity, that's a good thing. It means my house isn't broken. Just the street is broken.

I dug out my electric bill (still in the dark with just the flashlight) and called the number on it to report an outage. The automated thingie told me they would have it back on by 8:00.

Um, that's a problem. It was now 7:15 and I leave for work at 8:00, which means I had to figure out how to get ready for work in the dark for the next 45 minutes.

So, I set up a series of flashlights in the bathroom (I have more than one of my Grandpa's old flashlights . . . that still work). It's tough to find good flashlight angles when a mirror is involved in a small space where, say, you have to do your hair and put on makeup and make it all look decent.

I have a hard enough time getting my makeup and hair to look decent in full bathroom light. I don't know if the flashlighting will make that worse . . . or better.

You have to find the right angles to prop the lighrs so that the room gets adequate light from the small beacons of light while not blinding you by reflecting badly off of the mirror.

I finally got it all set up . . . then the electricity came back on.

And then I didn't have much time to get ready for work, so I'm pretty sure I still looked like I got ready in the dark by the time I got to work.

Maybe I'll get ready in the dark for the rest of the week to be prepared for the next time the electricity goes out. You know, just in case.

C.T.