San Diego 8/8/11

I was on the phone in front of the computer. In a flash it all went dark and the phone dead.

A grin grew. I quickly called the person back, on my cell phone, to explain we had a power outage. Once we were done talking I went up stairs, still not power, so I pulled out the non-cordless, and plugged it into the phone jack. Worked like a charm. Tried getting information using the iPhone, with no luck on logging into the SDG&E site. Gave up and called my Dad, had him, in Vancouver, go on the internet and get any info he could. It was sounding fairly major, so we decided to fill up a couple of extra water bottles, and get the candles and kerosine lamps out.

There was still plenty of daylight so we laid around and caught up on some reading. As the sun set we went out, walked over to Bird Park for a view of the city. There were many more lights than I thought there would be, a lots of red dots. The Naval Hospital looked totally unaffected. Forésta had an old cell phone which had a radio and we sat there looking at the skyline, and stars, each with an earbud in one ear listening to reports of the power outage.
We unplugged from the radio and just looked out. The realization hit me then. This could all be a a plan on SDG&E and Sempra Energy to increase support for the Sunrise Power Link. I would not put this past them, they are the ones that created the power shortage that took down  the governor of California. They are the ones that were in cahoots with Enron. It was maddening to think, but could be all so true.

For now it was time to let go of the conspiracy theory and take to the swings, leaning way back to take in all the sky.

We decided to check out University Ave without power. It was beautiful walking down the middle of the streets, lit by the moon, with the occasional car lights (they seems annoying). We passed many houses with people on their front porches or yards. It is not often that  you see people in the fronts of their home. When we got to University there was many more people walking around, some with flashlights, most without. We passed a pizza place serving pizza from their gas burning oven, the West Coast Tavern was open, and they had a truck parked with the radio going for people to get information. As we approached the corner of 30th and University there was a lot of activity. Heaven Sent Desserts was giving out free slices of cake. We went in and they told us the cakes would be ruined, and they would rather people from the community enjoy them, than to have them thrown out. They were taking donations for 2 charities, we gave, and I found out today they raised $600.

We walked back home eating out cake beaming about our neighborhood. It looked beautiful in the moonlight, people were all friendly, free cake, and no looting.

When we got home, we lit some candles, opened a bottle of sparkling water, put a DVD in the laptop, laid down together and starting watching A Christmas Story. We went to bed early, and when I got up to get a glass of water at 11:25 I know it was all over. Power had been restored. It saddened me that the event was short lived, and it reaffirmed my conspiracy theory. How convenient that power was out during the hours when it is used the least, SDG&E would not loose that much revenue, and they make a case for another power link being essential. Of course if power was produced where it was needed most, which is should be, a link would not be needed, and a link would not fail.

I thoroughly enjoyed our short lived power outage. Wouldn't it be nice if the power went out once a month, or once every three months.