Black out

Our bathroom is nearing completion, but G and I are still showering in the cottage. It's not really that inconvenient - it's kind of like being at camp or something where you have to go to the bathhouse. It's a nice shower, too - plenty of hot water (unless G takes an extra-long one right before me), good water pressure, and a window in the bathroom to let in natural light.

This morning there was a problem. As soon as I plugged in my hairdryer, the lights started flickering. They went off and on and off and on and off and on and then just off. My first thought was that I had caused this with my hair dryer. The outlet was one of the safety ones that has test and reset buttons. I pushed them repeatedly in various combinations, but still nothing.

So I took my hair dryer back to the big house to finish getting ready there. Surprise - no power there either. I was pretty sure I couldn't have caused both the cottage and the big house's electricity to fail, so I began to suspect that something bigger was happening.

I finished getting ready in the semi-darkness and dried my hair the best I could with a towel (not a pretty sight for my curly locks). This wouldn't have been a big deal at all except that I was heading to judge a high school science fair this morning, and I didn't want to look like a ragamuffin.

I drove through the neighborhood looking for lights, but I didn't see any. There was a fire truck parked at the end of the next street and I almost asked them if they knew why our power was out. Then I noticed the bright orange cones surrounding the dangling power line.

So it wasn't me, then.