I'm baaaaack... last night was an overheated experience...
Yesterday the high temperature of the day was 97°F... of course every home and business had the air conditioning going full blast... that puts a significant strain on the power grid here in the NYC area... we are, after all, a city of 8.5 million residents and 17 million in the tri-state (NY, NJ & CT) area many of whom commute into Manhattan every day for work... so the draw on the power grid is HUUUGE... especially on the hottest day of the year...
The hubs had just finished grilling up some fabulous chicken thighs that had been marinating for two days and we were just about to sit down for a late supper at about 8:20pm when *boom* the power goes out... of course we check to see if it's just us or the neighborhood... it was the neighborhood...
Okay, okay... so dinner by candlelight (how romantic 😂) while the temperature slowly rises in the house... at that point there's no more opening the fridge or freezer... turning off wifi on phones to save battery life... we eat, chat, enjoy our supper of chicken and a crisp green salad with a side of caprese salad and some herb bread... and we wait...
Eventually we take a walk to see how far the power outage extends... it's just a few blocks in either direction... across the street the light are on... but it's HOT and muggy out (still about 90°F at 10:30pm)
The hubs is off to bed to try and sleep... the house is about 80°F and not humid... a call to the electric company reveals they don't expect the grid to be back up until 11pm the next night... yiiiikes... fridge and freezer in jeopardy... apparently there are spotty outages all over the city... ugh
12:30am... I wake the hubs... thanks to superstorm Sandy we have a generator in the garage that can power both the fridge and freezer so we don't lose our food... he agrees the time for repair is too far off and we set about hooking up the generator... the hubs is the one doing all the work so I jet off to find gas for the generator (5 gallon gas can in the back of the Hyundai) and snacks for us (White Castle is open 24/7 and the drive thru nets us 8 cheeseburgers and a giant ice cold vanilla shake... mmmm 😋... so cold)
2:30am... the fridge and freezer are back on line and we have one power cord into the living room that can handle a few watts... we set up a small fan, one lamp and charger for my phone in case Mom pushes her button... we chat for a while then try to sleep on the living room couch... (the burgers and vanilla shake were perfect)
We were fortunate... the power was restored by 12:30pm today and we got to take the most wonderful showers to wash off the sweat by 2pm when the house had finally cooled down again...
It is amazing how an incident like this reminds us how grateful we are to have the luxury of electricity at our fingertips in virtually unlimited amounts... we were sweaty and a bit tired, but none the worse for wear...
But more importantly we both recognized how lucky we are to have had the generator available... especially during the COVID pandemic when we couldn't stay with anyone else...
Today was cool in comparison... only 91°F.... and we had tuna salad, romaine leaves, smoked provalone and cantaloupe for supper in a cool air conditioned kitchen... profoundly grateful 💞
How was your day? What's on your plate? Thoughts?
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