This past week has been something of a nightmare without the sleep. It started off last week actually. ‘The powers that be’ at the office decided to move us from the corporate umbrella to the government side. This actually isn’t such a bad thing because the government business is who we spend 98% of our time supporting. On the bright side, we got a couple different days off… Columbus Day being one of them. On the down side, our team had just gotten over all the chaos created by moving us to the corporate umbrella a year ago. It shouldn’t really be too big of an adjustment since this is where we started back then.
Monday was Columbus Day… our first new day off. I didn’t really enjoy the day off much. Things just aren’t the way I’d like them to be in my life. I basically just bummed around. Tuesday, it was back to the office. Tuesday and Wednesday both seemed a lot like Monday, with all the crazy catch up antics that go on in any business after a weekend. Wednesday afternoon improved and I headed for home much like any other day.
Dad and I ate dinner together as always. He has been telling me that his truck has been turning over slowly. Its only a year old or so and really shouldn’t be having starting issues at this point. I left his place and went to ‘The Middlesex Mall’ (Dollar General) to buy milk. I got home just a little before dark. I came inside giving little notice to the paper stuck in the door. Being a political season, I have been coming home to find flyers of all sorts promoting this party or that politician. I opened the fridge to put the milk in… no light. My ears realized that they were being bombarded by silence… No ceiling fan running in the kitchen… No furnance or fridge motors running. The light that normally would have been on already in the living room wasn’t on. I turned back to the door to grab the piece of paper wedged in between the trim and the edge of the window. It was a Disconnect Notice from the electric company. “SHIT!” and maybe a couple other choice words were uttered as I dialed the 800 number on the paper.
The typical corporate recording answered the call. I hate these things. This one is voice activated. You have to say one of a few specific phrases. Being just a little upset, I ended up hanging up and calling back to gather my composer so the stupidly inept machine would understand what I was saying. I finally got “Discuss My Shutoff Notice” out in a dialect that the computer could interpret. It was more like “DIS Cuss MY Shut Off NO Tiss” than the fluid representation the male recording gave as example. I’m pretty sure smoke came out my ears when the male automaton’s very non-chelantt response was “Your problem requires direct assistance from our office. Please call back during business hours.” Great! I’m not going to have power tonight for sure.
Ok… Fine! I’m going at least one night without power but I’m loading my guns with information for when I do get through to the office. I used my smart phone to check my checking account and make sure my last payment had cleared. I also looked for the last statement I received by mail. I had signed up for paperless billing so I don’t get much from them. Having everything I thought I might need together, I decided that I should get my oil lamp and such together for a long night in the dark. Well, maybe not. I’ll call Dad. Maybe I can go up there for the night. More smoke shot from my head as he gave me a bland… “Well, Its not supposed to be that cold tonight. You won’t freeze.” I hung up on him. I was ready to scream.
I got in the truck and headed to Walmart. I had to get out of the house for a bit before I did or said something that I would regret. My mood was just starting to turn around from about two months of feeling like crap. This one stupid incident had brought that fire back just as intense as before I started fighting it. I’m sure I probably had a few choice words for several stupid drivers as I made my way uptown. Inside Walmart wasn’t much better as I dodged wreckless buggy drivers and kids running rampant. I walked around through the lanterns and flashlights looking for an inexpensive LED lantern that I could read by instead of holding my flash light up to the book. I wanted a lantern because it would sever more than one purpose even after the power was back. LEDs would last a long time on batteries so I wouldn’t have to worry about how much reading I did in the dark. I found what I was looking for and headed for the checkout. The craziness was just making my mood darker.
I spent the night curled up on the couch with my book and my lantern. Tink made her way down and came up on the couch with a loud per as if she knew I was in a bad mood. She continued to do this even after I crawled in bed. I had got the old sleeping bag out and opened it like a bedspread. I figured this would be very insulating should the house get overly cold during the night. I never did use it either of the two long dark nights without power. I had trouble falling asleep Wednesday night. Every little sound echoed in the darkness. We take for granted how much noise goes on in our daily lives in the background… seemingly unnoticed. I swear I could hear my back aching. When I get stressed, it seems to ache more and ache it still does as I write this.
