Like Pilgrims with cell phones

If only the cell phones worked, that is. Or as my friend Anne just texted me, "Like pilgrims with cell phones and banjos" because her husband has a banjo and has been playing it in the evenings.

Last night I got very excited while shopping for dinner in the darkened Krogers because I scored a tiny little hot rotisserie (sp?) chicken and a bag of lettuce. It beats the peanut butter.Power is slowly returning. Not in our neighborhood, but mother in law had hers for almost a day til it went off again this morning. The customers served by Entergy (including us) were about 97 percent out of power after IKE. Centerpoint (Houston) was about 80 percent. Centerpoint seems to have some easier fixes. Some places, like the Galleria shopping center and surrounding homes never lost power. Husband's office, obviously, has power or I wouldn't be on line. But up in the northern suburbs, we took the eye wall, so they say, and the result isn't pretty. You know, I think because this wasn't the loss of life like Katrina, the media has stopped showing all of you what's going on. Well let me say, just so you're sure - the 4th largest city in the US is still largely living like a third world country. But the convoys of electric trucks keep rolling in. So help is here.I keep pretending it's like camping.

Last night we: ate our little chicken. Checked on Alva next door who lives alone and spent some time chatting. Went for a drive to charge the cell phones. By 8:45 it was too dark to drive around safely. So we sat on the porch by the propane lantern and listened to AM radio. There are two types of people in this world: Those who think it's a good idea to call in to AM 740 and say things like "Do y'all know when the power will come on?" or "What we all need to do is just put a little love into this" and those who just want their power on and don't really want to chit chat pointless platitudes but nonethless find it entertaining to listen to the clearly stoned 16 year old calling from his father's car to whine that he has had to spend 8 hours a day with nothing to do and does anyone know when his (he gave the name but I'm keeping his stoned self anonymous out of courtesy) high school would open up again cause he really, really needed to know. (Uh, dude! Could it be any more obvious to the listening public that your dope connection is a fellow student and you're running low on weed?)

Til next time...