Thursday, Aug 14 - Blackout and Lilli
1:29 p.m. || 08.27.03

Ok, lets see... where do I start...

Thursday, August 14th I woke up fairly early this morning and immediately saw a note from my dad on our snackbar. It was the nicest thing, and completely uncharacteristic of my dad. He's not really the affectionate type, hes usually quiet, but this note made me cry. It said how I did a good job handling the accident and how he was glad I wasnt hurt and stuff. I saved it, but I think I left it at my parents' house. I'll have to remember to get it. Anyways, my mom and I dealt with insurance companies all morning... ours, our agent, and theirs. It wasnt too bad, but annoying telling the story over and over. We then took my car over to Carruba Collision to get an estimate done. That wasnt too bad, and they estimated $1800, including labor. The main things were my bumper, my exhaust system and the floorboards in my trunk.

After leaving Carubba, my mom and I got lunch and tried to figure out how to get me to Andy's. Andy had offered to pick me up or meet us halfway, but he was supposed to work at 4:30, and by the time we were supposed to leave, it would have been too late, and I didnt want him missing work. If we were gonna meet, we were also planning on doing it in Syracuse, and by that time, it would have been rush hour, and really stupid for us to try and work that out. So, my mom decided to drive me the entire way.

On our way to the thruway, the other person's insurance company called, and admitted the fault of their client and told me they were completely liable for everything. So that was awesome and such a relief. We then talked to Carruba to see when we could bring the car in, and they said Monday, so my mom said that she'd take care of that.

The drive out was so busy!! My mom and I listened to CDs the entire way, and just stayed with the flow of traffic. It was a bit nerve-wracking for me, cause of the heavy traffic. Usually I am good, but my accident happened in rush hour, and ugh.

So anyways, we got to Andy's shortly after 5. To get to Andy's house, you have to pass through 6 stoplights. Well, the first 4 were working fine, and nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. When we got into NY Mills, where Andy lives, the two lights there werent working, and the police were directing traffic. It was strange, but I thought they just werent working and I really didnt think anything of it. When we got to Andy's house, I saw that his car was there. I was like "What the heck??" And as we walked into his house, I noticed that there were no lights on. No TV, no nothing. No one was inside, so we walked through the house to the backyard where everyone was sitting. It turns out there was no power! Since my mom and I had been listening to CDs the entire way, we didnt know anything about the blackout! And when Andy tried to switch their cordless phone to the corded phone, their jack broke, so he couldnt even call us to tell us, or try and meet us or anything. And since he works at a call center for T-Mobile, with computers, it was pointless for him to try and go to work.

So, we ended up sitting around and talking. Andy's grandma was so concerned about us eating that she and Andy's mom made the only thing they could (after Andy relit the pilot light on the stove), buckwheat pancakes and bacon. She felt bad, but its not like we were expecting her to make us food in the first place, and second, its not like the blackout was anticipated.

During this time, my mom called my dad, who also had no power, and my sister in Michigan, who was also in the dark. My dad was getting annoyed cause my grandma kept calling him with updates on what signals were out, etc. Plus I guess the phone was acting up, cause it kept ringing and no one was there. Weird. During this time, around 6:30, the power came back on. In all, it was out maybe 3 or 4 hours. At my parents' in Lockport, my dad said it was out from about 5 til 9. My sister, however, lost power for 26 hours (see Trent's entry for his account on the blackout... I liked this entry a lot -- ok for some reason it isnt working and it says his diary is no longer... hmmm...). So anyways, we ate our pancakes and bacon, and then my mom had to get going, as it was going on 7pm, and she wouldnt be back til after 10. So, Andy and I decided to take her to the thruway. I rode with my mom, and Andy went and got gas. We met up at the Thruway entrance, and we said goodbye to my mom, and then headed over to the mall cause I still needed shoes to wear to the wedding.

When we got to the mall, we noticed there werent many cars in the parking lot, but we didnt really think anything of it. Well, we went into JC Penney's, which is the typical entrance we use, and looked at their shoes. I didnt really see anything I liked, so we went to go walk into the mall and we realized it was closed!! I guess JC Penney's and Target were the only stores in the mall that were still open. All of the other stores sent their employees home when the power went out. It didnt even occur to us that the mall would be closed. So, we got back into the car, drove around the mall and went in through Target. I still didnt see anything I liked, so we said we'd go to Wal-Mart later.

By this time it was getting towards 9pm, but we decided to go visit Danielle and Lilli. Danielle was up visiting Lilli's grandmother (Lilli's father's mother), who lives 20 minutes away. I actually wasnt supposed to know they were up, Danielle wanted to surprise me, but she couldnt keep it a secret for very long, and told me a couple days prior. I didnt tell Andy I knew, however, until right before we went over there. So, we drove over to where she was staying, and we were in luck, Lilli was still awake! Usually she goes to bed around 8, but she was still quite awake when we got there. This was my first time meeting Danielle and Lilli, even though Danielle and I talk online every day, and she sends tons of pictures of Lilli, so I was a little shy. I hate that. And Danielle says that she is shy too. So, I'm glad Andy was there to keep us talking. Right away, Danielle asked if I wanted to hold Lilli, so I did. She is so cute! She is growing so much, I wish I could have seen her a lot earlier. We took lots of pictures, and watched the CNN coverage of the blackout, with which Lilli was enthralled. There was this scrolling bar on the bottom of the screen, and Lilli just kept her eyes on it. We stayed til about 10pm, and then Lilli was getting cranky and fell asleep in Danielle's arms, so we decided it was time to go.

We went over to Wal-Mart after leaving, but I still didnt find anything I liked. Ugh. Maybe I am too damn picky. I was really tired by then and just said screw it, I'll wear my sandals I already have. No ones gonna be paying THAT much attention to my feet anyways. And I was right.

So then we went back to Andy's and went to bed shortly after... We decided to get up at 9 the next day, and I had a bad headache. :(

Here are some pictures of Lilli and I... Danielle already has them up on a website, so I know its ok that I use them...

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