Steph's Suitcase

What's going on in Steph's life and her random musings... for anyone who gives a monkey.

Thursday, November 21, 2002

What a day-- at about 5:30 or so the power went out. My computer was making a crackling noise and some banging. Since this had woken me up, I wasn't sure what it was at first. Then I realized it was my computer and I figured that didn't sound right and thought I should ask Neal about it. My first thoughts were that it was my subwoofer or that our sockets had overloaded. When the power was completely off I waited till 6 for it to come back on. I know it was 6 because I went and got my watch and shined my flashlight on it. I went back to bed but I couldn't let myself sleep because I knew then I'd not wake up till 8 or 9 and I had an 8 AM class. I'm a light sleeper anyway, so any loud noise will wake me up and I can never sleep after that. I didn't think my alarm would go off with the pwer off anyway.

I waited till 6:45 to get up. I kept looking out the window every 15 minutes to see if there was power anywhere else. Only the Rosza center and Walker had any. I went to the bathroom and heard voices, so 15 minutes later I went again and went into the one with voices. At 7 my alarm went off. It wasn't the music I had set it to, but the beeping so I could have slept. This made me mad. I didn't know that alarm would still go off because the power always comes on before I need the alarm. Someone was taking a shower which was lit only by flashlights. I talked to Lizzie for a bit and she was going to go to her 8 AM class anyway. I went to my room to get my shower stuff. There were at least 10 of us up with 8 AM classes. I took the coldest shower because with the power off there's no heat for the water or rooms. I also took the shortest shower ever. I took more time getting ready to shower than I did in the shower. It was so cold I was gasping. I took about 2 minutes because I only washed my hair. I continued getting ready.

At around 7:40 a guy came by (there were a group of us in the hall) and told us classes were cancelled till 10. After that they'd decide what was to happen. This made me mad because I had only 4 hours of sleep for nothing (I fell asleep around 1:30). I gave up sleep for nothing. Well, I went back to my room, woke Erinn up, and ranted. Then I did my calc homework. She's lucky she had no classes today. Oh, and just before I went back to my room I talked to Tim. He had a 10 AM class but he ate early anyway. He's nuts. Anyway, today is my hell day. It was also going to be my last physics lab (8-10) but now I bet it's going to be rescheduled so I have one less Thursday to sleep in. I would have done so today if that hadn't meant I'd have to do a makeup lab by myself. So I ate animal crackers for breakfast and listened to my baby. Oh, and not only is it my hell today but it's also Neal and I's 4 month anniversary. Never try to put on eye makeup in the dark with only 2 hands, a flashlight in one of them. It doesn't work. Thus I didn't finish my eyes, but oh well.

Around 9 or so I played Skip-bo with Erinn, Stephanie, and Margo. That was a lot of fun. I also yoinked bagels from the cafe since it was free, and 2 cups of OJ and 2 bowls of OJ. The bowls were because it held more free drink. Since then I have peed at least 17 times. The day went on boring, as the people tried to figure out why the power was out. They told us at 7 we'd have to be in the cafeteria to sleep because the fire alarms weren't on and thus a safety hazard. More than half of the hall (which is the largest one too, about 2000 if my estimation is correct <5 floors, about 100 doors each, 2 sides, doubles...>) left to go home. Unfortunetely Neal, Erinn, and I couldn't because my parents had Alli's orchestra concert tonight and thus couldn't leave earlier. Classes were cancelled for all day today and all day tomorrow so I don't even have to skip like I was planning.

I did have an odd incident of walking on 5th with Erinn and 2 black guys saw us and were like, "Man, give us a piece of that ass!" and stuff like that. I told the main guy that I was already taken and he said, "We can work that out! Come on!" I thought that was funny. I spent the day visiting people like Dave and Andy and Neal. Marie left early (the bum!). I also played Uno with Neal and Erinn and Star Wars Trivial Pursuit (I suck!) with Ken and Erinn.

So the whole story about why the power was out for over 12 hours (came on at 7):
Apparently the college doesn't have backup generators. Being a tech college, that makes no sense. Also, there is 1 main power line with lots of branches off of it. About 3 years ago I guess the main power thing broke so then they've been running on the backup since then and the main hasn't been fixed. The lines are over 50 years old, too. We have like the best technology here supposedly yet our electricty is all out of date. Crazy. Apparently this is the first time in 15 years that classes have been cancelled.

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