Sup Head-Case, remember me? As of 8:15 this evening, I have been without power for a week now. That means no running water (I have a well and an electric pump) and I have been reliant on two wood stoves for heat and candles for light. It's like living in the 19th century. I finally got cell phone coverage back on Thursday (lots of towers are out) but it's been going down periodically since then. Of course I have no internets. I have a UPS for my cable modem and wireless because of the frequent brownouts I get. I've checked it a few times and the cable modem has said "HAHAHAHA. Stop kidding yourself."
I was out last Saturday. In the same space I'm sitting now, in fact (my friend's DVD rental store.) It's normally a 15 minute drive home from there. I left at 10:45 and did not get home until 3AM. It was like playing some sadistic video game. All the roads, which I know like the back of my hand, were nearly unrecognizable from the whiteout condition. Also, most of them were blocked by fallen trees, which KEPT falling as I made my way. I was also STARVING. I drove all the way to Whately (not close, on the other side of the Connecticut River) to find food. No dice, the power was out everywhere.
I finally got home by sneaking past some cops who were stopping traffic because of a downed tree, going AROUND the tree and then following the tracks of a big 4x4 truck that had been there before me. I got within 3/4 of a mile of home, by stopping and pulling a few branches out of the road and keeping going. The final obstacle for me was a huge downed tree. The 4x4 drove into the snowbank and kept going. There I got my trusty Subaru stuck, so I abandoned it (after promising to come back for it) and trudged the rest of the way on foot.
That was one of the scariest walks of my life. I had walk under downed telephone poles only supported by their remaining wires, trees suspended by the same wires, and probably lots of downed electric wires that I couldn't see. My light source was an LED headlamp, which was a terrible option. It was snowing sideways, and all the light did was illuminate the snow directly in front of my face.
As of this writing, I still lack power. There was the first sign of workers on my street today. No less than three tree crews removing downed limbs and such. Still no electric workers. I got a robocall from the B'town police dept tonight, "80% of the homes now have power back." That's up from 38% last night, guess who's in the remaining 20%?
I have both of my wood stoves going, in order to keep the pipes from freezing (it's been in the 20s both last night and tonight). I'm here to order food, check some email (holy shit, inbox) and then go back to babysit the stoves.