Derecho

We have just experienced our first Derecho.  It hit at 9:00 at by 9:30 there was around 1 million people without power.   It is like the world's shortest hurricane.  For us, no power also means no water.  This coincided with a heat wave that made for some miserable conditions.  It has been over 100 degrees and the humidity has been oppressive. 

There are trees down everywhere we go.  Many of them have taken down power lines .  It has been four days and could be a week before all power is restored. Ordinarily I love having our own well. We never had to worry when those with town water had to boil all drinking water for a year.  But when our power goes out, so does the pump that brings the water from the well to the house.  There is a tank that filters the water and sends it into the house.

We can still use the water and even flush the toilets, until the tank runs dry and then....nothing.  You never know how long the power will be out, so you have to conserve from the first.  This means no showers, no face or hand washing, no dish washing, no tooth brushing and more important, no toilet flushing.  Lee is superior  many ways and in particular in the ability to use the outdoors for certain functions.  I am not, so we just tried to flush as little as possible. 

After two days we called and discovered WalMart had power and water.  Baby wipes make an acceptable bath, if you use enough of them. We bought plenty.  We wanted gallon jugs of water and settled for flats of small bottles.  We also looked for a car charger for our cell phones.  They were out.  I forgot to look for a book light.  They are way easier to use than trying to hold a flash light at night when trying to read and mine are all used up.  They rarely last very long for me.  My Nook was sadly low on power.

Fortunately we have a small generator.  It is not much, but it will run the refrigerator out in the garage.   We  moved all we could from the house refrigerator and have been running the generator off and on.  We had to steal gas from the mower to run it as the local gas station didn't have power and we didn't want to drive all over with the gas can.

The power came to our neighbors over the train tracks, but stopped there and no one on this side has any power or water.  I guess it is true what they say about living on the wrong side of the tracks.

We are very lucky we had just filled the 100 gallon tank for the horses.  This kept them for a long time and we were able to dip water out to put in their stalls for at night.  We have a smaller 40 gallon tank that we have taken to the neighbors and filled.  That will tide us over for awhile and then we can go back. It sure is nice to have great neighbors.  Thanks Rose and Bob!  They also fed us after they got power and let me use the shower and the toilet.  I LOVE mod cons.  They even let me enjoy their air conditioning. 

                             

The only air conditioning we had was the basement.  Our basement is unfinished and has a walkout.  It is about 60 to 65 degrees during the winter and even with this heat wave it has been around 70.  Because there is a walkout there are windows on one side and so we have light until about 9:00.  So a good part of the day, and night,  has been spent down there with the pets trying to keep cool. 

                             

So, other than temporary discomfort we only have a bit of tree damage.  It could have been worse and it has been for many people, so we are counting our blessings. 

                           

We do have a tree from SOMEWHERE that has blown in to the middle of our field and is draped over the power lines.  Lee has reported it, but it must be way down the list as no one has come.  I don't want it to fall on him so I have been discouraging him from trying to fix it on his own!

                         

We have a cedar tree with damage.  It smells like pencil shavings!

Our walnuts have a bit of damage but they are still standing.  One tree fell on the hot wire for the pasture, but the horses are elsewhere, so we will get to that when it cools off a bit

I hope we get the power back soon, but at least I found a way to access the Internet.The laptop at a place with Wi-Fi works, but it is slow and clumsy and I probably didn't catch all the editing problems, but at least I am back online...temporarily.