As it turns out, the outage wasn’t just our building. When Bella and I got outside, you can see little clusters of people out on the sidewalks, obviously office workers from the nearby buildings. I looked up and down one of the major streets and at least 4 intersections were without functioning traffic lights, at least in the north-to-south direction. We walked a little further southeast and took an east-to-west glance and the outage went another 4 blocks. Being lunchtime, the sidewalks were slowly filling up with people, more so than usual. You could hear police and firetruck sirens, impatient car honking, and even helicopters! Probably just news crews, but all the noise, you’d think people were looting or something. If it weren’t so hot and humid outside, Bella and I would’ve just hung out in the shade somewhere. But, of course, all the good spots were already taken. We came home instead. Took a deep breath and marched back up to our 4th floor condo. We even ran into two guys moving out, carrying a mattress down the stairwell. “So, it’s just had to be today, huh?” I joked to one of them. As Bella and I squeezed passed them, I added, “At least you’re going down and not up.” “Yeah, thank God.”

It’s amazing how things come to a halt when the power goes out. Without lighting or access to computers, several businesses are forced to stop, although the restaurant patios filled up quickly. Once we got back inside, I got caught wondering what to do in the meantime. No power. No internet access. No TV. Can’t surf. Can’t play World of Warcraft. Can’t watch TV. I thought about playing a game on my iPod Touch, but the games I’m into right now all require wi-fi access. I’m really surprised at how bothered I am that I can’t tweet about what’s happening.

So before I forget this little moment in time, I opted to write my thoughts out offline and upload as soon as the power’s back. Now let’s see how far I can get on this laptop’s 79% battery power.

(UPDATE: Power came back on at 1:03pm.)