96 Hours In Review

• Lost power around 6:15 Friday morning. Ella freaked the hell out because her "mukic" was off (actually, the music wasn't playing at the time...but the fact that the stereo was off was sending her over the edge; now, though, their lullaby CD has to play on repeat all night long).
• After nearly two hours, the power was restored and all was right with the Muffins' world again and much peace ensued. J worked from home on Friday and the power stayed on.
• Saturday morning, my brother, P, who had been without power since 10 Thursday night, called and asked if we might be able to pick up some lamp oil if we were heading out. He also mentioned that he didn't have enough gas in his car to get anywhere and that all of the local gas stations weren't working. I decide to take it one step further and go in search of a gas, lamp oil and order some pizzas for my brother and his family. My sister, who is, shall we say, a very prepared person, happened to call me as we were out on our quest to find a gas can (since most of Concord wasn't hit as hard as other areas nearby, the big box stores were slammed with people looking for supplies) and told us to just go to her house to get the supplies P needed.
• I was deemed my nephew's "favorite person ever" (at least for the time being) upon delivery of supplies. I'm sure the pizza had nothing to do with it.
• Brother's power came back on within two hours of our expedition. Of course.
• Yesterday started off well, but then deteriorated. I was supposed to meet some friends for dinner, but one of those friends is still without power so we postponed our plans.
• I ended up napping while the kids took their nap and delayed my visit to the gym. All was still going well.
• Grocery shopping was next on the agenda and let me just say that Sunday night is a fabulously quiet time to get your grocery shopping done. At least, around here it is.
• I twisted my ankle in the meat department, while trying to get the largest turkey that I could find. That sucked.
• THEN, just as my boatload of groceries was being rung up, I looked in my bag to see that my wallet was not there. *gasp* Thinking that I'd left it in my gym bag, I tried to use the one credit card that was in my backup wallet (which is really only good for holding my checkbook) that I was pretty sure I had cancelled, but thought I'd try it anyway.
• Well...I wrote a check. Knowing that I didn't have my license on me, though, I anticipated this being a problem. I do, however, know my license number by heart and included that on the check. The cashier was skeptical about my confidence in recalling my license number and continually missed the first two numbers when entering it into the computer and insisted that it was invalid.
• After calling the manager over TWICE and a huge line forming behind me, the issue was cleared up, and I resumed my silent freakout about where the hell my wallet could be.
• I immediately call J and ask him to check my gym bag, and as I'm on the phone with him, two bags of groceries topple out of my cart and I run over a bag of chocolate chips and watch bottles of juice fly across the parking lot.
  
• A very sweet girl, thinking, I'm sure, that I was about to totally lose my nut, helped me gather my groceries and I called J back (whom I had unceremoniously hung up on when the food stuffs went flying) to see if he had located my wallet.
• He hadn't.
• I pulled over on Main St. and searched the van, finally locating the wayward wallet on the center console. My bag had fallen on the floor as I pulled into the grocery store and, apparently, my wallet had flown out as I picked it up from the floor.
• UGH!
• Get home. Put kids in bed. Unload the bazillion groceries. Clean kitchen. Finish Christmas cards. Sleep.
• Today was going swimmingly until we lost power again. Fortunately, Cait was here.
  
• No nap for the kids (because no "mukic" natch).
  
• No homemade spaghetti sauce made while the kids were supposed to be napping.
• Started to light candles and spent a couple of hours keeping kidlets away from the open flames.
• J gets home; power's still out.
• We decide to head out to dinner and wait to see if the power comes back on. I realize the entire time that we're still so much more fortunate than a lot of people in New Hampshire, but am getting a little concerned that we may need to head to Mom's for the night which pretty much guarantees no sleep for anyone and cranky kids and Mumma tomorrow while J gets to go to work.
• N calls to say that the power company told her that the power most likely won't be restored until morning and that we should "pack it in and head to Mom's."
• Dinner sucked, but the kids were pretty great at the restaurant, at least.
• We drove around and went to Sam's to kill time.
• J was periodically calling the house to see if the answering machine kicked in, thereby indicating that the power was back.
  
• It wasn't.
• And it wasn't.
• It was, however, very bizarre to see J so optimistic. He was convinced that the power would be back by 8 pm.
• We drive around to kill more time.
• More phone calls, no answering machine.
• Just as we decided to head home and light some candles and wait it out a bit, J calls the house one last time.
• And...the answering machine picks up!
• Now, we're happily watching the Survivor finale, the heat is cranking, the kids are sleeping comfortably as their music plays and all is once again right with the world.
• I can't believe how many people are still without power here and I fully recognize that our experience today was nothing in comparison to what they've been going through. My thoughts are with them certainly, but I'm ever so grateful that we're safe and warm and comfortable in our own home tonight.
• My ankle still hurts, though.