Blackout

After a particularly long heat wave our power went out.  Not the entire city, nor the entire neighborhood, just our little street, with two others.  A total of 38 homes were affected by this black out.  It wasn’t that serious. I don’t think it will be serious, but as I write this article my laptop is down to 30% power.  As far as I know this could be it! This could be the end of all things! The beginning of the fall of all that is, was and ever will be, but it’s probably nothing, just a temporary interruption of power.

I’ve spent some time in Mexico so power outages are nothing new to me, but having a power outage in a major metropolitan area is, and especially in one of the most industrialized countries in the world, it makes one wonder why?  I think I paid my bill.  Perhaps all of the 38 houses forgot to pay their bills at the same time creating a mass cut off of services, doubtful.  The real reason for the outage is, the equipment got too hot. 

When thinking about this excuse, I think it’s only an excuse; I have to consider the realities of where I live.  I live in the desert, every year it gets over 100 degrees and stays that way for a few weeks, forcing all of us to utilize the wonderful technology of air conditioning and in our case sitting in the cool, wet, pool so we can save on energy we won’t have to pay for later.  But then if I know this why doesn’t the power company know this and prepare for those “overheating” issues? 

I think this falls into the category of ignorantly not caring, at least as long as they get paid.  Like in Long Beach, California, not a desert, a city by the ocean, where the power has gone out a lot lately due to exploding power boxes.  I’m not sure what a power box is or why they would explode but four have exploded over the last month and a half, putting hundreds and thousands of customers out of power, often for days at a time.

It can’t be simply due to ignorantly not caring, there must be some other grand issue at play, some complex, unexplained set of circumstances that have caused these issues to occur.  It can’t be just for the profit takers and their lack of desire to upgrade their service areas.  Is it really just like our roadways and the inability of our state to use the billions of dollars received in gas taxes and car registrations, that are supposed to go to fixing our roads, but never seem to find their way to even fixing the pot holes down the street? 

Maybe there is a better, more honest explanation.  Let’s see, a car hit the transformers and blew them up, no?  Umm, perhaps it was rats that chewed on the wires and then they exploded, not that either?  Ok, Ok, it was the dog; the dog did it, or the alien cats that have taken over planet earth?  Sounds ridiculous, and it is.  Any excuse given is simply their way of not doing their job. 

Whether it’s the state, the federal government or the power company, they all seem to have the same lines to feed the people, except their lines always end with “we need you to pay more, get less and stop complaining or we'll cut you off.”  To be completely honest, I don’t have a brilliant answer to this cancerous problem infecting this nation.  I readily admit that I, yes me, don’t have a clue how to instill honesty back into a corrupt system that has trickled down from the top into the very companies that provide our basic services, or is it the other way around?

I know what you’re thinking.  Your power will come back on so just sit tight and live with it, don’t open the fridge, don’t bring home ice-cream from the store, like my daughter just did and don’t call the power company to tell them your power is out, they already know, there the ones that shut it off. 

So why am I so hot and bothered?  Because it’s hot, the AC doesn’t work when I need it the most and there telling me it’s my fault for not setting my thermostat to 80.  Why do I even have AC if I can’t use it?  I guess it’s my fault the roads are bad because I drive to work everyday. And it’s my fault that the radical Muslims don’t like me because I’m a Christian or the gays are gay because I’m straight or best of all I am to blame for global warming, oh sorry, climate change, I am the one person who is to blame for all of the worlds issues, just because.  Just because they, someone called they, said so. Ok, I’ll admit it, I’ll come clean, it’s all my fault. Can I have my power back now?