>> Wednesday, August 29, 2007

The recent bad weather and subsequent power outages have me thinking about electricity, or rather what it's like not to have it. Though it can bring a lot of anxiety and inconvenience, I recently learned some benefits of no electricity.

For one, there is no TV. No cable. No movies. This meant I had to find something else to do in the evening. I read. I played Sudoku. I talked to my partner. I cleaned. I found I had so much extra time.

There is also no Internet. This meant no email and no blog. However, it also meant no mindless surfing, wasting many hours of my evening. Again, I had to find alternative activities to occupy my time.

Another added benefit was the refrigerator. I learned it is much, much easier to clean a warm fridge than a cold, in-use fridge. I now have a sparkling clean icebox.

I am trying to look on the bright side of my recent outage, if you couldn't tell. Seeing a potential disaster in its best terms is a way of keeping my mind as nontoxic as possible. As the two year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina is being observed, however, I realize that for some there never was a bright side to their outage and maybe never will be.




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