Power outage provides some light moments
When our power went off last Thursday morning, I was unfazed. No biggie, I thought; it will come back on quickly.
But no. It came back on Friday night, 36 hours later.
It probably serves us right. Last December, when more than a million homes were dark because of a storm that took out power all over the Puget Sound, we didn’t lose ours. I remember it flickered once.
While homes all over the area were dark and cold, our neighborhood was ablaze with light (and heat). The glow from our Christmas lights could be seen from miles away, flaunting the fact that we had power.
Every time someone asked whether our power was back on, we’d say, quite sheepishly, that we had never lost it. The longer repairs took, the nastier the looks we got and the warier we became.
I knew we’d pay eventually.
The power outage on Nov. 1 and 2 affected 1,323 homes, Puget Sound Energy said. Initially, it was expected to be repaired by midnight (11:59 p.m., actually, which amused me - why not just say midnight?).
At 5:30 the next morning - I knew the time because of the LED watch on my nightstand - I called again for an update.
By then, the repair estimate was 8 a.m. Then it changed to 2 p.m. then 11:59 p.m. The number of affected homes changed, too - from 1,323 to 350 back to 1,323. That’s when I knew we were in trouble. The number of homes should get smaller when things are being fixed, right?
The outage was caused by equipment failure. It was prolonged by a subsequent series of failures and a water-main break that delayed repairs to the power grid.
Kind of comedic, really.
But honestly, one night without power wasn’t awful. It was unfortunate that it happened on one of the coldest nights we’ve had recently, but that’s life.
I picked up Mexican food, and we ate it by candlelight. We played cards in front of our gas fireplace (useful for a little light - it doesn’t heat anything), and slept in one room with our dog, who kept us warm.
I was frosted (pun intended) that I missed “Grey’s Anatomy.” And when the power was out for a second day, we had to toss almost everything in our fridge.
But in the end, all was good: I can watch “Grey’s Anatomy” online. Our fridge is the cleanest around because we gave it a good scrubbing.
Plus, I got a column out of it.
Cindy Zetts: 253-234-8602 or czetts@seattletimes.com