The remnants of a tropical storm have been passing by. So the first thing to do once it stopped was get out the boots and walk in puddles! Beside our house is a berm that separates the residential zone from a rehab center, it is overgrown and there is one clearing that the girls and I call the “Witch’s Garden” (from Rapunzel). It often has good ditches to poke around in, so that was our destination this time.
Found a local news article talking about the power outage Sunday night. From what I’ve heard, the power company workers started fixing the pole at around 11:30 PM.
More than 4,000 homes in Burgaw, Rocky Point and other areas lost power for about an hour and a half.
A spokesperson for Four County Electric said a farmer burning a wheat field damaged a power pole that served several communities causing the blackout
The spokesperson said everything has now been fixed.
No word on whether the farmer will be fined for the repairs.
From Pender County blackout | WWAY NewsChannel 3 | Wilmington NC News
Technorati Tags: electricity
I woke up last night to CDF asking me for the flash light. It was about midnight and the house was unusually silent — I could hear the crickets outside. It took me a minute to realize that my eyes were open because it was so dark. I don’t mind sleeping without any light, but I’ve gotten used to the four night lights we have around the house.
Fortunately MD didn’t wake up. I was worried she would wake and be scared once she realized her lighthouse was not lit. The other one woke up a couple of times when her pacifier fell out of the crib, but once I stumbled around and found it everything was OK again.
The dog was funny. I heard her sniffing her way down the hall and the thought of her using her nose to guide her was quite amusing — even if it isn’t quite true.
Then around 12:30 the power came back on halfway (like a brown out) and I was able to make a note of the time. A little bit later it was off again. Then finally in the early morning it came back on fully.
That was just in time for a big thunderstorm. Halfway through the storm the power went out again (apparently after a really close lightning strike). There was a lot of lightning and I was very surprised that neither daughter woke up.
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The other day when I got home from work, I noticed a wild rabbit sitting beside the driveway eating (or out for silflay if you’ve ever read Richard Adams’ wonderful novel). It was content to stay there while I parked the car, went inside, and then came back out with the camera.
A group (maybe a family) of Red-headed Woodpeckers were in our back yard this morning. I counted at least four or five flying between the trees. When they landed on a tree, they would make their “qwer-qwer” call and then hammer away as the chorus of replies came back.
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It has been a while since I last played music with anyone. So recently I decided to invite my brothers over for a jam session. We got together this past Saturday.
I had to get the Slingerland kit back in tune, but once that was set we got right in sync. The guitar led it off with a number of songs by some 90’s bands (Rage Against the Machine, Smashing Pumpkins, No Doubt, Greenday) and then we moved on to other songs, whatever someone decide to kick off. I just tried to play along, whether I knew the song or not.
I was happy with things turned out, and despite being in the living room, we were about to play at a comfortable volume level without driving everyone out of the house. LP even slept through most of it!
Yesterday was a day of calamity for the girls — to put it dramatically. CE usualy is the one getting hurt, Calamity could be her name. But yesterday started off with MD.
I got a call from CDF around 10am. MD had been bitten or stung on the foot while playing in the back yard. She didn’t see what it was, but it left a red welt that was starting to swell. CDF checked the area for a black widow spider, but found nothing, so I think it was most likely a wasp that stung her. It was painful for a while, but CDF put on some cream that helped the stinging go away.
So when I got home that evening everything was going fine, until after supper, as we were getting ready to go outside, CE tripped over her feet and fell into an ottoman. It’s about 18 inches tall with padding on the top. She missed the padding and hit her head on the corner of the wood. I heard her start screaming and by the time I had picked her up a “goose-egg” was already growing on her forehead. She didn’t like having a cold rag on the bump, so we gave her some infant tylonol and let her lay on the couch for a few minutes.
They’re both feeling better today.
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CDF and the girls gave me an ice cream maker for Father’s Day this year. I had occasionally talked about getting one for a while now, but I had forgotten about it recently and was surprised by the gift.
So Sunday afternoon I went to the grocery store and got what we needed to make mint chocolate chip ice cream! I asked MD if she wanted to go with me and she said she didn’t — but of course she changed her mind as soon as I left. But she and CE got to help me when I got back.
CE really wanted to help, and got upset when she couldn’t stir and taste as much as she wanted (she had also gotten up from her nap in a cranky mood). But they both had a chance to stir and taste the ice cream as I took it out of the mixer and put it in the freezer to set.
It was getting too late to eat the ice cream that night (it was supposed to set for 2 hours), so we rode bikes the A. B. Grill to get ice cream there.
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Originally uploaded by jmodule
CDF took some pictures while I was working on replacing part of the dining room floor. While I was nailing, MD came in the room with her toy hammer and asked if it would work well. I let her try, and then she wanted to use a real hammer. It was heavy though, and she gave it back pretty quickly.
The picture below is what the floor looked like after I had cut out a 5 foot by 8 foot section and replaced it with 5/8-inch thick plywood.
Since we moved, almost three years ago, we’ve enjoyed seeing the wild rabbits that live around us. This year there haven’t been many about. In comparison, last year we had two or three regulars to the clover patch in our back yard.
So we were quite pleased to see this baby bunny in the front ditch as we went out for a bike ride. It sat very still while I went back to get the camera. It didn’t move until I got closer and it decided to make a run for the woods, making a wide circle around the bikes.
Interestingly we saw another adult rabbit on the bike ride a few blocks away from our street.