I took the day off to try and get the power back on. I called and got a real person at the power company. She had a cold and wasn’t very with it. I don’t know how many times I had to repeat my account number. I work with numbers and addresses all day so I’m very careful reading off these kinds of things to others. She finally apologized for being a little out of it. I tried to get things straightend out but there was nothing she could do. Apparently, the disconnect department is also disconnected from the billing department and the rest of the company. She couldn’t figure out why my power was off because she could not retrieve any of my payment history. Finally… Fed up with the whole situation… I told her “Just tell me how much I have to pay to get the stupid power back on!” That’s when she read off the options to me. I selected the pay it and get it over with option. She informed me that it could take 24 hours to 3 business days from the time the work order was logged to get the power back on. Great! That means that I could technically be without power until Wednesday morning! (More choice words were uttered). As she hung up, she noted that the work order would probably not be processed until Thursday morning. I am camping in my own house for another night. Woo Hoo…
I have a generator but to run it when I’m the only one without power on the block I’m pretty sure the neighbors would be slightly unhappy with me. Dad had all kinds of uneducated advice of how to ‘plug’ my generator in so I could have lights and such when the meter wasn’t in line or how I could just plug the furnace into the generator. I work with heavy electrical planning as part of my job… I know EXACTLY what it will take to run my furnace or power my lights. I’m not going to go to the work of rewiring my knob and tube house for two nights of power loss. The day I have the house rewired there will definately be a transfer switch that allows the generator to safely power certain circuits without worrying if the power will come back on and blow up the generator or burn the house down. Until then, a two night outage on a fall night doesn’t warrant my spending a fortune. It was bad enough I had to pay the reconnect and deposit fees the power company wanted.
The lady I talked to at the power company and the cut off notice both said someone “MUST” be at the house to turn the power back on. The tech would need access to the house to make sure everything came back on safely. I took a second day off hoping that would not be a waste waiting for someone who wouldn’t show until the following week. About 10:20 AM, I heard a noise at the front of the house. I looked out. There is the technician replacing the meter. He hadn’t knocked or anything. Would he come to the door after he was done and ask me to turn things back on… Nope. He hopped back in his van and drove off. Had I not heard him out there, I would not have known that the power was back on as they had also instructed me to turn off all the breakes so the powe would not surge any of my electronics. I left out a sigh, as I went to the basement to power the house back to life.
The best thing out of the whole deal was that it was early enough that I could head in and get a half day of work. I get a fairly decent amount of time off, but why use it if I didn’t have to. I have the ability to work from home but this was also the last day of one of our coworkers so we were to take him out for “Get the heck out of here” errrr.. .I mean “Going away” lunch. I guess I forgot to mention that when Dad came down Thursday morning, his truck finally died. I had to jump his truck. He took it straight from here to the shop to have it fixed since its only a year old. They couldn’t get it in but promised to look at it on Friday (today). I worked my half day. Just before 4 PM, I checked my phone. Dad had called. His truck was done. A bad cell in the battery was supposedly the culprit. He didn’t have a way to get back up to get it. I told him I’d check with my boss but I didn’t see why I couldn’t leave right then and come get him. We got his truck with no charge for the repair. We went to Eat N Park for dinner. Finally, the week from Hell was over. At least I hope its over.
Tomorrow, I take my truck up for an oil change and tire rotation. I have the gear to do the tires myself, but with my back the way it is… I’ll pass. I’m sitting here listening to the RUSH Time Machine DVD as I type. Amazingly, tonight has seemed much longer than either of the cool nights I spent in the dark. I’ll probably head off to bed soon. Hopefully, I will sleep better than I have this past week. I’m not counting on that. I am counting on a better day tomorrow.
~Cappy