We had a rare August windstorm in the Seattle area yesterday. The lights went out in my neighborhood around 1 or 1:30. Despite the daylight, the winds no doubt hampered the efforts of crews to restore electricity. When I got home from an early evening out and about, the lights were still out.

It wasn’t all bad, though. The cheap portable radio I got from Radio Shack a few years ago (after a similar outage) still had working batteries, so I got to listen to a Twilight Zone radio show by candlelight. Then, I got to bed at a reasonable hour (no Netflix to tempt me to stay up past midnight), and, in the much-darker-than-usual dark, and quieter-than-usual night, I slept very well. (I didn’t sleep any longer than usual, but that’s a minor quibble.)

The lights were still out when I got up to feed the cats, so I changed the radio station to NPR, and went back to sleep.

Still no lights when I got up at 9 a.m., so I took a very quick, lukewarm shower, and headed out in search of hot coffee and something to eat. Since I didn’t have even phone service by this point, I couldn’t check the outage map, so I headed for Third Place.

Closed. No power. The main arterial heading into Seattle was closed, so I had to go the opposite direction. Power was still out over much of that area as well, so I took the long way (really, the only way, what with streets closed by downed trees and/or power lines) to the freeway, and finally headed south, into Seattle proper, where I knew there would be plenty of places with running and hot everything.

At this point, it appears that power was briefly restored in my neighborhood, but is currently out again. But, I have had my morning coffee, done a little bit of writing, and (obviously) have both a phone signal and access to wi-fi.

Now I wait.

(30 August 2015)