One year ago today was the BLACKOUT!!!

i remember it well - i was grading the regents for summer school....in the dark!

my funny story about it....
my brother was over in Iraq with the Marines, and he called my Dad and was like, 'Dad, what's up with the blackout - it's everywhere'...and since we had no power, my dad thought it was only our immediate area.....so it took my brother in IRAQ to let us know how extensive the blackout really was

and then my brother in law got into a motorcycle accident that day as well....he still has scars on his arms from skidding across the pavement...

I got engaged that night!!!!

I remember it well. I was still working on Long Island (so thankful for that) was right in the middle of a big copy job and poof, no lights, no phone, and the document is now stuck in the copier. It took about a half hour to close the office. Stayed in the pool all night. Had a candlelit BBQ dinner.

No power the next day - so no work.

Saturday - power came back in the late after just in time for me to leave on my cruise vacation, where FH proposed.

UGH - I rememebr every second of the blackout - it was NOT fun!!! My company basically had NO emergency plans whatsover, and our 'security' consisted of people running on each floor screaming at us to get out of the building... It was chaos. One of my co-workers and I figured we might be able to get a bus to Jersey (mom lives there) so we went to Port Authority - along with EVERYONE ELSE!!! I tell you ladies, I will never forget how frightening it was to be in the middle of something so out of control. No one knew what to do, including the police who were scattered around the block. It was a nightmare - if you ever saw the movie 28 Days Later, when they're stuck in the tunnel... that's exactly what I felt like once it started getting dark. Once the sun went down was when people really started going nuts - so we made an emergency decision to try and get to another co-workers apartment in Brooklyn. Luckily - she gave us her number before we left work, just in case we needed to crash at her place. SO, long story short - we WALKED from Port Authority to Brooklyn (the HEights) in the pitch black dark..... By the time we got there, DH (then FI) drove from LI to come pick me up as soon as I could get through to him. Remember all the cell phones weren't working? Every phone we passed had a line about 10 deep too, so I couldn't get in touch with anyone until 10:30 that night! The blackout is NOT something I look back upon with fond memories....

So today I brought my emergency backpack with me to work, you never know when you'll need to be ready...

OMG...is it really?!?

I remember the day well...walking from downtown NYC over the Brooklyn Bridge and all the way home...got home in about 7 hours. The blisters...oh the blisters...and no power for the next 2 days!!!!!!!!

My husband (fiancee at the time) and I were going into the city and got stuck on the HOT LIRR at the East Rockaway train station. We were stuck for 45 minutes until police came to let us out. Keep in mind the doors on the train open electronically so they had to pry open doors. We met friends ont he train and walked to a bar in East ROckaway, got tipsy and then got a cab back to Long Beach where we went to an Minnesotas who had a blackout party..
definately a night to remember!

I was actually lucky because I was in Las Vegas. Granted, it was 110 outside but at least I had A/C inside the hotel. I'd just finished my summer at the firm the week before and I heard that the lawyers had to walk down 40+ flights of stairs in the MetLife building. I'm always injured, so I was definitely glad not to be there!