Monday, October 29, 2007

Powerless to change.


Or perhaps, just powerless.

I had just gotten home from work, watched enough of the Redskins game to see they were hopelessly behind, and started watching something I had recorded.

Boom! The lights went out. More importantly, the TV went off.

Didn't hear any thunder, so a nearby tree probably wasn't hit by lightning. Doubted it was a tornado, unless it was one of those extremely rare blue-sky tornadoes. Just one of those things, I guess, those things that Dominion Power is fond of: random outages for no apparent reason.

I called the emergency line, and the automated voice told me (a) that a "widespread outage" had been noted in my area, and (b) that the power should be restored by 8:15. Hmm. Interesting that an outage could be described as "widespread" after only 5 minutes, and that they could predict a successful conclusion to the quarter-hour.

Rather than sit in the dark, I drove to a local watering hole for dinner. On my way out of the neighborhood, I couldn't help but notice that the widespread outage did not include, for instance, the house immediately in back of mine - on the other side of the power line from me. But it did include the vast majority of the houses in my neighborhood, and the nearest set of traffic lights on the major road near me, so I was satisfied.

And by 8:30, the lights were back on.

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