Saturday, February 18, 2006

COLD AND WINDY

Oh, my gosh...Friday was a horrible day here in the Pacific Northwest.  I had completed my journal entry Friday morning when POW...out went the power.  I had just checked the temperature outside my kitchen window, prior to beginning my entry...it was 22 degrees and we had been warned of high winds. They were right...today's paper tells us there were gusts up to 60 miles per hour.  Anyway, the power went out at 8:20am and finally came back on around 9pm last night.  I'm thankful for my wood stove, an oil lamp, lots of candles, a battery operated radio and at least one hard wired phone (of course I have a cell phone, too but that costs $$ when you use it continuously). The wood stove is great but I could only get it up to about 65 degrees in the living room. The rest of the house was pretty chilly.  It's amazing what you can do on a day with no power...I shook all the scatter rugs, swept non-carpeted floors and used my little carpet sweeper for the carpet.  And then around noon I ventured out of the house.  Friday is my movie day and I knew the theater up the street from me would be closed, but there's another one in a mall about 6 miles from here.  The traffic lights were out (what a traffic mess) until I got within a few blocks of the mall, so I knew I was in luck.  I saw "Freedomland"...oh, that theater was nice and warm, the movie was just ok. And then made my  way back home. What is normally a 10 minute drive took almost 30 minutes each way.

The musical play Thursday night was great.  "Ain't Misbehaving" features music of Fats Waller.  The all black cast were fantastic !  There were only five of them but when they sang together they sounded like a choir.  I just love the fact that communities like ours have these theater groups, to bring great shows to the public.  The last one I saw there was before Christmas several years ago...it was "Yes, Virginia There is a Santa Claus."  That production had lots of kids in it and they were amazing  We have lots of talent here in our area.

Well, it's sunny and cold here again today but the tree branches are just barely moving (good sign). I understand with our 20 something degrees yesterday, combined with the wind...we had a wind chill of about 1 degree. The power company is still working hard this morning to restore power to about 14,000 homes here in Pierce County. I'm going to get a shower and a shampoo (yesterday I just took a shower as I knew my hair dryer wouldn't work) and get the mess from hauling in wood all day cleaned up with the vacuum cleaner.   I would have not made a good pioneer and that's a fact !

Happy Saturday, until next time........Linda

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

I couldn't live without electricity. Even my gas central heating doesn't work without it as it has an electric pump. Nice for you to get out and see a film while it was all going on. I hope the power outtage doesn't happen again, once is enough! Have a great weekend. Jeannette.  

Anonymous said...

Wow, that is a long time to be without power, do you get a reduction.  If the power is off for any length of time over here, they have to knock something off your bill.  We have never had a cut that lasted that long.  The show sounds great, something I would have enjoyed.

http://journals.aol.co.uk/jeanno43/JeannettesJottings/

Anonymous said...

No power=no cup of tea = desperation in my book!! You seem to have made the best of it and were prepared in a way with the candles and woodburner!!  Glad its back on for you though!!   Eve

Anonymous said...

While I had power the whole time, my MIL was without power most of the day and we live less than a mile from her!  I was really wishing I had worn warmer clothes at work, as I sat there freezing as the heater wasn't generating enough heat.  Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Monica

Anonymous said...

We had a flicker or two, but no outage...JAE

Anonymous said...

Hi Linda, I`m glad you coped alright when the power was down.  With the wind blowing like that I`ll bet it can be pretty scary. I`m glad you enjoyed your evening at the theatre. :o)

Sandra xxxx

Anonymous said...

What awful weather you are having Linda - Hope it don't last too long....That was a long time to be without Electricity...We had 1 power cut caused by high winds but it did not last too long...but like you we have a wood burner - and Oil lamp....We are ever ready just in case.....You were well prepared  with all the things you had to hand.
The musical you went to see sounded great..."Tom did say he knew he had ancestors living in Washington".....Ally

Anonymous said...

hoping today is a much better day weather wise. No fun to lose power for that long especially on a cold day.

betty

Anonymous said...

I see you all got hammered pretty good, hope its better now. Its like -5 here and snowy and windy, I thought we were past this stuff,lol, crazy weather. Have a great weekend

Hugs,
angelrose

Anonymous said...

Your evening at the theater sounds wonderful.  I love live theater.  Stay warm!  Pennie