Power play
It was tough at times to keep ourselves entertained during the power outage.
We were home listening to a little transistor radio and making do with
something or another when the 10-year-old next door came home all excited.
There were lights on at the house across the alley and he was certain his
power would be on as well. When he and his mom pulled up in the car, he jumped
out screaming and waving his arms.
"Our power is on again, our power is on."
(The utility company's new campaign to make power outages more kid-friendly is to dress PG&E lineman as power rangers. The multi-colored workforce makes waiting for the arrival of the work crews more exciting).
He raced to the door, no doubt to see if his XBox now worked.
If the XBox had worked, "Our power is on," would have been the last words we
heard from him for several hours.
Alas, the power was not on. Somehow the lines were filled with precious
electricity just 20 feet from our front doors, but everything was still black inside
our houses.
To say he was impatient for the power to go would be like saying Nelson
Mandela was good and ready to be released from captivity.
The next morning at about 3:30 a.m., the power did return.
When we woke up Sunday morning, we yelled out the front door, jubilant that we
could crank on everything in our homes again.
After about an hour, Tommy had a fantabulous idea.
What if he snuck over to the side of their house and flipped their circuit
breaker so the power went out at their house?
Most excellent.
I hurried inside and turned off the radio and make sure the microwave and
coffee maker were turned off.
We heard the desperate screams from inside the house. First the 10-year-old
and then my best friend. They were hollering and lamenting.
Meanwhile, Tommy and I tried really hard to contain our snickers so they
wouldn't know we were messing with them.
When the 10-year-old came racing out of the house, we tried our hardest to
look dumb, and say "oh no, is your power still out too?"
Leify was yelling at his mom to call the power company. And for good reason.
The power had been out for an entire 30 seconds.
I calmly said I would go into the house and call the electric company, but
maybe they were just adjusting the lines and the power would come back on soon.
This quieted him for a moment, but then he realized he had not saved the last
1 1/2 hours of his game on the XBox, and now he was SERIOUSLY bummed.
Tommy and I felt badly for him losing so much precious XBox gaming
conquests, so we conspired to one another that we would not tell him that it was
actually us who turned off their power.
A few minutes later Tommy flipped their power back on and all was well.
Until the next time we couldn't help ourselves and the power mysteriously
went out again, this time just at their house.
My best friend yelled "It just figures!" throwing her hands up in
the air. "It figures my house is the only house on the block without power."
After the fourth time their power mysteriously went out, our
friend the Shepherd was visiting. Tommy and I snickered and confessed to him that
this was the fourth time we had turned off the power.
When he heard my best friend and the 10-year-old making a huge fuss in their
house, yelling about the power, and complaining about lost XBox conquests,
our friend the Shepherd was a little surprised.
"Heather, don't you think turning on and off their power all day is close to
harassment?"
I thought for a second and had to agree with him.
But then Tommy and I couldn't help but cracking up.
The last time we turned off the power that day, we let them catch us and let
them get mad at us for pulling a joke on them.
However, we pretended that was the first time we had pulled the hoax.
That's why I'm writing this in my blog and not in the column, because my best
friend doesn't read my blog.