The Power went out!!!

so, like 2 hours ago our power flicked off, then back on...ummm, OOOooohhh-KAY
...then off, then on, then off, on, off, on...we started unplugging stuff so nothing would break!

Then off....and it stayed off. Well, if you've seen the weather at all, there are some crazy storms coming thru our state, it's been raining off and on for over 24hrs, everything is saturated, puddles all over my yard, it's more like a wet sponge actually...and we have a basement. For those of you w/o basements, they fill with water in conditions like these, unless you have a sump pump running every 15-20 minutes to drain your sump hole.

Well, sump pumps don't work without electricity...so I started to bail water. By flashlight. It was PITCH BLACK in our house.

Not knowing when the power would come back on, and full-well knowing that the last time our power went out, it was for a VERY long time.... my dear husband went off to the gas station (thank god they have generators and their pumps were still running!!!) for gas for our generator (thanks Papa John!!!)

I stayed home and continued to bail water. Probably upwards of 50 gallons, it was coming in just as fast as I could bail. By flashlight. It's still PITCH BLACK in our house. And since there is no bathroom or any other type of drain in our basement, when I say BAIL water, I also mean I carried it upstairs by the 5-gallon bucket to dump it in the kitchen sink. It was still POURING outside or I would have taken it out, but I didn't feel like being cold and wet.

We'd never even unpackaged the generator since we got it for Christmas, we were lucky last winter w/ no power outages. So, it doesn't have wheels or handles and the thing weighs like 80lbs....more when full of gas *snort* ...yes, we filled it first, and then moved it...we're idiots!

So I poured over the instruction manual by candle-light while my husband continued to bail...by flashlight. And after a very long time, we felt we were knowledgeable enough to start it up.

We got it running, then plugged in the sump pump...EUREKA, it worked! I swear it took 15 gallons of water out of the sump hole in 13 seconds....would have taken me another 10 minutes to bail it!

We high-fived and were so happy at our accomplishment when WWHHHHHHUUUUUUUUUPPP The power came back on. Go figure.