Last Monday the state of Kansas, as well as other states in the Midwest witnessed a horrific and devastating ice storm that left many people without power, water, and heat. What are now being coined as "Warming" or "Warm-up" stations, as well as other forms of relief, assisted those without power and saved many who would have lost their lives. Unfortunately, others were too stubborn or disillusioned to seek out help when they needed it, and as sympathetic as you will probably ever see me, I am sorry for those families who lost loved ones. A round of applause and thanks are due to those who ventured into the slick and unforgiving weather to raise fallen power lines, re-establish power to homes, and clear the streets of debris and tree limbs.
Interestingly enough, I spent my time in my cold, dormant home like a refugee, reading books and sleeping. If I wasn't doing those two things, I was calling and harassing Weststar. The first couple of calls I made were to an automated, downed-power lines call center, if that makes any sense. Basically, I would call in, and a pre-recorded message by a paid voice-actor would kick on informing me that Kansas was under a thick sheet of ice that knocked out most, if not all power in the hardest hit regions of the Midwest. No shit! I was asked to answer a few questions for Weststar Energy, such as, do I have a complete power-out, partial power-out, or downed wire. I would relay to them that I had complete power-out. Next, do I know the number to where the power outage occurred, and of course, I said, "Yes." Then, "What is the 10-digit phone number of the location of the power outage?" Answered. "Due to the ice storm, power has been knocked out in residential and rural areas of the state. Your power is expected to be on in...7-10 days..." First, I thought it was a little excessive to say my power would be out for a week-to-a-week and 3 days, considering, whenever I would go outside, there were no downed power lines or tree branches touching the power lines around my house. In fact, the only thing that killed our power was a faulty fuse in the transformer on the electricity pole. So, patiently, I would randomly call the electric company and go through the same questions asked before. On one occasion, I actually talked to a real person. She was from Wichita, an almost untouched part of Kansas; I'm even able to say that from actual experience of driving through Wichita - they hardly got any of the ice Hutchinson did. She had no idea what we were going through, and, from the tone in her voice, she cared very little about the ice storm damage in Hutchinson. She was just following orders. I told them the power lines were still up, no branches had snagged any of them; if a crew were to venture out to our neighborhood, it would literally take them only a few minutes to restore power. It didn't make any difference...
I suppose most of the crews out restoring power were sent to the worst areas of Hutchinson and surrounding towns and counties. However, if you are like me and don't have water supplied to you by the city of Hutchinson, you have to pump your own water from a well, and that pump runs off electricity. So not only did our home not have heating or lights and electrical appliances, we also didn't have running water...We had plenty of bottled water, but as far as showering or toilet, we were out. You would think Weststar or the city of Hutchinson in league with Weststar would have known this, and a crew would have been sent out to areas such as these, first. During the first 2-3 days, the ice was so bad in our neighborhood, even if we did decide to go to a shelter, we couldn't get there...Needless to say, my family was pissed.
It was Wednesday when I decided to call Weststar about 20 or so times a day, leaving a damage report each time. Whenever I was given the chance, I would speak to a representative of Weststar, in length and daily, to go off on them in a 5-sometimes 10-even 20-minute tangent on how fucked we were without power. These tangents consisted of me being pleasant the first few seconds of the filibuster, and then raising my voice and spewing inappropriate language the last few. Each speech was different in some way. One involved me stating that I was an African American, and that I could sue them all for racism. I remember shouting, "I guess since I'm a black man, I'm not getting power because you white devils would just love to hear on the news that another BLACK man was killed, this time from hypothermia!" I kind of miss fucking with those representatives because it was the only chance in such a trying time to be creative, other than linking up extension cables to my grandma's motorhome, jump-starting the generator on the motorhome, and using the power so my family could shower and what-not in our bathroom.
Before, I spoke of driving through Wichita, where most of the trees did not have ice on them like Hutchinson's trees and power lines did. I failed to mention that, on my way to Wichita - this was Thursday, I think - I drove through Yoder, and saw electrical crews restoring power to that town before they did my house, which is precisely one and a half miles outside the Hutchinson city limits. Like most of the Amish people around Yoder need power...
To tie up the loose ends to my rant about not having power at my own house, Weststar did eventually come out late Friday night, and they restored our power. It took them approximately fifteen minutes to do so, just as I knew it would, and upon asking one of the workers what was wrong, they told my dad, "Just a blown fuse on the transformer...." I FUCKING CALLED THAT! I knew that was what was wrong, yet it still took them four and a half days to come out and attempt it. Waiting four and a half days for them to fix a simple fuse is like being at a soup kitchen and stirring up the soup, repeating to all the starved individuals, "It's not right! It has to be warmer and sit awhile longer," then, after thirty minutes-to-an-hour of simmering, you would say, "Oh shit! Tis' too warm..." and then dump the whole batch of soup down a drain right in front of the homeless, repeating that procedure for four and a half days.
On to a completely unrelated topic, what the fuck is up with people and their names? As I've mentioned previously, I work in a computer lab at the public library in my hometown. For people to jump on a computer for use, they must first supply me with a name - it does not have to be their real name, I hardly ever ask for I.D., just as long as they have a name. Some people will come up and say, "My name is George Burrton (don't worry, this name has never appeared on our sign-up sheet that I know of) and I'd like a computer." I go to type in the name, and they stop me mid-sentence, stating, "Oh, you probably have me listed as Fred Burrton...didn't even think about that...." WHAT???? How is Fred and George anywhere close to the same name, and for that matter, why the fuck would you lie about your name? People are fucking paranoid anymore! Like the public library is going to sell your name! We're a fucking library! Lie to us because we are surely out to get you, not like the spam messages you get in your emails you click on because it says you have just won ten-thousand dollars! WHAT THE FUCK, people?! "Ah, my name is...Bryce Benson....oh, by the way, it might be Steven Lucia in you computer system...." Why would your name be different up in the lab, then it is on your library card - ah, because you have been caught doing bad things in other public places, and if we catch you, you don't want us to know your real name??? Yeah, you're getting a computer....FUCK NO! The funny thing is to ask their name, and for some people, it will take them a few seconds to recall their own name, much less the fake one they supply me with! You think you've fooled me? You think by saying, "Sorry, I kind of spaced out there for a moment..." has helped you out any? NO! If I am in the mood, which I rarely am, to accept your bullshit, I care less, and direct you to any computer you wish. Otherwise, I ask for a library card, and if you don't have that, I don't have a computer for you. ... "Yeah, my name is Blaine VanPelt....oh shit-the-bed! I bet you, in your system, you have me down as Michael VanPelt...sorry..." No, I have you down as fucktard, go back to whichever mental health facility you escaped from...
As far as a "system" goes, the computer lab doesn't have a database that looks up every one's name...well, I take that back...it does, but we don't use that to sign you in to use a computer. This is a computer lab in a fucking library...not the DMV....I have to type in your bullshit name over and over and over and over and over and over again in a god damn Excel spreadsheet...it's basically MS Word with gridlines....fucking morons...
