technology: grand and scary
Jul. 14th, 2007 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
indigo_rose99It wasn't just our house power that went out. Almost the entire county went with us.
I had ordered pizza 10 minutes before the power went out. It was supposed to be about a 30 minute wait, so we waited about 10 minutes after the power went out and set out for the pizza place. At first, it was fine. The car had AC, and traffic seemed fine. But then about halfway there, we discovered that the stoplights were not working. They were not blinking, they were black. All of them. It took us an extra 20 minutes to go what should have been a 2 minute trip.
We finally got to the pizza place to discover that their power was out, too. They had no record of our order. Their stoves were electric. Even their phones were out. The manager used his cell phone to call the next nearest store and transfer our order. He promised it would be free.
We did our best to take a route to the nearest store that involved only roads without lights -- interstates, country roads, whatever it took. And it was crazy! So many lights out! Some people at the first pizza place wondered where all of the police that should be directing traffic... We found them. They were at the lights leading onto the interstate. I have to figure that so many lights were out that they had to place the police at critical points.
After having seen the latest Die Hard movie, all we could think was, "Someone having a Fire Sale?" I got a taste of what just the loss of electricity can do. We depend on it in ways that truly astound me.
I had ordered pizza 10 minutes before the power went out. It was supposed to be about a 30 minute wait, so we waited about 10 minutes after the power went out and set out for the pizza place. At first, it was fine. The car had AC, and traffic seemed fine. But then about halfway there, we discovered that the stoplights were not working. They were not blinking, they were black. All of them. It took us an extra 20 minutes to go what should have been a 2 minute trip.
We finally got to the pizza place to discover that their power was out, too. They had no record of our order. Their stoves were electric. Even their phones were out. The manager used his cell phone to call the next nearest store and transfer our order. He promised it would be free.
We did our best to take a route to the nearest store that involved only roads without lights -- interstates, country roads, whatever it took. And it was crazy! So many lights out! Some people at the first pizza place wondered where all of the police that should be directing traffic... We found them. They were at the lights leading onto the interstate. I have to figure that so many lights were out that they had to place the police at critical points.
After having seen the latest Die Hard movie, all we could think was, "Someone having a Fire Sale?" I got a taste of what just the loss of electricity can do. We depend on it in ways that truly astound me.
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traffic lights out
Date: 2007-07-16 10:48 pm (UTC)In Baltimore, NO ONE behaves properly when lights go out. It is insane. People just barrel through every intersection with no regard for life or limb. Heaven help you if you are trying to get across a busy street. All you can do is inch out slowly into traffic until someone has the humanity to slow down enough for you to get through.
Did you ever find out the cause of the outage?
Re: traffic lights out
Date: 2007-07-17 02:41 am (UTC)