What a day

knot2share · Feb 9, 2010

The alarm clock wakes up and yells at 5.30am. It is time for us to wake up and get ready to go to the gym. The weather outside is quite pleasant with just the right amount of chillness in the air. We set aside 40 minutes for the workouts and hubby and I get started with our exercise routines. In half an hour’s time, hubby decides to call it off as he feels very tired. So I pack up too and we head back home. After DH leaves for work, I get on with my routine for the morning by making the bed, clearing the clothes scattered all over, put clothes for washing, clean the dishes, organise my breakfast and sit in front of the PC log on to IL, check my emails, check if any job opportunities to apply and then log off for the morning.

It’s time to head into the shower and I decide to clean the shower before I have a bath. I end up all exhausted and tired when I finish my shower and this severe hunger pang hits me. It is only 11.15am and I am already so hungry? So, bite on a fruit and decide to follow up on a couple of job ads found. As always when we call recruiting agencies, we get a standard reply from the person who answers the phone – Sorry she is on another call or in a meeting. Can I get her to call you back please? I leave my contact details with the lady. I then try to call another agency and this time when I pick up the handset to dial, there is no audible dial tone. I disconnect from the previous call again and try to dial but no luck. So I pick up the handset from our bedroom and no dial tone there too!! What’s going on I wondered....Oh, the power has gone. Great! Normally when we call the recruiting agencies and leave messages, nobody bothers to call back. But I am certain that of all days, there will surely be a call from this lady today for whom I had left a message. She is sure to get furious at me for not answering. But she does not know that I have a power cut at my place and the handsets don’t work without electricity. So it might be ringing at her end, but not at my end.

All of a sudden, I have nothing to do. I could possibly do some cooking but it is quite a hot day today and don’t feel like sweating it out in front of that stove. I sit with a book in my hands and quite consistently doze off in just 2 pages of me reading the book. I have been trying to complete this book (Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert) for a while now and after every second page or so, I doze and find myself in this beautiful place, floating and smiling away at everyone in my pink dress. After a few minutes of floating, I wake up again and decide to call the electricity service provider using my mobile. Ah! Just found that my mobile is running out of battery. I forgot to charge it earlier this morning. It is interesting how things happen at a critical time. I have just been told that due to some underground fault, the power in certain areas have been cut off and they did not have an estimated time of restoration yet.

Paradise literally means a walled garden, as mentioned in the book that I was attempting to read. At the moment, my house is a like a walled furnace – very very hot inside. So decide to open the doors a bit and suddenly there is a gush of hot air from outside, which seems to have been waiting to enter the “cold” interiors of my paradise. For a moment I wonder which is better - fresh hot air from outside or the hot air inside! By now I have started sweating profusely due to the heat. My mobile rings again and it is the electricity provider. The estimated time of restoration is 5pm. I have another 3 more hours to spend and after the call ends, my mobile dies. Perrrrrrrfect timing! I am in no position to be contactable now, which seems a bit scary even though it is day time. It amazes me how dependant I have become of this commodity called Electricity and this constant need to be in touch. We all take it for granted isn’t it? A few hours of not having the luxury and I seem totally lost not knowing what to do and nothing works at home too without Electricity. Can we turn the clock backwards please!!!

Tubelight · Feb 9, 2010

Oh dear dear !shakehead A bad hair day, if ever there was one ! Some days turn out like that ! Everything jinxed from the word go. There's an old superstition that the day will not turn out right if you woke up from the wrong side of the bed !
What else can be done with a jinxed day, but to dream about floating smilingly in a pink dress ! That was -) . Dreams are Sanity-Restorers !

I am quite surprised to read that electricity can play hide and seek in Australia too ! So our "Powerless" Karnataka is not without company ! Powercuts are routine here with even a neat schedule of outages. We need to plan things in advance. It can get awfully frustrating when it shuts down at some crucial moment ! And you are so right, we have got used to electricity so much that we feel totally handicapped without it ! And just imagine, Electricity has been around for less than 200 years only ,but the history of mankind is soooooooo looooong !

