My Week Without Power

Way back in 2006 a huge storm blew through St. Louis.  I was attending a PartyLite conference at the dome downtown and remember walking onto the concourse, hearing the tornado sirens and seeing the green sky through the window.  And the WIND.  We were three stories up and the debris was blowing past at eye level.

What I was witnessing, I found out later, was "straight line winds" not a tornado.  Trees and branches had dropped all over town and power was out.

There was little surprise driving home with so many of the street lights and signals out that my own power wouldn't be working.  And as with any power outage I pulled out the candles and hunkered down for the night.  My kids were with their dad that Thursday night and his power was also out.  In fact everyone's power was out.  When I arrived to work the next morning my office was up and running and the conversation centered on that weird storm the night before and how wide spread the outages were.  I returned home with my power still out.  That had officially been the longest I have ever gone without electricity.

This was at the end of July and the heat was increasing.  The kids returned home so we sought refuge at my mom's house for the evening - this wasn't a full scale blackout, merely large pockets of outages.  We went home the next day with promises to return if the heat was too much.

My power did not come back on until the following Friday.  EIGHT DAYS.

We never went back to my mom's house, but we did have to change our routine and we survived (obviously).

Let's be clear, I am not a prepared person.  I do not, and did not, have huge stores of supplies for doomsday circumstances.  Well, today I have what equates to a miniature grocery store in my basement, but it wouldn't have been helpful in this situation.

The first thing that came out were my candles.  Having been a PartyLite representative for five years I have plenty of wax on hand, even today.  After my traumatic experience of no power for EIGHT DAYS I will forever have candles at my disposal.  My tale of woe was woven into my candle demonstrations from then on out.  I had enough candlelight to be the most illuminated  house on the street - you could see us blocks away!  I rigged a three wick monstrosity next to the couch so I could comfortably read - seriously, it was bright enough.

I knew not to muck with the refrigerator.  Leave it closed, it would be fine for a day.  And it was.  As it became clear I was exceeding the 12 hour limit of safety I bought a bag of ice to cram into the freezer.  That saved me more time.  On my way home Saturday morning I bought two more bags of ice figuring I would continue tossing them into the fridge and freezer.  When I got home it was clear I would need a ton of ice for that procedure to work properly and knew I had to move everything into a smaller device.   I had two coolers that had served me well the previous year when I toted my spawn across the country for a ten day journey of travel, camping and sightseeing.  Milk and all of the perishables were carefully packed into the coolers covered with plenty of ice.

Every morning I would drive to the grocery store and buy two bags of ice.  The store almost walking distance from my house was impacted by the power outage so I had to drive a few miles away and back.  I would drain the excess water from the coolers and cram as much ice as would fit.  It was funny how this became my new routine, me the non-morning person running to the store.

Just about everything was stashed in Ziplock bags before hitting the cooler.  I rarely make specific brand recommendations but I've learned that nobody makes a zipper bag like Ziplock.  They seal completely and are not prone to pin holes along the seams.  Even items that don't look like they will take on water should still be put in plastic bags.  There's nothing worse that hotdog flavored butter.  And in this instance I wanted to keep the melted ice water as pristine as possible in case we had issues with water purity, rumors were already circulating.  In that burst of brilliance I made sure to clean out my coolers with bleach water before storing food in them.

My house was not completely electric.  We had gas to our stove and hot water heater.  While the electric spark on the stove was inoperable I could still use a match to light it.  I opted not to heat up the house any further by cooking on the stovetop other than to boil water or small food preparation.  Instead I lit up the grill in the backyard.  The kids gathered small branches since there were plenty after that storm and I didn't exhaust my charcoal supply.  We didn't have much to be rescued from the freezer and what was there was promptly cooked and eaten.

It's been a few years and my memory is crap, but I think maybe my kids spent time with other family members.  I don't remember incessant whining about boredom.  Detoxing from the TV was refreshing and I caught up on my reading.  I spent a lot of time sitting outdoors in the shade because the house was pretty freaking hot.  At night I slept with a wet towel to keep cool.  I now pay attention to window placement in houses.  This particular house was not built with airflow in mind.

