Cold Weather "Stuff"

For those who are undergoing serious weather conditions, I thought it would make you happy to know that we are having freezing temps down here too. While I know most would appreciate an actual picture of my "cold weather" scenario today, that's not going to happen, so you'll have to create your own mental picture!

I'm happily going about my chores for the morning - put a load of laundry in, drank breakfast (yes "drank" - protein drink), put color in my hair, and then sat down to work when - BAM - the electricity goes off. Jim calls and is giving me an update and instructions, but at this point my brain is registering that we have well water, which needs a pump, which needs (you got it) ELECTRICITY. Now I only hear "blah, blah, blah" coming from my phone.  Once Jim stops talking I ask (forcing my voice to be calm), "Ok, but how am I going to get the color out of my hair with no water?"  Pause..... He says there is probably enough in the pipes to run for a little while, so be conservative.

Now I'm starting to envision what my hair is going to look like if the power really is off for an hour as the electric company was predicting (amazing what pieces of info your brain locks on to in the middle of "blah, blah, blah"). I hurriedly grab my mop bucket and force myself not to inspect it too closely as there isn't enough water to clean it first. Ah - there was enough water to fill the bucket, but the pressure was dying toward the end so that really is all the water I'll have. Now my mind is racing to try to figure out how to make one bucket of water last long enough to rinse the color out. (Interesting - now the bucket looks teeny tiny and the color has "grown" into this huge mound of mess...) But at least having some water helped quell the panic taking hold inside!

So now I just have to wait to finish my hair. Hmmm- what can I do?  I know - I'll make some tea - oops, electric stove. My protein drink is wearing off now, so I'll make my hot breakfast cereal - oops, microwave needs electricity. I can play computer games - oops, Internet doesn't work without electricity. At this point I'm starting to look for warmer clothes and where are those indoor/outdoor shoes I bought that keep my feet toasty warm? (Yup - electric heat.)  Finally I realize we're leaving for NC tomorrow (family wedding) and I haven't started packing. So I very slowly start setting out my clothes and organizing things (for those who know me well, packing only takes me 10-15 minutes). I'm happy to have something to do. Then there's a loud squeeling noise. Great - now what???  Oh - seems something is resetting - YEAH, the electricity came back on! 

Needless to say, the first thing I do is run around the house looking for my cellphone since all the clocks in the house are flashing. Okay - so I'm not one of those "techno" people who have their cellphones attached to their bodies at every moment of the day and sleep with them by their heads at night. Anyhow.......I realize it's already past time to get the color out (but not horribly over the limit), so I dropped everything and ran for the shower.

While the electricity was only off for about 20-30 minutes, it has taken about three hours to get back to where I started - sitting down to work again! Alas, my packing will have to wait for another time. 

Hope my "cold weather" scenario put a smile on your face. It's always fun looking back on panic mode scenarios that that turn out well in the end. Have a great day everyone!

OOPS - just realized I never did what Jim said about letting the faucets drip to protect the pipes from freezing - gotta run..........