The Odyssey

Now that the power is back on at my house, I can tell you all where we stayed the almost eight days we were living out of suitcases.

WW and I both had to be at work Wednesday so we made arrangements with two friends, one kept our three dogs, and the other loaned us his house. The first night at Tom's his heater needed to be repaired so we slept in his house without any heat whatsoever. I wasn't even able to use my CPAP because the air, even with my CPAP's heater cranked up almost full blast, was so cold it felt like I was breathing ice daggers. Also, condensation built up in the hose (this is called rainout) because my breathing was warm, the air inside the house was cold, causing water buildup. When I'd breath in, it sounded like a soda can filled with pennies, making sleep all but impossible. The good news was Tom had the heater repaired so we had heat the remainder of our stay

Even though the outage was frustrating and I will have to replace all my refrigerated food, I have a lot to be thankful for. While staying at Tom's, the only exception the first night without heat, we had adequate warmth. We even had the house to ourselves since Tom was out of town. It wasn't lost on me that during the entire outage, not once did we have to stay somewhere without power. I thank the generosity of my family and friends for this. Heck, we even had a place lined up Tuesday night in case our power was still out. I also didn't have to worry about my dogs as they were taken care of . As for my food? ALL of it can easily be replaced. WW, myself and WD all came through this without harm.

About the dogs? All three were very happy to see WW when she picked them up and were more than ready to go home.

I can honestly say God did provide for our needs, even though much of the time, I was a little too frustrated to see his handiwork.

Boy if that ain't an example of His grace (continuing to provide for us even though we were frustrated and sometimes didn't see Him in all this) I don't know what is.

Back on the Grid

After seven days and eighteen hours without power we're back!!!!!

We came home from work to check the house and found the porch light on; a neighbor confirmed power was restored around 2:30 this afternoon.

WW and I started getting things back to normal; I cleared out all the food in the fridge and both freezers, she went and got our stuff from the friend's house where we were staying waiting out the power outage.

I called PSO and we were supposed to be back on by 10 PM Tuesday. Thank you PSO restoring our power over a day early. Thank you also for the quick response in getting our city's power back on.

FYI, I just heard less than 25,00 in Tulsa are still without power. That's down from 300,000 in Tulsa when the ice storms hit.

Winter Wonderland Part II

After going to the motel lobby for breakfast, I noticed several groups wanting rooms due to the power outage. After reserving our room for a second night we headed out to run errands and take care of our dogs. Once home, we saw the extant of the damage on our street. One branch was in our yard and there was so much debris in our driveway we had to park along the side of the curb. Our next door neighbor had several tree limbs in both his front and back yard.

Once finished with our errands, we went and got food from a store near our motel room. When we got there, we found the power was completely out so I went downstairs to get our money back. The attendant would not give me cash telling me "when power is restored he will put the charges back on my credit card. " (Don't get me started) WW and I spent the next hour or two looking for a place to stay with no luck. I finally decided we'd head to my father's house in Cherokee County where we are now.

Both WW and I have tried to call our offices to find out if they were opened tomorrow (Both were closed today) we discovered the phone lines have been down for some time.

I'm thankful we have a place with electricity but I'll be glad when the power to our house is back on. God only knows if I will be able to salvage any of our foodstuffs in the fridge and deep freezer.

P.S. Our three dogs are fine; they are at a friend's house who has heat.

Winter Wonderland

Here in Tulsa, we're in the middle of a large ice storm. I got up, and, after arriving at church discovered services were cancelled due to power outages. WW and I were hoping we'd get lucky and not lose power, but around 8:30, the lights went out and we spent the next half hour packing by candle light. As of this posting we've checked into a Howard Johson waiting for our power to come back on. Earlier WW learned her office was closed. I won't be surprised if mine is too. We both work in the same building but different companies in Owasso. I doube I'll be in tomorrow.

Nothing to do now but wait.

I've never blogged from a Motel room, first time for everything.