Angry Birds and candlelight....

So, what did you do on the Fourth of July?

Dave and I spent the afternoon and evening at my house without any electricity.

Storms rolled through the area around 4 in the afternoon.  The lights flickered off and on.  We began to talk to them as if they could hear us..."Stay on! Stay on!" I yelled to these inanimate objects.  It was all to no avail.  We were soon without any power...and, that included air conditioning on this sweltering July afternoon.

I called the "Power Outage" hotline (No pun intended....ha!) to report the situation and got a recorded message that said "...yes, it looks like there is an issue in your neighborhood and we expect to have it fixed by 5:30 p.m."

OK.  We can handle that. 

So, I began to read and Dave listened to a baseball game on my battery run radio.  It was actually kind of nice and peaceful and cozy.

Then, as darkness began to set in, I got out tons of candles and spread them out around the den and kitchen.

I thought that it was kind of romantic. 

I don't think that Dave agreed (!!), who by this time was deeply into playing "Angry Birds" on my iPad while listening to a ballgame on the radio earphones, starting to get hungry....and, wondering when the power was going to be back on.

I was continuing to  read through a stack of unread magazines with my trusty flashlight.

He stopped the game long enough to go outside (in the pouring rain) to light the grill. I followed him with a huge umbrella and a pork tenderloin that he had purchased before coming over.

My son, Jeffrey, had grilled some peaches while I was there visiting last week...and, they were delicious....so, we threw a couple of them on the grill along with some leftover rice and mushrooms sealed in tin foil.... from the night before.  We also had a slightly warm watermelon that he had brought over.

It was turning in to quite a feast.

We sat at the kitchen counter and ate our dinner in the candlelit, but, otherwise totally dark room.

After dinner, we were back on the couch again (Dave with Angry Birds and me with my magazines and flashlight) as I continued to call the Power Co. to get updates.  Unfortunately, the times for having the power returned were getting later and later....and, the house was getting warmer and warmer.....They were now saying 10:45 p.m.

Giving in to the situation, we headed to bed around 9:30...figuring that we could at least get a good night's sleep.

Wrong.

First my alarm system began to "chirp".  I'm still not sure why it did that....but, I put the code in and all was quiet again.

After tossing and turning for a couple more hours, the power did finally return sometime after midnight.  The partially finished clothing in my washing machine began to churn again, some of the house lights went back on, and the air conditioning humming began as it slowly cooled  things down.

I am not sure when we finally got back to sleep....but, suddenly it was 6:00 a.m. and my phone began to ring.
Who could be calling at this ungodly hour??

As I put the phone to my ear....I heard a recording from the Power Co. asking me if our power had been restored.  I pressed "1" for yes and blearingly hung the phone up.

You have got to be kidding.

Thanks for the wake up call, Alabama Power!!

Oh, and Happy Fourth of July!?!?