(PS : I do hope you din't miss that lady's call ! Best wishes)

Arunarc · Feb 9, 2010

K2S Dear
Say All Izz welll...............hahahaha
I can understand your situation this happens sometime when we are in need of something and everything is not in place, Whatever you do goes wrong. You have rightly said we are so use to these luxuries that just one thing is not there we get irriated, don't know what to do and go on blaming the whole world.
Good you got your electricity back so that we could read your post, that you are so helpless without elelctricity, telephone and land up eating cold food too if not mistaken.
Just thinking about the ancient people how they might be surviving without all these luxuries.
Hope everything is working for you now.....cheer up dear.
Think the other way round rest for everything for a day.
Hope that lady will understand and will pray that she will call you tomorrow for the job interview. All the best for Job hunting.

amihere · Feb 9, 2010

Dear Sree
Ofcourse our life has become so much dependent on electricity. Karnataka govt has already given excuse of power shortage for
loadshedding and there are power cuts every now and then. Saturday and sunday mornings are the freakiest. MIL and me try to grind the grated coconut asap after brushing our teeth so that no power cuts can come in way of our lunch.:rantMIL asks the maid to come in at a time(this time is predicted depending on the power cuts of previous day) so that
she can put all the rinsed clothes in dryer. And what a surprise the load shedding is sure to happen the moment she finishes her washing. Then it is a long wait by MIL with clothes in bucket for the power to come:spin.Most of us (women especially) are indepentdent in many terms financially emotionally etc etc....but I dont think we can ever be independent from Mr.Power:biglaugh

Padmini · Feb 9, 2010

Dear Knot2,
How is the day today? Sometimes it happens like this! All " misfortunes" at a stretch. But I really wonder does thing happen in Australia too! We are used to that sort of powercut that too in hot hot summer!!Almost everything that surrounds us has direct link to Electronics, from the very computers we use whether it be laptops, netbooks or notebooks which has millions of tiny electronic components on it like resistors, inductors, capacitors, logic gates and the likes to the calculators, appliances, gizmos, measuring devices, and gadgets to name just a few. Electronics truly molded our lives we have today, for without it, we might as well grimacing in the shackles of underdevelopment and stagnant society where progress is hardly felt as if we are in an isolated islands.As long as the electricity is available, no one thinks much about it. The importance is realized when the power goes out.
with love
pad

ubellah · Feb 9, 2010

Anyways, life will not become a standstill if there is power cut...we can still use our conventional telephones, cooking gas etc.. in India...So we are blessed in disguise.

shivachoubey · Feb 9, 2010

Dear K2S,

Though I really felt bad about your day. I really enjoyed your post. It was actually playing in front of me. I could easily see you in gym and then back home doing your daily routine, searching jobs etc. You held my attention through out just the way they do it in novel. Very well written.

As for the day, tomorrow will be better than today.

Kamalji · Feb 9, 2010

Dear Knot,

Now that is a cute blog.Well when i dont have the electricity, same is the cas e with me. i get upset.But good that u have yr super sense of humour intact eh ! You have a way with words, which very few people have.HAHA

So be cheerful, and by the time u open yr computer, u will have 20 FB;s waiting for u:rotflSee the positive side of things ?HAHA

Regards

kamal

Soldier · Feb 9, 2010

Dear K2S

That was an interesting read. Sure many of us have experienced such days. To concur with others, I too have the question now - does power cut find a place in ur place too. I thought that was typical of Indian scenario only.

At least we can cook using LPG and emergency lamp here. And it is certainly terrible when all things plan for a layoff together!!!!!!!!!!!!

Keep cool and hope to have to have a better day tomorrow.:thumbsup

monifa13 · Feb 10, 2010

A powerful post about no power K2S! For the past one week there's something wrong with our power lines and simultaneously three things -the tubelight in the kitchen, kettle and a decorative light which I have kept in front of a statue of Krishna and Radha- go off with a loud sound like FFFFFFUTTTTT one after the other! This happens only when I am alone at home. Initially I used to jump up hearing all the bursting noise but not anymore...