Blackouts

[Renatus]

So the power went out at my house for a couple hours this morning and it left me wondering, what do other people do during power outages, and how often do other areas have power outages?

Personally I sort of enjoy it, at least when it takes place at night. Sort of a fun little variable/obstruction to add something interesting to the night, akin to how walking through water is compared to walking normally.

[Raptor]

Originally Posted by Renatus

how often do other areas have power outages?

Pretty much never. I think I remember one in my life.

[Fruitbat]

The last outage we had was right after we did Earth Hour - it was hiliariously bad timing. Blow out the candles, turn on the lights for five minutes and then stumble around in the light of a mobile phone trying to find the matches again.

We went out spotlighting (looking for animals with a torch - no guns involved) and then I think we all chased each other around the house with torches.

I love candle light - if babybat was in bed, I'd play board games or uno or do something totally crazy like just talk to Mr Bat.

[Murder.Of.Crows]

It happens quite frequently out here, but mainly during the day.

[Saya]

Usually once or twice a winter, usually doesn't last longer than a night. We'll just light candles, maybe play on a DS or read. Last fall during Hurricane Igor, I didn't lose power but my siblings did, and my brother's cell phone died so I had to go look for him in the dark at his apartment building. Was very Silent Hill esque. It was gone for days so both of them would come to my house to shower and charge up electronics.

The only other time like that that I can remember was during a blizzard in 1994 where we lost power for two days, we put a bunch of mattresses in the living room because our house would get really cold without heat, and slept there. In the day we'd go to my aunt's house because she had a wood stove. This was before internet came to my town so there was still a lot of things that amused us and didn't require electricity.

[Ben Lahnger]

I'm such an electronics geek that it generally just annoys me. I'm not charmed by things like reading by flashlight or eating by candlelight (unless it's a PLANNED romantic candlelight dinner - that's a different story.) So when the power goes out I get a little frustrated by the "great, now there's a whole bunch of stuff I CAN'T DO" aspect of it.

And I hate losing power in the middle of a movie, TV show or video game. On the other hand, having a smartphone and a Nintendo DS XL does help a bit.

Also, a little while ago I lost power for maybe a minute. No biggie, right? Except now I have to go around and set a bunch of blinking clocks on the VCR, the microwave and the oven! And it happens often enough around here due to the heat, air conditioning and power surges that those clocks are a real sore spot for me.

I don't normally complain, because in the big, wide world full of people with real problems, it seems small-minded and petty to complain that I can't always have the trappings of my affluence. But, you asked.

[Grausamkeit]

The breakers in our house flip regularly over here. It's an olde, crappy house built in the 30s, not fancy, think 30s POS.

I can't vacuum for 5 minutes without the fucking breaker switching. So, I have to run my lazy ass outside and flip it back on.

[MissCheyenne]

We rarely get blackouts here, the longest one I ever remember was around an hour or two long and that was in the middle of a brutal storm and severe flooding that was beating the ass of the country.

[Stormtrooper of Death]

Minnesota has a far superior power grid to that of Wisconsin. Take that Wisconsin! Just kidding, we've had pretty good luck with our system since the huge storm of 97 and we had no power for 3 days.

[Solumina]

It happens all of the time at my mom's house as she lives in the middle of nowhere and it can last for a while as she is the last house on that line. She has a generator that can run everything essential (thought the built in microwave, oven, and stove don't agree with it so she has a small microwave and an electric griddle for cooking) but that can only last for about an hour or two at a time (though she did get a new one that I think can last longer) and is too inconsistent for things like computers and tvs so the fireplace, lanterns (both flame and battery powered), board games, and (very importantly as cell coverage can be more than a bit spotty at the house) the corded phone all get well used.

Down here we don't get a whole lot of outages and now that we have moved back to this complex we are on the same grid as a hospital so unless there is a true disaster we will have power.