Location Taken: Baddeck, Nova Scotia
Time Taken: July 2012
I was getting rather worried yesterday that I wouldn’t get my post up in time. I’d come home at around 9 pm, with a full three hours to write the post and get it up. I seem to do best with that touch of time pressure in keeping this blog updated.
But as I stepped out of the car, there was a peculiar somewhat electric sound and all the streetlights flickered and went out. As did every single other thing connected to the electrical grid. The only lighting was the occasional distant lightning from the storm that had caused the power outage.
Well, and a few solar-powered garden lights, and the usual light pollution present in this highly populated area that makes it quite bright enough to get around without hurting yourself on any cloudy night. But that’s besides the point.
But well, no electricity meant no internet, not to mention no computer to write my post on. And it was after closing hours for the library, which is my backup for when I can’t use our home internet for whatever reason. I had to use that option just under two weeks ago, when a different power outage fried the box connecting our computers to the ISP’s network.
So I sat around in the dark, with only a lantern as light. I played on my aging Nintendo DS for a bit, but both of the shoulder buttons weren’t working consistently, and they were essential for the game I was playing, so I quit in frustration after an hour.
Then I pulled out one of the books I’d picked up at the library when I was there to update my blog during the earlier outage, turned the lantern to just bright enough to read by, and read away, trying not to worry too much.
And then the silence was broken by my fan turning back on, and the lights in the hallway turned on, and I rushed to the computer, turned it on, and quickly wrote my post. I wanted to get it up before the electricity decided to go out again, for it was still raining quite nicely with occasional distant flashes in the sky.
Perhaps I should have more of a buffer, but well, this way seems to work well for me so far. I may run right up to the deadline and occasionally over, but I’ve gotten it up every day until now. And including now, since I still have 20 minutes left before my deadline. That’s plenty of time, right?