Overall, it was not a completely negative experience.  I felt proud for being resourceful enough to rise to the challenge.  Little did I know that in six months I would have to repeat my resourcefulness for another extended power outage, this time during an ice storm.

My husband hates the potential harm from gas lines and fireplaces, but my experience has made both very necessary.  The fireplace was the only way to keep warm during the ice storm.  I had pet birds at the time so I crammed their cages as close to the fireplace as possible and draped heavy blankets over them.  This time I do remember the kids were not home as I recall sleeping on the couch in front of the fire.  Fortunately my power was back on in 48 hours.  I had already kicked into my previous routine of running to the grocery store for ice (kind of ironic with an ice storm, huh?) and cooking the contents of the freezer.

I think of these experiences as I hear of others facing long term outages.  It is possible for an unprepared person to survive.

If ever you were to give something valuable to a young adult moving out on their own let it be an emergency kit:
   • Candles
   • Lighters (more than one!)
   • Manual can opener
   • Ziplock bags
   • Cooler
   • Gallon of water
And if you were really generous, pack it with non-perishable food.

Random Gift

When I arrived at work yesterday there was a large grocery bag sitting in front of my office door.  This wasn't the typical plastic grocery bag either, but a huge paper deal with handles like you would find at Panera Bread.  It had a note to take what I want and donate the rest. 

Are you kidding?  What wouldn't I want to keep?

Oh, what was it?  Left over cotton fabric, most of it decades old, all of it very outdated.

And I LOVED IT!

I sought out the mystery gifter and thanked her profusely.  She warned some of it was probably too small to use.  Ha!  I keep some of the tiniest scraps imaginable - I am a true scrap quilter.

She was happy to be rid of it and I was delighted to receive it.

Clearly it's time to return to the basement and start quilting again.

Handmade Ornaments

I throw away NOTHING.  These I have acquired over the years ornaments from Christmas Card exchanges with my favorite messageboard. 

Um, yeah, that would be a knitted turd.  And it makes me smile every time I see it.  It's almost a shame I put these away, because they make me smile.

BEST Christmas Gift Story EVER

I just got off the phone with a friend and she was telling me about her visit to the hairdresser. 

They were chit chatting about Christmas and the hairdresser was a little put out over the gift from her husband.  Turns out he gave her a GUN.

And it wasn't even a pretty one and it was not PINK!

She did not want a gun but her husband felt she needed one with the late hours she works.

So what did she give him?  Exactly what he asked for - cash.

My friend looked up at her and said, "you need to take that gun and tell him it's a stick up and take that cash away from him!"

Smart girl, that friend of mine.

Opening The Gifts

Sexy Skirt

When I was growing up we would receive care packages from my grandparents.  I'm sure to most people that would be an exciting delivery and I know my mom appreciated the love packed inside.  But for me and my brothers?  Fear and trepidation.  There was no telling what sort of mystery crap Grandma would squeeze in, cushioned by coupons to stores not available where we lived.

Grandma has never catered to giving toys to children.  What a crazy idea.  She is the type of Grandma that likes to shower you with clothes.  Especially HOMEMADE clothing.  Nothing says stylish teenager like a blue crocheted sweater from Grandma!

I know I sound really ungrateful, but I have received some really awesome things from my grandmother, just not in the homemade clothing category.  My mom dutifully paraded us kids in front of a camera to prove how much we adored our new gifts and we each wrote notes gushing our gratitude.  But there was one item that my mom roared with laughter and promised me that I would never ever have to wear it.

It was truly frightful.  The fabric was a print of a Van Gogh painting (which as a quilter is really cool, but I wasn't a quilter at the time).  The skirt was below the knee during a time when skirts were supposed to be above the knee and it was gathered at the top with ELASTIC.  Soooo not cool.

But actually I did end up wearing it.  Once.  I had an event that everyone was encouraged to wear the most outrageous outfit possible.

The Van Gogh skirt did find a use - as a birdcage cover (you can see the skirt stored at the top)