LIGHTS OUT!

PING! There was no warning. One minute the room was a bright and cheerful place and the next, a pitch black vacuum with danger at the door....

Power cut! Pitch dark inside and out. No lamplight, no moonlight and not even the orange glow that is always visible at night above the city's towering rooftops. Visions of mayhem flash through my mind. This is the city after all and anything could happen. The darkness is an impenetrable, muffling blanket and claustrophobia is closing in. Must find candles - and I am turning away to search for them, when a faint scratching sound at the window frame sends my heart leaping out of my chest! O.M.G., it is really happening - somebody is breaking in!

Police! I drop to my knees - though lord knows why - and scrabble about bumping into furniture till I find the phone. D*mn! Forgotten that installing one of those 'cut-price-all-in-one-computer-modem-telecom-packages' means that the phone becomes dependent on the national electricity grid! No prepaid left on the cell phone either. Nothing else for it then - the noises at the window are getting louder - have to escape out the back door and hide in the shed....

It takes an eternity, crawling about trying to find the back door and not give myself concussion, when suddenly - PING! - and there I am, highlighted in all my indignity, with the telly blaring again and the grill reheating the cauliflower cheese and the coffee machine burping out lukewarm sludge....
Grabbing a broom I charge back to discover the intruder half stuck in the open top window and protesting plaintively and loudly!
'MEEOUW! Let me the hell in!'
What the....? Oh for goodness sake it's only the cat - scared witless by the blackout. Sheepishly I haul her inside and treat her to rubbery, half melted cheese.

Flippin' electricity company. Electricity technology is all very well but it should do what it is supposed to do and not mess about after sundown, scaring decent folks and innocent animals half to death! It makes me wonder though.... This power cut lasted about half an hour. How would I have coped if it had gone on for a week? Don't even go there....