That’s the time our power came back on this morning. We were without power for 6 days in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. The winds blew through here at up to 80 mph at times, and left total destruction in their wake. We lost several big trees on our property… Luckily none of them did any major damage.
This one luckly fell away from our house right in front of our garage.
This is my hubby standing next to the roots of that tree – he’s 6′ 1″ tall, so you can see how big this was!
This big tree cracked in half setting off a chain reaction of sorts…
That tree fell into this one…
…which then took out this really tall one!
We were lucky this was the only damage to our deck!
We lost all of the food in our fridge and freezer except for this…
3 bell peppers and a lemon!
It got really cold last night – we were all shivering, even my poor dog and cat who have built in fur coats! We finally broke down and lit a fire in the fireplace to try to take some of the chill out of the air. It was 50 degrees in my family room!!
Ahhh…warm fire!
The only problem is that the crackling of the wood scares my poor dog, so she was stressed out for most of the evening. I was really glad when the power came back on – even if I found out by having our house alarm system start going off at 3:17 am – thus the title of my post. I heard the noise, the lights came on, and then…the heat. Ahh..the heat! I was finally able to shed one of my layers – I felt kind of like Randy in “A Christmas Story” when he was all dressed up in his snowsuit and couldn’t put his arms down. I had so many layers on – even two layers of socks!
I am still cautiously optimistic about our power staying on. I keep hearing rumblings of a Nor’easter headed in our direction mid-week that could bring unseasonable cold, rain, and more winds – 40-50 mph! Please…that’s the last thing we need! I still have friends and family without power, and that will only hamper the efforts to get them restored.
As I said in my post from Thursday – with all that happened, I am so very thankful that we fared as well as we did. I learned several things from this experience….
1) We need a generator – not one of those little ones, but the big whole house one. Our heat is supplied by electric heat pumps, so one of the little ones really wouldn’t do much other than save the fridge and give us a few lights. If power goes out during the winter when it’s cold for multiple days in a row, we’re screwed.
2) I would not have done well back in the pioneer days. I survived the long, cold, dark nights reading books on my iPad, watching movies on my laptop, and lurking on Facebook on my iPhone. I am a techno-geek. Gotta have my gadgets.
3) My thermos totally rocks – so I bought another one. It stayed hot enough for warm tea for 48 hours. Yup. That’s pretty damned amazing. Here’s the link to Amazon where they have it. Wish their associate program was still legal in CT… Best Thermos On The Planet
4) When a storm like this is coming, fill up the gas tanks in both cars. There have been lines for gas ever since the storm – due to the inability to get trucks here to refill the stations, stations not having power to pump gas, and people using a ton of gas to run generators. I have never seen lines like this before in my life. I remember my dad telling me about the gas shortages in the 70s, and how lucky he was to be able to get gas whenever he needed because he was a volunteer fireman. I’m hoping things ease up in a few days because I’m going back to work again tomorrow…and my commute is about 32 miles a day.
5) Always have extra D batteries. My favorite flashlight uses Ds, and I only had enough to replenish it twice. I also learned that a set of batteries in that flashlight lasts about 4 hours straight (left it on for the pets when we went out).
6) Be patient. Long days with no heat, no sleep, and no hot showers wear on everyone’s nerves. I was doing okay until day 5 – but lots of people around me started losing it after a day or two. I get it…but everyone’s in the same boat. Getting upset with other people isn’t going to help. Throwing eggs at the lineworkers trying to restore your electricity isn’t going to make them work any faster (yes -that actually happened!!). Threatening to kill the mayor of the city you live in if you don’t get power doesn’t work either (yes – that actually happened too!!). People are so used to instant gratification and modern convenience that a few days without wreaks havoc on daily living. Yes, it’s difficult. Yes, it’s annoying. Yes, it’s uncomfortable. But it’s not as bad as all that. Really.
Well – all in all, I’m very thankful to have made it through this, and I’m hoping that this next storm decides to take it easy on us. Hopefully things will slowly but surely get back to normal around here….
Losing It Little By Little 