Let me tell you what an oddessy THIS has been... - December 27th, 2004

December 23rd, 2004:

Around 3:45am I wake to this crashing sound and my cell phone bleeping at me because my power has just gone off. I lay in bed thinking, "oh crap, I'm gonna get cold." I crawl out of bed to check the lights and yep, electric is definatly out. I call the electric company to report the situation. I then look out my front door and see a huge freaking tree branch lying in my front yard. I crawl back into bed and attempt to fall back asleep and conserve the most of my heat from my electric blanket.

I couldn't fall back asleep. I kept hearing tree branches cracking and falling and crashing outside. Tree branches were falling on my roof and sliding off onto my car. Transformers were blowing left and right. It was a dance of light coming through my curtains. For the few moments I did fall asleep I had one of those experiences where I knew I was awake but something was preventing me from opening my eyes and I felt like something was sitting on me and not letting me move.

I was getting scared because I didn't know what to do and I was by myself. My parents called around 6:30am after I had already been awake for 3 hours to tell me to pack up my stuff and head over to Jeremiah's and turn off my water. At that time Jeremiah called to check on me and said he was going to walk over and help me out. I called my parents back to update them when at THAT time, my work called telling me not to come in.

Thursday was Jeremiah's 28th birthday and I had everthing set out for his surprise party. Before he walked over, I had to take everything down and put it away so he wouldn't see it. I had to light candles just too see what I was doing. Jeremiah came over around 7:30ish and turned off my water and we both headed over to his place.

By this time, my tree threw up so much that I couldn't get out of my driveway or drive on the street. I had to face the snow and ice and walk through broken tree branches and frozed puddles.

Jeremiah and I cuddled and fell back asleep over at his place and around noon we tried to get a kerosene heater but no such luck. We drove back over to my place because someone had cleared the branches out of my road and driveway and I heated up some chili while he cleaned off my car.

After lunch, I took him to see the Nutcracker for his birthday over at the Ohio Theater. Even tho we both almost fell asleep, it was nice to sit in a warm building and thaw out. After Nutcraker, he dropped me off at my place and I half way decorated again before he picked me up 30 minutes later to eat dinner.

I was going to take him to Abuelos out at Easton, but since it had no power, we ended up going to California Pizza Kitchen instead. After dinner, we drove back to my place for my attempted surprise party in the dark and cold. Since nobody was there yet, I went ahead and gave him my present. When nobody still hadn't shown up, I told him were were going to have to wait for his 3rd present to arrive. He thought I was getting him a stripper. HA HA!

About 5 minutes into our candlelit card game, a group of people showed up at my door and started singing x-mas carols. At that time I opened the door and told him his 3rd present had arrived. He was surprsed to see his family. He didn't have a clue!

Rumor had it that Jeremiah's power was back on so we moved the party over to his place. When we walked in the door, his power when out again but later came back on. We we opened presents, had food, and played "scene it." Since my power hadn't come on yet, I stayed over and his place with all his family since his street was the only street with electricity.

Its been five days now since I haven't had electric. And at the moment I'm babysitting my gizmo. I hope she doesn't freeze. My apartment is so cold you can see your breath and there are icicles hanging from my kitchen faucet.

So X-mas for me was exhausting. I drove to my sister's on the 24th and after a 2 1/2 hr trip which should have only took 1 hr and 45 minutes, I realized that I had left my medicine at Jeremiah's house. So I called up to Jeremiah crying and he said he would drive halfway and bring it to me. So back in the car I went with my dad and drove all the way to Lancaster just to get my medicine. I missed x-mas mass. I had been working on no sleep since 3:30 that morning, I fell asleep twice while driving and took a wrong exit getting lost. I came back last night to still no heat and crashed over at Jeremiah's again. But this time I had Gizmo to worry about. SHe and Chandler didn't get along so well. And I didn't sleep so well either.

Very interesting weekend, but I'm too lazy to write more in detail so if you want the whole story, call me. This entry is freaking long enough!

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