So the Blackout of 2003 is finally over. 26 hours without power isn't the end of the world, but certainly it is a rare thing. In all my years of living in New York City (a combined 22 years), this has only been the fourth time I've been in a significant blackout (or any blackout whatsoever). the '75 and '77 blackouts (I was too young to remember). The '89 East Side blackout, following the fire at the Bronx substation. And of course, the '03 blackout. Where were you when the lights went out? On the phone, making a call to the boss about a situation that had just arisen. Supervising a calling session. At work on Wall Street. And then it all just died. What did you do? Well, at first I figured it was just the construction down on the street had caused an accident. No big deal. But then Mike C. reported that the building across the street had also lost power. So we made a command decision to evacuate the building. Grabbed my bag, grabbed my power cables, and made sure the floor was empty before we all headed out. So that's when you followed the diaster plan? Nobody wanted to follow the disaster plan. I suggested it three times, and was voted down three times; mostly by the question of why meet up someplace else when we're all already here. People didn't look panicked, and there was no suggestion of any imminent danger (and people were enviously looking at my bag and realizing they had stuff upstairs they wanted), so we headed back upstairs to grab our crap. But you were prepared. You didn't have to go upstairs. I forgot to change my shoes. My work shoes are about 2 sizes too small, feature stiff leather, and are generally ill-suited for anything else except for looking good and sitting. Which is pretty much all I do at work. My real shoes are horribly worn out, but correctly sized, and I can go for miles in them. And figuring I had a long walk ahead of me, I braved the upstairs with a few others, and got my shoes. Were you scared? When you work in lower Manhatten in a World Trade Center survivor office, you tend to overblow these things. I'm not proud of my wild assumptions, but then, we were in an informational black hole. No phones, no cell-phones, no power, no cops, and (and this was the freaky freaky part) no radio. I mean we had no radio, but every car I stopped and asked what was going on, they told me there was nothing on the radio. That's when we made a command decision to go home. How did you get home? We said goodbye to those heading for Jersey (at least those that bothered to stick around long enough to tell us goodbye), and we headed for the water. Not that this was the way home for many of us, but we wanted to stick together while assessing the situation. As one might expect, we got a bit of early disinformation from a passing car. We got a little scared. And we met up with one of our own who had broken away to try the ferries (jam packed). The bridge it was! A little cliched, eh? While stopping to listen to the radio, fighting to stick together, saying goodbye to the ones that peeled off one by one to try their ways home, it did seem to me to be a bit overdone to cross the bridge by foot. But I wanted to get home. And so did the others. And so home we struck out for. Couldn't be bothered with the pedestrian path, we just streamed past the cars like everyone else and strode up the highway. The sun was out in full force, the wind was nearly non-existant, and the cars and bikes were honking up a storm to the point where I got into quite the verbal argument with one (Out of state Mercedes. I should have pulled his air-conditioned ass out and shoved my umbrella up where the sun don't shine.). But by the end of the hour we had finally made it to Brooklyn, and I got a rather unique view of the Brooklyn Bridge to boot, welcomed home by the Borough President. What was the game plan? After a brief rest, and lots of water (thank God for city parks water fountains and natural water pressure from naturally filtered upstate mountain resevoirs), we trekked another half a mile to Mike C.'s pharmacy where we hooked up with his wife and some more water, and working phones. Called up another coworker's husband, and got a ride home. I felt bad for others in our party, who were waiting for a ride to Long Island. And G., who I had convinced to come with us although he lived in Westchester. But where else was he going to go? I wasn't going to let him sleep on the streets. I'm betting he spent the night with Mike. I felt a little bad abandoning them, but I had to get home. Home was good? Home was too hot and sticky and dark. But it was home. We had no bread, and of course everywhere was sold out. But Dad had made soup, and I had just enough light to get the batteries (I bought a 48 pack a while back, still had 45 aa's left). And then it was just listenning to the radio, marveling at the extent of it all, and trying desperately to keep from melting in the heat. How did today go Well, I melted some more, took a walk and discovered that two blocks away they had power, enjoyed a little air-conditioning action at CVS, took a call from the boss (I got the day off, not that he really had any say in the matter), and tried to keep melting inbetween naps. And then, the blessed power came back on at 6:30PM. Besides cooking my ass off tonight, and talking to Kirk on the phone, the Blackout of 2003 pretty much sucked all around. But you're glad the electricity is on, right? Last night I went to bed at 11, tonight I'm up at 3AM. And even with a working fan, I'm still melting.