Saturday, July 7, 2012

Derechos and Updates

I was at work last Friday, early evening, when the power suddenly went out. A few minutes later, some brief rain showers and those massive 90+ mph winds blew right through in a period of just about 30 or so minutes, uprooting some whole trees, ripping shingles off of roofs and sending tons of tree limbs of various sizes crashing to the ground. Not too upset about the prospect of leaving work three hours early, I headed home at around dusk and expected the power to come back on soon enough like it usually does. Four days later, I was still waiting... Ironically, despite this problem being caused by rain and unexpectedly strong winds (classed a "derecho"), we didn't get any more rain or wind that could have conceivably helped to cool things down from then on out.

The day after the storm, I ventured out early to grab a few much-needed supplies only to find out that just two local gas stations (with generators) were opened. Both were sold out of ice, nearly sold out of all batteries, drink and food - there wasn't even a crumb left in the Krispy Kreme display - and had a several hour wait on getting gasoline, which one station had hiked up to 5.50 a gallon. While some fled town and drove hours away to find a hotel (many of which also reportedly upped their prices) or stay with a friend or family member, I decided to just tough it out in my home with water, limited food, a handful of candles and a few little LCD lights. I had plenty of yard work (disassembling an old greenhouse I was no longer using, planting grass seed, touch-up painting) I'd procrastinated on to help me through the days and a handful of books I was planning on reading anyway to get me through the nights. As a few days passed I also had a refrigerator and freezer to clean out, which was a huge pain in the ass considering I'd just stocked up at the store and had 130 dollars worth of Schwan's frozen food products spoiling in the freezer. By the end of the power outage, my entire neighborhood was actually starting to smell just like rotten food!

While I admittedly did miss my lights, computer, ability to watch movies and other perks dearly, the absolute worst part was the heat. Nearly every day the temperatures exceeded 100 degrees and nearly every night it was in the high 80s and extremely humid. Despite leaving all of my windows and doors open throughout the day, my home was so hot and stuffy my glasses fogged up simply from sitting still inside. And I'd toss and turn for hours in bed trying to go to sleep, drenched in sweat most of the time and hoping for a cooling gust of wind through my open window that never seemed to come. It wasn't a fun experience in the least, but I kept reminding myself how good I had it compared to what those poor people hit by Hurricane Katrina had to endure during that fiasco. Or how good I had it compared to what billions of people have to endure on a daily basis all around the world.

Going through the discomfort I and many others did, absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things, is a nice reminder to not take things for granted and be appreciative of what you do have: Wake up calls are always welcome, even when they come from an unexpected source. It can also nice to be away from modern conveniences for a few days and be more frugal and resourceful. I sat for hours in the evenings on the front porch every night during the outage. My neighborhood was extremely dark, extremely quiet and extremely still; there was no wind and no noise and no distraction whatsoever, which is so uncommon in our daily lives that it's almost something to be cherished.

So while absolutely none of that has anything to do with The Bloody Pit of Horror, I felt like writing it all the same. I plan on getting back to the review grind Monday evening after work and even dug out a few appropriate titles (THE ICEBOX MURDERS and SCREAMS OF A WINTER NIGHT) to counteract the week I've just had. I'm also in the process of expanding my scope to include a section on 1991-2012 independent films and B-movies here and am working on a few lists to add to the sidebar as well and hope to get that stuff up in the next few weeks. So hope everyone has a great weekend. I'm due for a night out on the town Saturday and if I have as much fun as I should have, I forsee a gallon of OJ, a bottle of ibuprofen and about 16 hours of sleep on Sunday.
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