It Could Have Been Worse

I’m sitting here typing as fast as I can. There’s a tree sitting on our power line, and it’s happily smoking (smoking kills, Little Tree), meaning that at some point in the next few hours, our power will be off again. For the fourth time this week. There’s a bit of a hassle factor because I had plans to get the ankle-biters out of the house this morning, and now we’re stuck at home watching the tree in case it bursts into glorious flame and we need the old 9-1-1. And we’re on our 5th day without a refrigerator.  But really, things could have been a lot worse.

Someone get the marshmallows! We can make s’mores! And sing “Kumbaya!”

When the refrigerator went out, I hadn’t been to the grocery store in three weeks.  There was precious little food left to spoil. And now that my procrastination has been so grandly reinforced, I may never go to the grocery store again.

When the rodents in the freezer thawed out, the snakes were hungry. No. That’s not secret code. I have snakes, and we keep their food in the freezer until they’re ready to eat.I hate to waste food, human or otherwise.  It presented a dilemma, but it all worked out, and everyone is happy.

We find out who our friends are. And which of them are weird like me. In addition to people offering freezer space for our food,  two people volunteered to keep our collection of owl pellets in their deep freezer so they wouldn’t spoil (although I am not totally sure how to tell if barf is spoiled) . Without even asking why we keep them in the first place. That’s friendship!

My kids like hot dogs. And that’s a really good thing. I stocked up on Ballpark franks when they went on sale for $1.25, so we have a lot of them. They’ve eaten so many dogs since Monday that they can wag their tails. And they think they’ve died and gone to heaven.

There was no worry last night when we lost power during last night’s storm. All of our food is already in coolers.  We wound up our lantern (wind-up lanterns are the coolest invention ever. Seriously. GET ONE!), and I read while my husband played chess with the kids.

If the refrigerator had been delivered already, we might have lost it in power surges last night. Maybe the new fridge needs a surge protector.

The kids are old enough that they will remember The Week Without Refrigeration. And for at least a little while, they will have an appreciation of ice that appears for the asking and the convenience of being able to store food, and of abundance.

The tree that fell on the line didn’t fall on the house. Our new roof goes on next week. We would likely have had a battle with the insurance company to repair any damage.

Severus enjoying his bonus meal. Isn’t he pretty?

So happy weekend, and I’ll see you again on Thank You God for the New Refrigerator Day. I’m asking the calendar people to look into adding it as a holiday.

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