Ice on the mountain 12-26-12

I took this photo of the day of the ice storm (actually its a composite of 3 photos), Wednesday the 26th.  The ice started late Christmas night and by the next morning I was getting calls from friends advising me to fill my water jugs.  I heeded their advice but by that night (Wednesday) I felt that once again I had dodged the no power bullet.  I have not been with out power for more than a few hours since I came up here, from what I understand that is an unusual occurrence around here.  Any way I got up at 5am Thursday morning and by 05:10 I had no power.  Just that fast, turn bed side light on, bed side light goes off!! 

My sister had been visiting but when the power went off and AEP said it could be a few days till it came back on she bailed on me!!!!! So the dogs and I “suffered” for 55 hours of no lights and, horrors of horrors, no internet!!!

I can say that I was quite comfortable; I have a wood stove, gas cook stove and kerosene lamps.  I also have a battery powered/hand powered weather/am-fm radio, battery powered Coleman lamp and flash lights.  It was very cold outside so I did not lose any thing in the freezer or the fridge.  I did not sleep all that well because my wood stove is small and needs to be fed at least every 4 hours, the new puppy is not helping in the sleep department either!! Lack of sleep was a small thing, I was off from work for most of the time so not being able get a good night sleep or to take shower was not too bad.  The first thing I did when the power came back on was refill my water buckets and turn the water heater back on.  A shower came on shortly after that.

Any way I survived and it was nice to have peace and quiet and true darkness for a little while.