Random End-of-year Ramblings

  • I’ve been on vacation since Dec. 24, and was sick for a good chunk of that time. This caused us to miss the Mass. Academy Reunion and TJ Collectibles staff Holiday Party, amongst other events, which was very unfortunate. Being sick is not a good way to start a vacation. But I’m feeling much better now. Hopefully, the rest of the week will be much better.
  • We’re leaving this afternoon (through the snowstorm) to go to the 15th annual New Year’s celebration at my aunt & uncle’s house in the Berkshires. It’s always a fun time, although I’m not sure how the sleeping arrangements will be this year. Many of the people of my generation have gotten married over the past several years, so more and more people come every year. It ends up being the only time we see some of our relatives each year.
  • For those of you living in Massachusetts, if you haven’t done so yet this year, today would be a good opportunity to see your reports free via MA state law. The MA law lets you see a report from each bureau free once per calendar year (unlike the federal law), so you really don’t have anything to lose by getting it today, since the clock resets at midnight.
  • Speaking of midnight, there is an extra second today just before midnight UTC. While we get one 23-hour day and one 25-hour day per year due to the bizarreness of Daylight Saving Time, today we get a rare 24-hour-and-one-second day. It will be at 7:59:60 P.M. Eastern Standard Time. I’ll try to remember to note how I spent my extra second.
  • Reflecting back on 2008, the big event of course was Hannah coming along and changing everything. Pretty much everything in life centers around her now. She’s growing healthily and happily, and I’m sure she’s going to learn to crawl any week now.
  • Happy new year!

Weekend Excitement

On Friday, I woke up shortly after 5am to the sight of nothing, which was the first indication that it would be an interesting day. The power was out, of course. We got out the flashlights and I turned on a battery-powered radio to WTAG, where they were having their usual morning host reporting from his cell phone on his attempt to get to work. He was describing the work crews in front of him on Rte. 56 clearing one tree just to have another fall down. It seemed like it was worst in the Paxton, Holden, and West Boylston area. West Boylston had declared a state of emergency, and that’s where I work, so I figured it would probably be fine if I didn’t go to work. If it weren’t for that on the radio, though, I would have gone in as normal. There was no sign of anything wrong around our house, other than a rainstorm. When Hannah woke up, we went next door to my parents’ place for the company and because they have a wood stove.

Around 9am on Friday, the power came back on, so I could call my boss, who told me that my work was in fact closed for the day. We couldn’t get in touch with my grandma who lives in Brookfield, so we went out to see if she was okay. Along the way, I saw just how localized the storm was. At the bottom of a hill, it was just like around our house, where things were just wet and normal. At the top of a hill, ice coated everything. And there weren’t particularly large hills, just the typical hills one has on roads around here. The damage was very localized. Since my grandma had no power or heat, we took her to stay with my parents for the weekend.

On Saturday, I judged at a PTQ in Hartford, which went very well. (I got to shadow someone though his first Head Judge of a PTQ, and we certified a new Level 1 judge.)

On Sunday, we went to church in the morning (they got power back on Friday night), and in the afternoon had my dad’s side of the family over at my parents’ house for a Christmas party.

It certainly seems like we were one of the lucky ones. I know several people who are still without power, and it’s very uncertain when they’ll get it back. But life for me, really, was only disrupted on Friday.