I stayed home sick today (about which another LJ entry is forthcoming). I was just about to post that entry when there was a sharp *pop* sound like a gunshot outside my window. I was instantly plunged into gloom and silence, but for the beep of my Uninterruptable Power Supply.
Boy was that a good purchase.
It kept my main PC/monitor alive long enough to save the entry and a few work emails I was composing (all to the effect of "So sorry I missed that urgent meeting/interview today!!"). My first reaction was to furiously click SEND SEND SEND...but of course the cable modem was down. So now there are several people at multiple companies wondering where the hell I am, and it'll just have to wait until Monday.
The whole building is dark, maybe the whole block (hard to tell with the sun still up). I learned that our fire doors are magnetic, and all swing shut on power-loss. Which is annoying because the hallways are windowless. I stepped out of my apartment and then had to grope around to find the door knob and re-enter. It's nice, though, how different things look when the electricity is gone. So strange to have no computers, no clocks, no music. I suddenly realized it was raining hard outside.
Buildings are lit on each block adjacent to us. Which means that the outage is very small and I SHOULD call it in, because maybe They Don't Know About It Yet. And I think the building manager took a long weekend.
However, I didn't feel like it. That stupid, childhood reluctance to take responsibility for certain things: the lights are off, the grownups will fix it soon. Outside I heard multiple sirens converging on my street.
Instead I packed up Hobbes, my powerbook, and walked to the coffee shop. It's packed at only 5:00pm, which makes me jealous. It's so serene here - had I not called in sick I'd be at work for another 3 or 4 hours yet. I need a slacker job like these people.
It was very bad of me to stay home, by the way (though I had a good reason). I had one interview, two phone screens, and an "urgent" meeting to schedule a bugfix, which is actually blocking us from shipping a new device. Everything's gonna be rescheduled for Monday so I've got that wasps' nest to look forward to.
Around 11pm the lights came back on. And I just bought a big box of candles. Dang.
BTW, the web interface to LJ now says "Processing Whining..." when I click submit. has it always done that?
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