PowerOutrage

Sailor here. Today was a very unusual one for Mom and me. At waking-up time, the sky turned dark and made loud howling noises, rain fell sideways, leaves blew sideways, and even a wayward lawn chair went on an agricultural detour sideways across the garden. Mom leaped out of bed to make sure the roof of my dog run was intact and not, like some of her garden umbrellas, bound for the next county. All was well until she went into the clothes room to put on her rendition of a winter coat. The room was dark, very dark.

� Oh, rats,� Mom exclaimed, �I�d better shower now while we still have hot water.� She jumped into the glass water room, draping the towel across my back. I make a terrific towel rack except in early summer when I blow my coat. I patiently waited for her to emerge, because my job in this tiled room is to make sure Mom doesn�t disappear down the drain.

After Mom was washed, rinsed, dried and dressed, she told me we were going to prepare for a disaster and filled each bathtub upstairs with water. I headed downstairs to hide, fully expecting the disaster to be Sailor ablutions, but much to my relief, the disaster was not a Do-It-At-Home dog wash. I�m not sure what Mom will decide to do with all these tubs of water, but I didn�t really want to stick around to find out.

�We�re having a power outage,� Mom explained to me, heading downstairs.

�Oboy!� I woofed in delight, heading to the front door to get my leash. �Zoe will be so jealous because nobody likes power outages like a Siberian husky.�

�Oh, Sailor, that�s not exactly what I meant,� Mom said, dashing my hopes. �We should probably stay inside where we�ll be safe from flying trees.�

Bother. I tried to picture airborne trees but came up with a blank. When I was let out for a brief potty break, I saw quite a few branches on the driveway outside and Mom told me to expect even more to hit the deck.

I followed her throughout the house watching her pull plugs and turn switches. She explained that we wanted to be protected from a power surge. I waited. Nothing surged. Sometimes Mom is just plain nuts

�How about breakfast?� my tummy suddenly cried, awoken by all this commotion and stress about the bathtubs. I sent Mom all my very best brain pictures about the food house, my bowl, the food house, veggie glop, and the food house. It worked. Mom opened the food house door and, even though the light did not illuminate the cold interior, she found my breakfast and spooned it into my bowl. Ahhh, bliss. Josie the Fat Cat was also fed her glop but seemed to take it as a matter of course and not a phenomenon to be gratefully acknowledged. Such is the way of a cat.

Next, Mom put batteries into her portable radio, chuckling that she could still light the stove with matches, thank you very much, and made herself coffee and pancakes. I didn�t get any, though, hmmmph. Turning on the radio and settling onto the living room couch with her coffee cup in one hand and my ear in the other, Mom and I cuddled up together to keep warm and listened to Car Talk. Well, Mom listened. I snoozed.

While I dozed and Mom laughed, the wind blew all the leaves out of the rain gutters, making Mom very happy that this year Mother Nature had accomplished this chore with a minimum of fuss and dollars. Maybe She will wash the windows, too, and Mom will be ecstatic.

I awoke to silence. Mom was asleep with Josie curled up around her head. The wind had ceased its yowling, the rain was tripping merrily down the rain gutters to the downspouts, and one lone light shown in the kitchen. The furnace turned itself on with a subdued whoosh and all seemed back to as normal as it ever gets around here.

I am still waiting to see what use all the water in the bathtubs will be, though. It�s kind of like waiting for the other branches to drop.

Sailor who survived the big storm