Power outage. A short story by Charles Roberts

          What we did when the power went off.  We carried on as per normal, except we had to boil a pan of water to make the tea, we have a gas hob so we weren’t inconvenienced in that way, the oven is electric, but as we only use that on a weekend when the electric is cheaper it didn’t really matter  At five in the morning I had to carry a torch around and when I needed both hands, to feed the cats, I had to hold it in my mouth and seeing as it was bicycle front lamp, it turned out to be a bit awkward.  For lunch we had salad, which I had planned for anyway, and the evening meal on Monday was all cooked on the hob, although the curried chicken drumsticks would have cooked better in the air fryer instead of a frying pan.  But, life went on.

          With no TV or computer I wrote a bit on the challenge of the month, to copy it to computer as, when, or if it came back on and went to my bed early at eight o’clock.  The main problem was that I couldn’t charge my mobile up overnight and I knew that it was down to fifty percent charge so that it would be touch and go whether it would last the following day, the hardships of modern living.  But, life went on.

          The sister-in-law’s kindle ran out of charge overnight so she had to revert to a physical book to read that night which meant that if she dropped it, as she often does with her kindle, when she fell asleep, she lost her page, also she had to use a torch in able to read.  As we are looking after someone who is incontinent the washing machine was full and had to wait until the power was restored until we could turn it on, we just hoped that it wouldn’t be off for long.  And with the power outage the water pressure dropped to a trickle, so no such things as showers, or dishwashers, or even washing machines.  But, life went on.

          As soon as the power came back on, it’s a wonder that we didn’t blow the trip because the dishwasher, washing machine, and kettle were all switched on. And, life goes on.