Wasn't That A Mighty Storm?

Friday night, I decided to take a break and try on some clothing.  It's not my primary task that I set for myself, but I do want to cull my wardrobe.  It takes a lot of closet space and I'd like to make my task of figuring out what to wear easier.  Fewer items would help.

Around 9pm, I was chatting with a very good female friend, describing what I was trying on next and it's disposition.  I wrote "the lights are flickering and it sounds windy.  I better shut down."

But I didn't shut down right away.  I chatted for another minute or so and then put the machine in standby.

Windows 7 actually does something right: if you put it to "sleep" mode, it both goes to sleep (low power fast restore) and hibernate (copy everything to disk so if power goes out you can get it back).  I wanted to take advantage of that.  I usually have a lot of windows open.

I waited until it went into sleep mode ~ the power button started flashing amber.  Then power went out.  Dam.  I thought for a second and realised if power comes back on the computer might try to wake up.  Power popped back on and it tried to wake up, just as I pulled the plug.  I knew I lost the race and it would be a mess when it came back on.

It was dark and I took off what I was trying on and moved the clothes I had tried on as best I could and, by the light of my phone and non-stop lightning, I got ready for an early night.

Saturday was mostly a reading day.  There was no power, many traffic lights were out, trees were down.  There wasn't much damage at this house, which is good.  I do have some cleaning to do.

The basement is the darkest and coolest area of the house.  Even with temperatures reaching 100 the basement was comfortable but I needed to be upstairs to read.  NO trying on clothes.  It was too hot.  Mostly I sat around in just panties.  NOT a pretty sight.  Trust me.  Pictures will not be forthcoming.

During the day I tried to find out what the situation was at my home.  There was no answer to phone calls to either my wife's cel or my landline.  She didn't answer e-mail.  My son didn't answer his phone.

So I braved the heat and the downed trees and the blank intersections and drove over there.  The trip took more than twice what it should: I couldn't take the most direct path out of my temporary neighborhood because of a downed tree.  I tried to go up a connecting street on the way to my house ~ closed due to power lines down.  I couldn't get into my neighborhood by the most direct path because of another tree.

Cel service and power were out at my house.

My wife was going to go away for the day but she decided this was a sign that she shouldn't go (I'm not the only one who listens to the universe).  My son was to go to a friend's house for an overnight.  Even though they didn't have power they did go.  First they drove up the street to look for a cel signal so I took advantage and raided my closet.  I brought back over 60 tops and a dozen or so dresses.  I have a lot of trying on to do.

At bedtime, lights were still out and I went to bed early.

Sunday, I went out for breakfast.  My son called later ~ he needed to be picked up and couldn't get hold of his mom so I went to get him.  Before and after that, I sat on the screened porch reading.  I don't have any shorts with me so I took off my shirt and put on a grey herringbone miniskirt and hoped that if a neighbor looked over it looked like shorts.  But later, with a critical eye, I knew that no-one would mistake it for shorts.  I don't care, much.

At 4pm Sunday, after 43 hours with no power, lights came back on.  This was a fast-moving storm that started in the midwest and made a straight line for the DC area.  There's a name for the storm: derecho.

From the Washington Post:

The storm that whipped through the region Friday night was called a derecho (duh-RAY’-choh) , a straight line wind storm that sweeps over a large area at high speed. It can produce tornado-like damage. The storm, which can pack wind gusts of up to 90 mph, began in the Midwest, passed over the Appalachian Mountains and then drew new strength from a high pressure system as it hit the southeastern U.S., said Bryan Jackson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

Unfortunately, there's no tornado-like warning.  No houses were down ~ the damage was more like from a hurricane than a tornado.  But it was bad and most of us were lucky.

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