Oooh Nooo!

Yesterday when I woke up the day looked beautiful.  I got ready for work and it was still beautiful.  I arrived at work and it was still beautiful.

Then as I was working I heard some noise, it sounded like a lot of wind.  I looked out the window, and sure enough, the wind was blowing... hard.  Hard enough to bend the tops of the tall pines into shape of a bow.  Around here, that kind of windstorm means one thing... widespread power failure. The people I clean house for have a generator that automatically kicks in when the power goes out, so it didn't effect my ability to finish the job.  I sent my oldest daughter a text, asking if the power was out yet.  She texted back "LOL, Yes."

When I left the client's house, I was a little surprised at the condition of the roads.  The storm was worse than I'd thought.  Tree limbs lay everywhere, I weaved in and out among them all the way home.  In one spot a tree had fallen across the road, fortunately before I got there a guy did who happened to have a chain saw in his truck.  He was just finishing up when I arrived on the spot.  So I was able to continue on home.  The road I live on was no better.  One neighbor's fence was broken down by a fallen tree.  When I got to my driveway, I had to get out and clear some large limbs out of the way before I could continue home.


Once I got home, I saw that the power was still out.  This meant a cold lunch, it was already 3:00 in the afternoon so I was famished and in no mood to search too much for healthy options.   My diet bread was frozen, so I had to use regular, and eat lunch meat and cheese.  After my sandwich I was sill hungry so I ate some of the lunch meat and cheese plain.  Finally I had an apple and a yogurt.  Then I started homeschooling my kids, my oldest works independently, so I focused my attention on the younger two.



We did Phonics, I read them a chapter from their new History book, and then we finished reading a chapter of Little House in the Big Woods.  They had done their Math while I was at work, and they do most of their science at co-op, so I decided to call that enough for the day.  The power was still out.


I decided I'd better go get our generator out of the garage and hook it up before it got too dark to see.  So I walked around behind our house to open the garage door.  Usually we use an automatic garage door opener, so I had to disconnect that in order to open it manually.  Then, to get the generator out, I had to move a bunch of boxes that had been placed in the path.    Finally I got the generator out of the garage and started pulling it up the steep hill to the spot near our door where we usually put it.  It was heavy and difficult to get up the hill.  I could feel the stress on my ab muscles and on all the edges of the hernia patch, but I had to have the generator so I kept pulling.  My son jumped in to help me and started pushing, that made it a lot easier and we got it in place.

Next, I tried to start it.  It has a long complicated starting procedure that involves three levers being in correct positions, and for some reason, the manufacturer didn't find it necessary to put a sticker on it explaining the correct procedure.  So I had to try a multitude of variations, and pull the cord many times before finally getting it started.  Next time I mush remember that the gas switch needs to be in the "Off" position to start, that makes no sense to me, which is why it took so long for me to hit on that variation.


Anyway, we finally had the generator running and the first thing we did was make dinner.  I plugged in the fridge to keep it cold for a while, and plugged the microwave in to heat things in.  I didn't pay as much attention to portions as I should have, which resulted in my calories for the day being higher than they should have been, but I was honestly hungry every time I ate, none of it was just eating for the sake of eating.

After dinner we unhooked the fridge and microwave and tried hooking up both of our convection heaters to the generator.  The heaters were too much of a drain and it triggered the circuit breaker.  We decided to go without heat for a while, wear coats, and just hook up our TV and a lamp and watch LOST.    I also hooked up the Wii so I could do Free Step as I watched.  That was one good decision I made, I didn't skip my exercise.  By the time Lost was over I still needed to do about 40 minutes more on Wii Fit Plus to reach my total calorie burn. So my oldest put the younger kids to bed and I stayed up exercising.  After I was done, my husband arrived home and we hooked up one heater and put it in the hall near all of our bedrooms, and went to bed.


This morning when I woke up the power was still out, the generator had run out of gas, and the house was cold, so I just went back to sleep for a while.  Later I woke up to find it still out.  My husband and I decided we might as well get the generator going again so we could start our day.  Just as he was about to go get the gas can and fill it up, the lights came on.  (Yippee!)


So my calories for the day were 2053, instead of 1600 like they should have been.  I hope that the hard day at work, moving all those boxes, hauling the generator up the hill, pulling the start cord over and over, and then still going on to complete my workout made up for the extra calories!  I won't depend on that though, I was 453 calories over, so for the next few days I'll try to come in under to make up the difference.