emergency power outage 101

Things to do while the power is out:

Take a nap
Wear warm closes
Make a fire
Watch a fire (from the power lines and transformer)
Play on the computer
Surf the web
Watch TV

Yes, all of those things were available today at the RFC while the power was out. Now, I know the first ones made sense to you, my lovely readers, but you might get lost with the last three (or four?).

I started the day with shoveling snow. It was deep. It was wet. It was heavy. My gift to my father this Christmas was shoveling all season long. He's old and deserves the rest to he honest. Later, I got ready for my presentation that I had in my class today. (The power was still on, so no problem with that) I got ready, scraped my car of ice, and headed off to school. I was planning on working at school after class, but by the time I got there, I realized that ALL my school books were still at home. Guess I'd go home to do homework.

Once home, I realized there was no power. Guess I wouldn't work on school. Ate lunch and took a nap. By the time I was going to work, the power was still out, but the RFC-EGG (RFC Emergency Gas[-powered] Generator) was carried out and set up. Yay! Although the power was out for the entire street (on the south side only... odd) the RFC was lit and warm. Now the fire department DID try to put out the electrical fire with a fire hose (Picture 2)... doesn't sound safe in the slightest...

Now the best part about having power? Modem and wireless router. Oh yeah! I didn't get much work done though because I was at work for the majority of the power-filled evening.

For those readers still following at this point out of bordom or a weird masochistic need to read the ramblings of Mojo, don't you worry. After 10 hours of the "power-outage," the RFC is back up and running at full-strength.

Yay for the Scout Moto: Be Prepared. Also for the Computer Science Moto: Make sure to have backups for wireless internet access because without internet, what good is a computer?

fire!

-although I wrote this on the 16th, I'm posting it for the 15th because everything happened that day-

Hello. What a wonderful 15th of December. Today, the 15th, I had an interesting day. Now that I have established the date... I went into work at 8, to find out that I didn't work until 1. I know. Great job Mojo. Wow.

Well, I couldn't park in my normal parking space today, because as I drove past it, I noticed that it was occupied. I would have continued on to find another spot, but decided that I needed to make a phone call about this intrusive car. I mean, how dare they!?!

So I got my cell phone out and dialed 9-1-1. The conversation went as follows:

Calm man: "9-1-1 Emergency. What's the emergency?"
Mojo: "um... Hi. I'm at the corner of ___ and ___. There is a car erupting in flames."
Calm man, oddly calmer than before: "Oh, the fire department knows about it."
Mojo: "Oh... okay... thank you..."
Calm man:

Yes. Mojo had a first. He called 911. The car that had taken his spot was on fire from the driver door all the way to the front license plate. It was quite the sight to see. No one was out there, not even a fire truck (I thought the fire deptartment knew about it...).

Thank goodness for 9-1-1. I know I wasn't the first to call, but still, it's great that we can have help so redily. It's just awesome.