Tag Archives: power outage

A Zero To 100 Percent Chance

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The weatherman says that there’s a zero to 100 percent chance that some/most of the country will get zero to 20 inches of snow beginning and ending sometime between tomorrow and Monday.

And where I live, people are losing their minds.

Milk, bread and toilet paper are flying off the shelves and weekend plans are already cancelled in anticipation of this weather event. My parents waited in a tremendous line at Walmart Thursday night and had the war weary faces of people who had seen too much in their quest to pick up my hamburger buns and lettuce.

The forecast models aren’t especially helpful either. One meteorologist that serves southern Ohio has three models going and each one shows something drastically different. Winter storms are hard to predict and last year’s gutting of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) didn’t do us any favors in this department.

So, I am preparing as though we will get several inches and be placed under a Level Three Snow Emergency where driving is restricted. I’m also planning for ice and heavy snow that will snap trees and power lines. And I’m prepared to just be happy staying home with a stack of books this weekend.

I was already prepared for that last one. Heh!

Here’s what I’m doing to get ready for Snowpocalypse 2026:

Charging– Yesterday I rounded up all the flashlights and battery backups. I checked batteries and started charging everything so it’s ready to go.

Food Preparation – I plan to boil some eggs and make a small pot of soup and some corn muffins today. I have some things that could easily be made on the grill or eaten cold so I’ll gather up that stuff and keep it front and center. That way I don’t have to dig through the freezer in the dark.

Water – Now that I’m no longer reliant on a well that’s electric powered, I worry less about water. However, a water line break is always a threat so I still have on hand a few containers of water for flushing as well as some bottled water for drinking. If water were still more of an issue, I would have every pot and pan in the house filled with water by now.

Warmth – I do not have an alternate heating source but I do have a tent! I wrote about this before (here’s the link) but it is worth mentioning again. A tent you use for camping outside will keep you warm inside your home if you lose heat. My tent is the perfect size to fit on a queen sized bed and it keeps me nice and cozy. I pulled the tent, sleeping bag and nice Eddie Bauer insulated blanket out of the closet yesterday.

As an aside, If you have small kids and are worried about keeping them warm, consider building them a blanket fort with your kitchen table. I used to do that when I was a kid and it’s loads of fun. Their body heat will help to warm that small space and make it more comfy!

Gathering Other Supplies – I tried to think about what else I might need if the power goes out. Today I will empty a plastic tote for outside food storage in case I want it. The nice thing about a power outage in the snow is that you can pack food stuff in snow in coolers or totes. Store them in the trunk of your car to keep them cold and safe from animals. I also have a bag of ice in each of my freezers. If I don’t open the freezer doors, everything should stay frozen for a long time.

My snow shovel is handy as are my boots and cold weather gear. Today I’ll run outside at lunch time to feed the birds. I’ll repeat that process again tomorrow morning if the snow hasn’t set in yet. That way their little bird bellies will be nice and full until the snow moves through and I can feed again.

Entertainment – I have a puzzle at the ready as well a stack of books to keep me entertained regardless of what the weather does this weekend.

What’s missing? I think I have covered my own priorities but would love to hear about yours!

I Ran Away

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I ran away from home for a few hours Saturday.

Life in the country comes with benefits and inconveniences. One of the benefits is that you’re surrounded by sounds and sights of the forest. One of the inconveniences is that those beautiful trees and their branches sometimes fall and damage power lines.

We’ve had regular wind storms for the last few weeks, causing frequent power outages. We lost power Saturday morning. Then it came back for a while and blew again in the afternoon.

It’s hard to clean, organize or do much of anything in the dark so I sat in a chair near the window to read. And promptly started to fall asleep.

Suddenly, I was irrationally angry to be wasting yet another weekend, sitting in the dark. Hiking wasn’t safe even though I badly wanted to get outside. It was too late in the day to find my way to a city with a museum or something interesting to do. I’m So I messaged my cousin Sherrie and invited her to join me for some treasure hunting and dinner in Athens.

We went to Peddler’s Junction where I found some bargains including this sweet little Dutch Girl, a Madame Alexander doll that is pristine and in her original packaging.

These nesting dolls were a bargain at just $3. I had admired some at a shop in Ligonier, PA two Christmases ago but they were beyond my budget.

Ephemera like these cards are some of my favorite things to collect. These small pieces of art that are easy to display and change out for the season. Plus, storage is easy.

If you look closely at the card on the right, you’ll see feathers on one duck’s tail. The middle piece has a hinging neck while the birthday card on the left has some fun details inside. They just don’t make cards with such care and attention to details today.

Sherrie and I had dinner and hit a couple more stores before calling it a day. Power was restored and life was good again.

Sometimes we need to lean into the obstacles and find ways to work with them. I have spent a lot of time this year happily resting and reading. But sometimes we have to stand up and say “not today” and go look for something else. Yesterday took an unexpectedly fun turn.

I’m glad I shook off the sleep and took charge of my day.

Lazy Saturday

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Yesterday was a rare lazy day but it didn’t really go as planned.

This week hasn’t been restful so I was grateful for a day at home. I stayed in bed, finishing a Simone St. James page turner, before doing a few chores. Bob the Shark cleaned the floors while Scout periodically reported back that the monster was a menace and needs to go.

It was too windy to be outside. The sunshine beckoned me to the woods but it didn’t feel safe to be under a canopy of tree limbs likely weakened by winter storms. So I turned off the furnace and opened the windows to let the fresh air in. Leftover soup made for a tasty lunch. I had made it Thursday using about-to-expire ingredients and was quite smug when I didn’t have to cook.

And then the wind picked up more and the power went out. So I laid down in bed with a book and promptly went to sleep for the next two hours. Honestly, I think I slept for over two hours and it felt amazing.

The last time I checked the power company was reporting 14,000 customers in the dark with over 300 outage incidents. They’re doing their best but it’s hard to combat Mother Nature’s tirades when they lead to massive tree damage.

And so, I’m writing this at 8:13 p.m. with no hope of seeing electric again for a while. I’m headed back to bed with another book and a flashlight. Here’s hoping all those linemen are safe on the job this weekend while I’m cozy in bed.

Every day can’t be a grand adventure. Sometimes you can make bad circumstances better by leaning into them and accepting them for what they are. For me that means resting up and coping with the circumstances in preparation for better days ahead.

I Haven’t Blown Away Yet

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I’m writing this at 7:16 pm on Friday night. That proverbial March lion is roaring tonight as a severe thunderstorm and high winds shake the house and rattle the windows.

The power is out and I’m tired so I gave Scout his medicine and we are curled up in bed. I will read until sleep finds me or till the flashlight battery dies.

… or until the house gets blown off the foundation. All three seem likely at this point.

This front is supposed to move through in the next half hour or so. The weatherman on tv earlier said this and gave people some tips for surviving a thunderstorm. One of his suggestions was keeping both hands on the steering wheel if you’re out driving. Do they teach nothing in driver’s ed these days? That just seems like common sense.

Anyway, I’m pretty happy making lemons into lemonade and enjoying some forced rest. Sometimes that’s the only way to get me to do it.

Here’s hoping we aren’t all flooded in this weekend and here’s wishing safety to all those linemen who have to go out in dangerous conditions to keep us all with electricity.

Have a good weekend, friends.