Blackout

Last night, I arrived back at my apartment building to find that the thunderstorm had knocked out the power. The entire building was dark from outside, so I knew before I got inside that things would be somewhat interesting. I pulled into the parking garage, which was pitch black, and found a parking spot and carefully walked into the building. The elevators would surely be off, so I took the stairs. The emergency lights were on to light the stairwell... until I reached the 4th floor.

I consider myself to be resourceful, so I quickly whipped out my cell phone and used the backlight to illuminate my path. When I got to my floor, I again used my phone to find the proper key and went inside. Normally, my routine would be to change clothes, plop down on the couch, watch Pardon the Interruption (my favorite sports commentary show with hosts Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon), fool around on the internet (checking sports scores and whatnot), then play an Xbox360 game until it's time to turn in. With no power, my usual routine was completely shot.

I found my stash of candles buried in a closet (with the use of the handy cell phone) and lit them with my torch lighter - which I normally don't carry, but have recently been, so it really came in handy (otherwise I would have been out of luck because I don't think I would have had any way to light them - no matches, maybe the gas stove would have worked... but I didn't need to try that). Then came the shocking part... I sat down and started reading a book. WTF? And not the Jon Hodgman book, or anything published by The Onion... but a real book - a Pulitzer Prize winning novel even - Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which was lent to me by the lovely Ms. Florance. I'm sure that I will post a review of some kind when I finish it next year. Ha! It's just too easy to watch television than to sit and read. I just try to make reading into a habit. The book is rather interesting so far, so I am sure that I'll work through this book on occasions other than blackouts.