Last Saturday our beloved Southern California Edison had scheduled some sort of maintenance stuff, and we had been notified that the power would be out some time between the hours of 7am and 3:30pm, by mail.  I wonder how many people in the neighborhood forgot about this and had friends or family over?  This timeframe was ok for me.  I didn’t have a whole lot going on, and whatever was urgent I finished on Friday.  My only commitment was to host my grandson, Evan, for an overnighter so his parents could have a “date night”.

 In a perfect world the power would have been off between 7am and 3:30pm, but in my world the power went out at about 11am, and didn’t come back on until almost 9pm!!!  The nerve. 

 I called my daughter to delay Evan’s arrival until 5pm or so.   Evan came over with the pepperoni pizza and bread sticks in hand, and I had a movie to watch.  At this point in the day the power was supposed to be back on at 6pm.  Of course I called to check on it.  My grandson was on his way over and I was the entertainment!   I figured no big deal, about 45 minutes with no power and then we could get on with our evening.  After Evan put the pizza in the kitchen and said his goodbyes to his Mom, he was investigating the house, the light switches, the tv. Walking around very inquisitively.

And this was his battery of questions-

So you mean the computer won’t turn on?

The light bulbs in the lights won’t turn on?

What about the plugs?  They still work don’t they.

Will the tv turn on how are we going to watch our movie??

And my response to each of these was “No Evan that needs electricity to work”.  It took him awhile to digest that information.

So, 6:15 rolls around, and still no power.  I called again to get a status and now the power won’t be back on until 9pm.  Yikes!  Not the evening I had planned.  Mini panic by Grandma at this time.

Now, Evan’s just a little scared because it’s getting dark, and our entire neighborhood is in the dark.  The street in front of our house is just pitch black.   I lit the fireplace in the living room, lit some candles, and we each had a flashlight.  At some point I had asked Evan if he wanted to go home, and he said, “Nope”.  Evan was too nervous to eat any pizza so he just snacked on the bread sticks.

 We played a short game of memory, and then Evan was looking around the living room and he says, “So this means I can’t play any video games, or watch tv right now”.  I replied, “You’ve got it!  This is a video/tv vacation”.  I’m thinking to myself maybe we should make this a regular thing.

Next I busted about my iPad.  I realize this contradicts my no electronics statement, but a Grandma’s got to go what a Grandma’s got to do.  I have some games on the iPad that Evan likes to play, plus it was well-lit.  We played checkers, tic-tac-toe, connect four, and then scrabble.  Evan’s really starting to get into the scrabble board.  He needs a little help, but enjoys putting the word puzzle together.

 Finally, the power came back on at about 9pm.  We scream Yahooeeeee, turn on the tv to watch the smurfs, make popcorn,  and eat some pizza.  TV/video vacation was over.

Isn’t it funny in this age of all things electronic that we just don’t take more time for some peace and quiet.  I think I have a new concept for overnighters at Grandma’s house.  A video vacation will be part of our new overnighter routine, and we’ll learn a new board game or card game, and read some extra stories together.

It doesn’t get any better than this.  Good night Evan.