Electricity is Nice

Well, as of this morning, the power is still out at home (has been since about 10 am yesterday morning) and may not be turned back on until late afternoon or evening. On my drive to work this morning I counted 7 places, just on Everson-Goshen road, where large branches or fallen trees were tangled in or leaning against the power lines. It was quite a windstorm:

Clallam Bay reported a gust to 92 mph, while Bellingham had an official gust to 74 mph, and an unofficial gust of 97 mph from a trained spotter six miles northeast of the city (that might have been a localized effect.) Anacortes recorded a gust to 73 mph, while on the coast, wind gusts were between 70 and 79 mph, including 71 mph at Hoquiam. Source: KOMO news Emphasis added.

Other than not being able to work on the pacific arts advertising again*, it was actually kind of fun to be without power all night. We lit about a million candles, made a fire in the fireplace, cooked some soup (the propane burners work, we just had to light them manually) and played board games until bedtime. The only real problem was not having water, but luckily we had plenty of half-full water bottles around the house and in our cars, so we were able to brush our teeth and make tea. I'll pick up a couple gallons of water and maybe a bag of ice or two on the way home today, just in case our power still isn't restored.

Well, there was one other problem. I set the alarm on my cell phone before going to bed, and was awoken by it's beeping in the middle of the night. "Urghhh... no... can't be... not 6:30 already?" I thought. Nope, when I looked at the phone I found out it was beeping to tell me that it was running out of batteries. So much for that attempt at a back-up alarm clock! Luckily our feline alarm clock went off about 7 am, so I was only about a half-hour late to work.

*I'm starting to think the universe has something against PAHM advertising.