A Few Hours in the Dark

Greetings,

Well, we had a bit of excitement here last night! I had been raining for just over an hour when the lights blinked for a moment. Hmmm...sisters Linda and Jane were in the kitchen preparing egg rolls for Linda to take to work tomorrow, they called out to see if I had seen anything in the living room. Nope, the lights were only out for a moment, so I turned the TV back on to catch up with the Sherlock Holmes mystery on PBS.

A few minutes later the lights blinked again. This time there was a loud crackling and buzzing outside as the lights went out. The sisters kept making egg rolls in the kitchen, and I went to the window feeling a bit puzzled. I was raining pretty hard, but there was no wind, no lightning, or anything that would account for the lights going off.

The third time was the charm. The buzzing and crackling started again, and I looked out the window just in time to see a transformer (about a half-block away) burst into sparks like a roman candle or groundflower. Then our side of the block went dark...sigh...the wrong side of the tracks.

Luckily, I have been keeping my flashlight (Christmas gift from my Dad) in the same place since one of those tornado/emergancy drill lectures at the monastery. I joined Linda and Jane in a hunt for the candles and other flashlights on the main floor. Soon we had enough candles so they could see to finish up the egg rolls. I held a flashlight in each hand to shoot some helpful light in their directions. We also called the electric company to report the blowout. The automatic voice told Linda that the company already knew about the 'problem'. We did have the choice of receiving a call either to give us an estimate of when the lights might come back on or when the lights came back on (why get a call to tell you the power is on, wouldn't you notice?).

So, we visited for a while, considered playing cards (but not everybody could see well enough in the candlelight), and eventually Jane headed off to her bedroom. Linda decided to wait for another sister who was out last night and snoozed off and on in the easy chair. I wrote a letter telling the story for the sisters at home...it should give a chuckle or two for the mailroom readers. My only problem is the Sherlock Holmes story. "The Tale of the Three Gables" isn't one of the shows based on a story from the books but written for the show itself, and I may never who done it in the end.

Blessings,