Blackout!

Ooooh. Yesterday, a major NYC transformer blew up / caught fire / something like that, and everything below 14th Street lost all electricity. That would include me, folks. Fortunately, it happened at around noon, and it was a nice sunny day, but still. My friends and I noticed as we were walking to my house -- no street lights, cars going nuts, all stores completely dark with their employees standing around outside. We got to my building -- also dark. No elevators, so we had to walk up to the 7th floor (not too bad). Fortunately, the emergency lights in the stairwell were working. The hallways, however, were pitch black. It was kinda cool. But no A/C, no radio or TV (we were trying to find out what was going on!), no phones (but yes cellphones), no refridgerator (bye-bye milk), no computer.... Weird. Cool.

We had to leave at around 6:30, because we had [free] tickets to see Shakespeare in the Park. By then, the emergency lights in the stairwell had died. Not fun. So I ran back to my apt. and got a candle. Cooooool. Fuuuuun. It's amazing how much light a dinky little candle can provide. But then we discovered that no electricity meant no subways. Bleh. Hot outside. Walking several miles in hot, sticky weather is not fun.

You really don't realize how much our lives revolve around electricity until you don't have it anymore.

Fortunately, the power was back by around 9 PM.... 'Twelfth Night' is a very good play, btw.

Random FotR nitpick

I was thinking about LotR (big surprise), and this occurred to me for some reason. From the movie:

Sam in field: "If I take one more step, it will be the farthest from home I've ever been."
....The next hobbit scene, wherein Merry & Pippin knock Frodo & Sam over:
Sam in cornfield: "You've been into Farmer Maggot's crop!"

Hold on a second, there! Sam is now some distance farther from home than he's ever been. How does he know that this is Farmer Maggot's field? How does he even know who Farmer Maggot IS? He's NEVER BEEN HERE BEFORE.

The problem with adapting from book to movie...

And now for something completely different: hello, lush_rimbaud! Nice to have a RL friend on here.

Must get back to the Fic From Hell (TM) now....