| a couple of thursdays ago, i experienced a big, nearly-city-wide power failure in toronto. i was doing some work on my computer around 10pm when suddenly, all of the power went out in my apartment suite. now, following decades of lessons-learned from apocalyptic cyborg films i knew very well that power failures are principally caused by EMPs (electromagnetic pulse) that disrupt power, computer and electrical systems and also typically herald massive amounts of death, destruction, and of course, robot invasions. this was my very first instinct when the power died and i rushed out to the living room to grab my cats and protect them from the inevitable fiery shockwave that was certain to level my apartment building within seconds. i was incredibly relieved to look out of my living room window and see, instead of glowing mushroom clouds, a sea of inky darkness with the exception of the street lights which seem to run on a separate grid than the residential power lines. it was an extremely cold night (for balmy toronto) at NEARLY -30C (if you could see me, you would see me smirking at the relative no-coldiness of that number, given some of the Edmonton winters i have lived through). i was very worried that if power would not be restored soon, the heat from my apartment would seep away and that my cats, fur-lined as they are, would ... um... get cold. the power remained off all night and it wasn't until around 7:30 in the morning that power came back on. the pipes that feed radiant heat to my apartment were cold, but my suite was relatively warm, given that i live on a high floor and all of the heat trapped in the building continued to rise as it moved through the building. getting to work was also complicated by the outage. apparently, power was spottily disrupted throughout the west side of toronto, mostly affecting residential areas, but also impacting traffic lights, and taking out most of the subway line that services the west-end of the city. of course, all this i didn't realize until after i boarded the subway and checked my iPhone for news about the power outage. i went one stop on the subway before i was forced to get out and either take a bus, for which some 500 people were already in line in the freezing wind, or to walk back home and drive to work. at the same time, israeli forces were bombing the crap out of hamas in the gaza strip. obviously, i felt that my own little brush with the end of the world was a farce, and i laughed at myself for the inconvenience that i felt, and thanked as i do almost daily my good fortune to live in this area of stability and sanity. the things for which we in canada have to be grateful are innumerable and these little, insignificant disruptions in the status quo should help us all realize what a utopia we inhabit. - g song of the day for when the world is running down: when the world is running down (you make the best of what's still around), the police. |