Barkerburgh

Well, not quite.

So about 10:30pm on Friday, I’m taking a shower in the basement bathroom at the Nairn estate and almost finished when the lights flash off, then come on again, then go out and stay out.

It’s pitch dark with only a useless glow through the frosted window.

I finally manage to - slowly and carefully - get dry, get dressed, and find my way to the first floor where I discover the whole neighbourhood is dark. One thing that helps is the power flashes back on for about one second while I’m trying to remember where the stairs are. I happen to be looking right at them when the lights flash on and off, and make my way over by retina memory.

I go outside and hear sirens. I’m just about to check on the little old Italian lady next door when she comes outside too. She’s fine.

Then I decide to follow the sirens because they’re close and a lot. I look south and can see that St Clair West is just fine, but everything north, east and west seems out. I can tell from the usual crepuscular glow around the area that the blackout is local.

I walk up Nairn to Rogers Road, then west on Rogers. Near the western edge of Prospect Cemetery a car has crashed into and nearly knocked over a telephone pole and two people are being worked on, then transported away by ambulance. (Oh, so that’s why the cemetery is called that!)

There’s a huge crowd of gawpers, and me, standing around. Finally I’ve seen enough so I leave.

I’m in an internet cafe on St Clair writing this.

Now we’ll see how long it takes for the power to come back on.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 11th, 2006 at 10:49 pm and is filed under Can't Make This Stuff Up, She Blindsided Me With Science!, True Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.