I was driving the kids to a salon for a haircut at about 3:40 pm. A few street lights were out and then the radio stations all went out. I turned on an AM station and heard breaking news about how much of San Diego County, Orange County, Riverside County, and northern Mexico were without power. No known cause. Traffic was a little ugly with people trying to maneuver the traffic signals. I tried to call Dick but the calls weren't going through.
We arrived at the salon to find out, to no one's surprise, that they didn't have power. However, they were able to cut the kids' hair anyway. Veronica got her very first haircut!! She was very brave! She couldn't quite decide if she wanted one for sure until I told her she could have a lolly-pop when she was done. That was also hers (and Jackson's) first lolly-pops!
Anyway... back to the power outage. I continued to try to text and call Dick and our friend Pete. Nothing. The radio was now talking about how the entire county was in gridlock - no traffic signals and everyone trying to get home. We had no radio in the house, no tv, no cell phone. Luckily, for just this purpose, I've kept a phone around that doesn't require electricity (remember those!?) So I used that phone to call daddy (had to leave a voice mail).
Then I went into emergency mode! It was only 5-5:30 so still light out for a little longer. The kids helped me find every flashlight we could find. I opened our emergency kit which I have not looked in for years! I found a battery powered light/fan. Since I have two 3-year olds, I have a ton of batteries on hand! Gathered some candles and a lighter too. Then pulled out our battery powered radio only to remember that for the last five years I've been meaning to remove the batteries from it so they didn't leak battery acid all over. They did and I couldn't get the radio to work. :-( I threw the emergency kit in the back of the car along with a 5 gallon jug of water - in case we needed to flee. The car had half a tank of gas.
Daddy got a hold of us and said he was planning to stay downtown for a while because of the gridlock.
Around 6 or 6:30 we finished our emergency preparations and decided to look for dinner. The kids had a great idea - cereal! We used up some milk that was about to spoil... the kids were very brave!
Daddy called again around 7 to say he was leaving downtown. In the meantime, Jackson decided he had to poop! So he, Veronica and I hung out in the bathroom on the little potties, by flashlight, while he took a major poop! Then daddy got home!
Even though the kids had a well-lit room and a fan (the temps were in the mid-80s at 7 pm), Veronica was a little scared and clingy. I finally had to leave her in the room crying/complaining but she soon fell asleep.
Dick and I listened to the radio on my ipod for a while and I read a book by flashlight. We went to bed around 10:30 or 11. I woke up around 3 to notice that the power was back on! Yay!
While it's kinda fun and exciting to have the power out, it's also scary. I had made sure to lock all the doors and windows as it got dark outside. You never know what kind of crazy things people might do! I was also getting annoyed thinking about possibly having to throw away hundreds of dollars of food from the fridge/freezer. As it turns out I just threw out the milk, mayo, eggs, cottage cheese and the like. The power was out for probably 9-10 hours total.
Anyway, that was our adventure Thursday. It's funny because for one evening life had totally changed to this very basic concern over safety and the bare minimums. The next day, totally back to normal with all the modern conveniences and a trip to the new downtown children's museum!
To do to this week - update my emergency kit! By the way, daddy messed with the battery powered radio and got it to work! I'll pack it away with the emergency kit - with the batteries in a separate container!
Veronica's first haircut (in a power outage!)
Painting Penelope the whale at the Children's Museum
What an adventure! You handled it very well and survived! We've had a few power outages for several hours and the fridge stuff lasts pretty well so long as you don't open it. I think the only time we threw stuff out was a 7 day outage!! yes, 7 days!!! That was in Livonia back in 1975 or 76.
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