I have had one of those weeks.? Not ‘bad’, per se, but no room to breath.? On Tuesday, I started a class, which is cool, but it’s pretty much solid class all day with a short lunch.? When I got out of class last night, I went straight to the center because I had a class to teach.? Again, it was cool, but I was there until a little after 10.? This made it a pretty late night.? On top of that, I forgot to set my alarm.
I awoke with a start, looked at the clock in disbelief and confusion, andmade a B-line for the shower.? I rushed out the door to head for class and was, of course, caught in traffic.? But I made it in time for class.? During lunch, I had to take a tire to the tire place so I could get a new one.? Since I was running short on time, I just dropped it off and paid for it and said I would be back to pick it up later.? At this point, I feel like I haven’t had a moment to catch? my breath in a day and a half.
After I get back, I try to call the house and the call is routed to my cell phone.? Since we have Vonage, this is my usual indicator that the internet is down.? Well nothing I can do about it now, I’ll have to deal with that when I get home.? I finish up class for the day and have been going from 5 in the morning until 4:30 in the afternoon.? Time to head for the tire place.? But before I get out the door, my cell phone rings and Chris tells me that the electricity is out at the house.? (Hmm…that would explain why the internet doesn’t work).? So I look up the number for the power company online to call in an outage.? I get them on the phone and tell them about the problem and she taps on a keyboard for a few minutes while I wait.? I am expecting her to tell me that, yes, there is a reported outage and they are working on it.
‘I’m not seeing any problems in that area so I’ll have to send a technician out.’
This throws me for a small loop but I thank her and head out the door as fast as I can so I can pick up the tire and get home to see what’s wrong with the power.? As I pull up to the tire shop, I of course notice the long line of people.? I park and hop at the end of the line and watch as the ONE SERVICE GUY is trying to help each person.? I finally get to the front, give him my tag and he sends someone to throw the tire in the trunk.? Now I head for home, which I am sure is cold as ice since we have had a cold snap and now we have no heat.
On the way home, I began wondering if maybe the circuit breaker inside had popped.? I got to the house and ran inside.? Since it was getting dark, I dug up a flashlight and then headed for the circuit breaker box.
‘Hmm…looks fine.”, I thought.? ‘But lets flip it just to make sure.”
This yielded no results so the next thing was the power pole by the house.? I went outside, opened up the box, but that breaker hadn’t tripped either.? Now my heart sank.? Since I had seen the lights on at my neighbors house, I knew the problem was going to be mine alone.? I was afraid a limb had fallen from one of out trees and broken the line.? I started walking in a path that the cable took to get out of my yard, trying not to trip over anything as I walked with? my eyes firmly planted above my head.
Oddly enough, I got all the way to the pole at the edge of the property and had seen no break in the line.? My eyes followed the line to the pole and then looked at it both to the right and to the left.? It all looked fine.? My eyes wandered down the pole to the fence line and…
‘YIKES!!’? I almost jumped out of my skin.? I was face to face with a squirrel who was on a bush at the base of the pole sitting at eye level.? I looked at him, he looked at me.? Then I became fascinated that I was so close and he wasn’t spooking.? I spoke softly to him and he still didn’t start.
‘Wow!? I wish I had my camera!’, I thought.
Then the whole oddness of this scene began to dawn on me.? I moved around to look at the squirrel from another angle, and the little guy still didn’t move.? It finally dawned on me that he was not among the living.? I thought he may have gotten his leg stuck and just died there kinda hanging, but then I look up again and notice what appeared to be a huge switch that was disconnected.? I looked back down at the squirrel then the switch again.
Yes, you guessed it.? He had crawled into the transformer to try to get warm and zapped himself.? This threw the circuit breaker on the transformer (open switch) and had thrown him off where he had plummeted to the bush and gotten stuck.? But he was stuck in such a natural position and there was no external damage that I thought at first he was alive and sitting there.
In the end the tech showed up, and confirmed what I had finally figured out and we have the power back again.? As I sit here and relax thinking how stressed my last two days were, I have realized that that was nothing compared to the day that poor squirrel has had.