Tag Archives: power outage

Yes, it was me

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Olive has discovered a fun game to play while I make the bed. She jumps on the bed and hides under the covers. Her crazy polydactyl claws get stuck .

Last Thursday, I had a dental appointment to get my teeth cleaned. An hour before my appointment the power went out.

I checked my iphone and the power company predicted power would be restored in four hours. They didn’t give the cause.

I called the dental office to let them know I couldn’t get my car out of the garage because the power was out.

The receptionist told me to pull the red cord and then I could manually lift the garage door. I hung up, pulled the red cord, but couldn’t lift the garage door. So I asked my husband to try.

“No. I’m not going to mess with the garage door,” he said. He wanted to leave well enough alone and wait for the power to go on. “Just call them and reschedule,” he said.

The dentist was able to swap my appointment with somebody on Monday morning. It was all good.

A neighbor called us and said she was at the hair dresser and would we please go to her house and invite her husband over. He had been walking their dog when the power went out. He was sitting freezing in the back yard with their dog. He had exited the locked house through the garage and without power, the buttons to open the garage door were worthless.

The wife said she asked him to come over to our house, but he didn’t want to be a bother. My husband returned with our neighbor and Rascal, a poodle bichon, a few minutes later.

The power was restored a few hours earlier than predicted and life was good.

But then Friday morning came. We had an electrician over to see why a few outlets inside and lights outside don’t work. My husband clicked to open the garage door for the electrician. The motor went on but the door didn’t open!

I saw a sticker with the garage door company name and number. I quickly called them in a panic. After all our dishwasher AND garbage disposal already quit working earlier. I was worried everything was going wrong in our “new” house all at once.

The garage door repair man came a few hours later. I told him we had had a power outage the day before and I didn’t know if that had anything to do with the double-sized garage door not opening.

“Did anyone pull on the red cord and manually open and close the garage door?” he asked.

“No, absolutely not,” my husband said. “We didn’t want to do that for the exact reason that we could hurt something.”

I was standing slightly behind my husband and sheepishly raised my hand. “I did,” I said.

The garage door man climbed a ladder under the garage motor, pressed a lever and presto! The garage door worked. The price tag: $230.

“Why didn’t you tell me you pulled the red cord?” my husband asked.

“You didn’t ask and the dentist told me to,” I explained. My husband shook his head and walked away.

The garage door man said he’d service our garage door and he also fixed the buttons outside which have never worked. So, now we can also get locked out of our house if the power goes out while we’re on a walk.

What embarrassing things have you done that compare with me pulling the red cord?

Feeling powerless

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Gila woodpecker
A gila woodpecker loves the Bird Buddy.

I’ll keep this short. We have a planned power outage today for an upgrade to our electrical panel. It’s four to five hours without electricity. Who knows? That’s why I’m powerless today. I’m using my iphone as a hotspot to write this post. I want to conserve my iphone and laptop battery until the power is back on — so I won’t ramble on too much. FYI the upgrade has to do with solar panels.

As far as my Bird Buddy goes, I haven’t been posting any photos lately because a covey of quail jumped on it all at once and the bird feeder flew off the fence into the wash. The solar panel roof hit hard on the ground, popped off and the usb-c connection broke in half.

I contacted Bird Buddy to see if I could get a new cord, but they said I needed to order a new solar panel roof. They sent me a code for a discount, but the solar panel roof isn’t expected to ship until late February or early March. Also, we need to find a better place for the Bird Buddy so it’s stable and can’t be knocked over by wind or greedy feeding birds.

If your power is out, what’s do you miss using the most?

When you don’t have electricity, do you find yourself forgetting the power is out and try to use something like the microwave? I found myself hitting the lights in the dark bathroom.

You never know what tomorrow brings

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Yesterday it started snowing! The prediction was 100% rain, not snow.

It’s Wednesday afternoon and I’m sitting in the dark. I’ve decided to write a post for tomorrow, while my laptop still has juice. I’m using my iphone as a hotspot so I’ll be able to post this.

You never know what tomorrow will bring, so I decided to jump on this while I have the chance.

My daughter asked me to come up and take care of her. She’s in quarantine with COVID and there’s nobody to help her with daily things like laundry, groceries, going to Target, etc. I booked a ticket for tomorrow and she found me an airbnb down the street from her. My son, who lives close by, isn’t cleared to drive and isn’t walking post foot surgery.

She said she’s not going to infect me. She’ll ask me to run an errand and I’ll leave it on her doorstep. I can do her laundry at my son’s house or a laundromat (she doesn’t have a washer and dryer.) And I can walk Waffles.

I wanted my daughter to stay with our friends in Santa Barbara for another day to make sure both she and Waffles were up for the drive. I’m glad she ignored my advice and left on Tuesday because by Wednesday a winter storm hit closing roads and freeways. She could have been stuck.

So off I went to my PO Box and to the store to pick up a few last minute things for my trip. I opened the garage door and discovered it was snowing. It started snowing harder and coming at me sideways. I wasn’t sure I wanted to drive to the Post Office or store. But then I thought, you never know what tomorrow will bring. I better do it now. I’ll be leaving town tomorrow.

While at the store, my husband called and said the power went out at our house. I told him I’d check with the power company when I got home. As I drove down the street to our neighborhood, I wondered if the clicker to the gate would work?

Fortunately, someone manually opened the gates to our neighborhood and I drove on through and parked the car in our driveway. It stopped snowing and raining altogether thankfully as I brought in my groceries and mail.

Now I’ll use my iphone as a light in my closet to pack for tomorrow’s adventure. I’m learning to not procrastinate or find excuses.

Are you prepared if the power goes out? Are you prepared to handle the unexpected like a freak snow or a last minute trip to help your child?