Obviously, we take electricity for granted

August 28, 2012: After publishing my last entry yesterday, some more events were brought to my attention that I felt needed to be more thoroughly explained here.

During our brief, unintentional Amish morning, I realized just how much we take electricity for granted in this house. Until my epic rage, I had not put 2 and 2 together and acknowledged just how important it is to have electricity in order to make my daily coffee. Can you see me having the patience to boil water over an open campfire each morning so that I can get my addicted self some caffeine to fuel my day?? Well...it would suck, but in all honesty, I'd probably resort to that if I had to.

I also fully appreciate having a shower light now. Getting squeaky clean in the dark was not exactly the most enjoyable experience I've ever had.

I know my family members had a heck of a time coping without power yesterday as well. According to Maddie, her breakfast would have been much more creative if she had simply been able to use an electric kitchen appliance. That girl had a hankering for some really good grilled cheese but realized as she stared at the frying pans that she had no grilling power since the stove was not working. Her back up plan was some melted cheese on half a bagel. Too bad the microwave wasn't functioning either. Well, she was definitely a little pissed off by that point. Luckily, we still had some multi-grain cheerios for her to settle on. Even though the light in the fridge was out, she decided the milk was still cold enough for that. We're all just fortunate that the power wasn't out for any longer than it was.

Fully powered and coffee-capable, this morning was a lot better than yesterday's. Maddie ate a couple pieces of toast and peanut butter paired with a mars bar cupcake that she had made the day before. When mom discovered that these delicacies were just chilling in our fridge, the next thing out of her mouth was, "YOU MADE MARS BAR CUPCAKES???? Ooooh, that'll go good with my coffee." She then proceeded to walk away happily making "om nom nom" sounds.

Obviously feeling guilty about eating that much butter and sugar this early in the day, mom got up five minutes later to scrounge around in the fridge for some salad and tomato juice (with extra pepper). She was feeling better about her nutrition decisions for about three minutes until she made a gruesome discovery. Apparently, "finding an unknown brown and slimy object in your salad means you're done." Gross.

In other news, I've discovered where Maddie's natural cereal mixing abilities come from. Dad's logic with regards to his Shredded Wheat/Rice Krispies combination? "Rice Krispies are a good one to mix because they're tiny and they fall between the cracks of all the other cereal. Shredded Wheat doesn't taste like anything so you need to mix it with something else to force it down your throat." True words of wisdom from a guy who knows his cereal.

I wasn't very subtle about hiding the fact that I was typing his words as he was speaking because the next thing dad said was, "Why do I have a feeling this is all going to end up somewhere? It sucks living with a writer." Heh heh heh. 

I suppose I know where my yogurt addiction comes from after watching dad finish off his breakfast with some coffee flavoured greek yogurt. He did hesitate briefly at one point to say, "Do I want to know what these lumps in here are?" but it didn't deter him from just stirring a little more vigorously and powering through the rest of it. Suggesting at one point that I could have just eaten that type of yogurt yesterday to cure my no-caffeine rage, I replied that I probably would have had to eat 12 of those little cups to make any impact if they do indeed contain any caffeine. However, I don't exactly want to revisit that low point of my life...

Today, the sun is warm and the birds are chirping merrily. We have power and I have coffee. All is right in the world...at least until the universe decides it's time to prank me again.