I always read myself to sleep on the couch each night and then when I wake up at what ever ridiculous time in the AM I go to bed. It has become a annoying routine, but one that assures I will sleep when my head does hit the pillow. Unless of course I am sick in which case sleep does not normally allude me.
Monday night’s routine was going according to habit and plan and I had just dozed off when there was a horrendous explosion right outside in front of our house… Now don’t think bad of me or hold it against me, but after being so thoroughly jarred from slumber at 12:45 AM I jumped up and was heard to shout, to nobody in particular: “What…the…he…!!!” (twice actually). The house had now been plunged into total darkness and silence.
so much for sliding into slumber.
I stood in the dark trembling and then began fumbling for my little flashlight that takes me from couch to bed without burning out my retinas or waking Bob from his slumber, and then went out to the front porch to see what had made the explosive sound. Silly to tell you this, but that feeble little light only showed me business as usual; grass, shrubberies, fence-line, cars in the drive… Oh, and that the rest of the houses on our street were in darkness too. Hm, I thought, the transformer is on a pole at the roadside just in front of our orchard/gardens…
“Yeah, that’s it.” I told myself
So, I came in, locked the door, and found Bob fully awake and standing up in the dark by the bedside. Groggily he asked, “What happened?” Then said, “My CPAP quit.” I told him I thought it was the transformer, and we put ourselves to bed. Well, about 4:00AM we woke up to big truck sounds and chainsaws right outside our bedroom window! The light from said trucks was very bright and leaking in around the blackout shades!
WHAT NOW?
We got up again, went to the front room window and then out onto the porch to find this…
click for a larger view
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- County workers
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- Men weilding chainsaws
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- A look of total disbelief.
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- A very large oak had gone horizontal in the road,
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- because its base was totally rotten under the driveway.
The work to clear away the tree, restore power to the house on the other side of said tree, and to reconnect telephone and electricity to all the homes from our house down took all day. Strangely, our power came online very quickly, but new lines to all the neighbor’s houses and power were not restored until about 9:00PM last night.
All things considered, even with missed work and no electricity, this was the best possible outcome: Right into the street and not onto their home and vehicles.
😎
Life on the Farmlet 