Friday, July 06, 2012

Sewcation Derailed

Last Friday, I was so excited that I could spend the weekend completing my McCall's skirt.  DH was late getting home and I had gone grocery shopping after work so that would reduce my time to do that chore on Saturday.  Once DH was home, we ate a light dinner (supper) and watched a little TV.  He decided it was time to take a shower as it was close to 9 PM.

While watching TV, the floor lamp light near where I set, flickered a few times and I thought then I really needed to get some new light bulbs.  When DH went to take a shower, the power went out, then came back on, then out again, on again and finally out for the night.  We were able to sleep through the night in spite of the high temperatures. Saturday was suppose to be close to 100 degrees.

Saturday AM-still no power.  We decide to go out for breakfast.  Let me say that power surges and outages are somewhat typical for our neighborhood; no rhyme or reason to be given to us from APCo for this in the 9 years that we have lived in our house.  So not having power did not truly phase us until we go out for breakfast and see the storm damage all around us.  Tree limbs broken-new and older trees.  One tree limb laying across power lines on the road that leads in and out of our neighborhood.  Fortunately the tree was only blocking one side of the street and power lines were still intact but could have easily snapped.

Two of our favorite breakfast places were closed due to loss of power.  Several other chain restaurants were open but crowds and waiting time was 45 minutes to an hour.  DH proved to be the smart one and called a hotel to make reservations for us to spend the night based on what we were seeing, hearing and briefly reading about, this was no typical storm that came through.  When checking in, wait time for checking in was over 30 minutes due to long line of people that were in the same situation as we were-no power.  While standing in line, DH called reservation 800# and extended our stay for another day, smart move and smart man.

As it turned out, we have been without power since last Friday, a week ago.  The stay at the hotel has been extended several times, power came back on last night and we will be back in the house tonight.   Today I spent time washing clothes, and scrubbing out two refrigerators as we lost all of food.

Many of you who may read my blog have experienced some of this as the storm came through WVA, Southwest VA and into DC.  I am grateful for the other states (NC, Florida, Indiana) who have sent power crews to assist in this repair and restoration.

I have always felt empathy and concern for others when they have undergone Mother Nature's wrath; I have learned you can not fully grasp how difficult those situations are until you go through it yourself.

I am thankful that I know I will have some more sewing days ahead; sometimes life just takes a different course and derails your plans.

14 comments:

  1. I'm so glad that you're okay! I was wondering how you did with the storm...

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  2. Your DH was so smart to make hotel reservations. Power outages really put a crimp in sewng, don't they. We were out for about 24 hours. DH and I went to Smith Mountain Lake on Wed. and there were power crews from NC still working on outages in the Lynchburg area.

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    1. Most all power has been restored, but Lynchburg was hit hard. Not sure what storms last night did to some areas, but we were spared this time.

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  3. Been there, done that, NOT FUN. Ours happened in winter and when the power came back on after 7 days, one of the pipes to the upstairs bathroom burst and we walked into 2" of water on the ground floor. NOT FUN. BUT, we survived. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but it's usually NOT FUN. Glad you are OK.

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    1. Thanks, Linda. Fortunately all is working well again at our home and definitely no frozen pipes. We do keep getting some power surges but I think that has more to do with extreme heat and brownouts.

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  4. Oh, Linda, so frustrating. But I am glad you are ok!

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  5. Linda, I'm glad you and DH are okay. I'm sorry you lost out on some sewing time (and I'm sorry you had the clean-up that goes with a major power outage). I'm glad your quick-thinking husband found you good accommodations to ride out the power outage.

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  6. So glad you are safe and finally able to get back to normal. What a great idea to go to a hotel!

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  7. I'm glad to see that you are okay and that you have power again. I went through this last summer when a severe storm took out an electrical substation in my neighbourhood. Sure it was uncomfortable for a few days, but things could have been a lot worse.

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    1. Thanks. This week the temperatures are falling to the 80's for most of the week! Almost like a cold front!:-)

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  8. I'm glad you finally got power back! That is terrible! I lost power before the storm, I presumed due to strain on the grid from the 103+ temperature. I ended up being outside in the storm on my way to stay with a friend who had power. It was definitely no ordinary storm.

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