Electricity is My Friend

Last week I didn't post because we had a power outage. We've been having a lot of those lately. Most of the time they don't last very long, but the one last week went on for two days.

It started on Thursday. It wasn't a full power outage, but a brown out, which is when you don't have full power. Most of our lights still worked, but we couldn't have anything plugged in because that appliance or electronic could get burned out. So, no fridge, washer, computer, internet, television, even fans.

Thursday afternoon, we noticed when the kid's bedroom fan went from full power to just a whisper of a blow. So, we quickly went and unplugged things. We have our midweek service on Thursdays, so we were about to get ready for church, and we figured it would be back on by the time we got back. That was usually how it went.

When we got back, there was no such luck. The power was still down and our house alarm was going off nonstop because it's backup battery was dying. So we had a dinner of pantry items while my hubby tried to get the alarm to stop blaring, and then when it finally stopped, we all went to bed. Friday we were hoping that it would get fixed that morning, but again, it didn't happen.

All of this time, I was trying to avoid opening the fridge so that nothing would spoil, but you can only go so long without needing to get something out. I hadn't been to the grocery store in a while and there wasn't much in there, but finally for dinner on Friday I opened it and started pulling things out that I could cook before they went bad. We have a gas stove, so I was still able to use that.

Friday night we sat in the living room with the kids, my husband was playing his dulcimer and my kids were singing. We've had power outages here that we full power outage and we spent those evenings sitting in the dark trying to entertain three little kids. At least with this one we still had lights.

I started remembering back when I was a kid and we lived in Africa. I remembered the power being out pretty often, and there was no way to know when or if it would come back on. I remembered playing games in the living room with lanterns and candles everywhere. We played board games if we could see enough or we played games that my mom made up. I remembered my mom reading the Little House on the Prairie series to us. Mom, also reminded me of a time when we had a brown out and the only light that worked was in one hallway, so we all ended up sitting in that hallway reading books.

Back to our current situation, finally on Saturday afternoon the power came back on all the way. Praise the Lord, I never opened the freezer so nothing in there spoiled. Now, pray that it doesn't happen this week because we just did a big grocery shop and there's a lot in my fridge right now!