So I get up this morning and the power is still out, the water is barely running and the phones are all dead. My iPhone was charged because I plugged it into an AC/DC battery pack I use for powering my studio photography lights for a few minutes. There were gusts of wind howling through my partially opened window and rain drops were splashing onto me. Last night I had put a towel on the window sill to help govern the amount of water that may have come in during the night as I tried to keep cool in my dark, hot house.
The refrigerator has been dead for at least eleven hours and I really don’t want to open it until power is restored. It was so hot in my room I couldn’t stand it. I was laying on another towel I had placed under my upper back and shoulders to absorb the sweat and body grease I was going to excrete during the humid, hot night. I had to keep my knees bent and up in the air just to catch a bit of wind from the window to help cool off the rest of my body. I don’t know when I managed to fall asleep but the sun was shining behind an overcast, drizzling sky. I could hear people outside somewhere in the neighborhood. There was no sense getting up and going to an obviously closed office so I tried to sleep some more.
I probably got a few more hours of sleep in when one of my models text messaged me about the status of her photos, waking me. I replied they were looking great until the hurricane wiped out the power. It was already about 3pm so I decided to get up. I inspected the house with a flashlight application on my iPhone and attempted to restart the house by playing with the fuse box. Nothing happened so I figured power was still out in the neighborhood. Monday evening I had filled up two five gallon jugs of drinking water and I used half of one to bathe in and brush my teeth with, old west style. I got dressed, took a few photos of the flooding and damage around my house, made sure the trash bin was still secure in the alcove of my front door, removed a tree branch that was stuck under my car which I had run over during the night and, sweating, got into my car and turned the air conditioner on full. It felt so good, you have no idea.
I drove through the city of San Juan, where I live, and the power was absolutely gone. The whole city was dark, not a street lamp, not anything. All the businesses I could see that didn’t have backup generators were closed. I traveled into the neighboring city of Pharr where a lone taco place called El Pato was open. I went to the drive through and ordered but when I got to the window they weren’t able to accept credit cards. So I drove to the nearest bank branch I could find that had power, got a mad $20 and went back to the diner. I was able to eat there and headed over to the office. It was already 4:30pm and the only cars in front belonged to the news personnel. The air conditioning in the office felt so good, you have no idea.
So now I’m in the office escaping from my dark, hot house and the spoiled food in my refrigerator, praying that freezers really do stay frozen for two days. I hope power, water and phone lines are restored tonight. If nothing else, I could probably just stay at the station. At least there’s television and working internet.
Update: About 10pm I checked on the house and power and water had indeed been restored. I made sure everything was alright, smelled the rotten-out contents of the fridge and turned on the air conditioner so the house would be nice and cool when I got back later this evening. I also got a quick bite to eat at Stars where burgers are $1 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Mental note: don’t drink the milk when I get home.
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