Gnarly Weather

Yesterday morning, a front passed through; bringing near hurricane force winds, at least one tornado, and about three inches of rain in a short period of time. One local video of a tornado passing across IH 10 made the national news. Damage was relatively light, but enough to severely change a few people's lives. No injuries, which is good. 

Right before the worst of the storms hit, power went out. A call, and some reports, revealed a power pole snapped and put over 600 customers out of service. That's when it became interesting.

My electricity is from a local co-op. Instead of a huge corporate money pit sucking up the revenue, the money is used to guarantee good service, which includes line clearing and necessary upgrades. Responses for problems are quick, and repairs fast. The bad part: they don't generate electricity, so they have to wait for the large electrical generating corporation to repair their equipment before they can restore our power. 

It took twelve hours for power to be restored. Up until dark, the pole laid on the side of the highway, with a cone marking the spot. At dark, and realizing power might not be restored until late tomorrow, I uncovered the generator, fired it up, and brought the refrigerator back down. Nothing had thawed, but I wasn't taking a chance. 

With power, I soon had the pot brewing and coffee to share. My sister-in-law came over for a cup, and we visited wile enjoying the coffee. As we were discussing, the power came back on, which relieved everyone. I turned off the generator and went back to line power. 

Plugging in the refrigerator demanded pulling it away from the wall. This revealed dust, and dirt. This morning, my wife and I cleaned behind it, I cleaned the coils, we pushed in back to the wall, and then tackled the stove. After all, if you pull the refrigerator out to clean, you might as well do the same behind the stove. 

So, the power outage was inconvenient, but inspired us to do some necessary cleaning. That's a good thing. Now, we'll spend the afternoon doing little, and listen to the wind roar outside. It came through with a vengeance this morning, and hasn't let up since.