Spring

The strangest thing is happening in Buffalo right now.  It is a bright, warmish day.  The snow is rapidly melting creating puddles and mini rivers in the streets.  It feels like spring!  Buffalo is weird and confusing.

I still have no electricity or heat.  Fortunately the mild temperatures have meant that my apartment is hovering around fifty degrees.  Fifty degrees is not comfortable, but it is also not deadly.  I can't imagine what this experience would be like if it were twenty degrees colder outside.  Yikes.

Last night Hamod had a party to keep all of his electrically-challenged friends warm.  It was great fun.  I have been referring to the people with electricity as "The Chosen Ones".  The Chosen Ones have been quite generous with us Shiverers. 

The nights have been pretty enjoyable.  We gather at the homes of The Chosen Ones to drink and hang out together.  The days are long and cold.  I have found it pretty much impossible to get anything done.  I am in the process of systematically annoying all of my friends by practicing in their otherwise peaceful homes.  (It is way to cold for practicing in my apartment.)  I would practice at the hall, but the hall is powerless too.  We had to cancel the English Horn audition that was scheduled for Monday and Tuesday.  It is a real bummer for the candidates who have spent a lot of money and time preparing for this audition. 

The time frame for getting power back has been extended to next weekend.  The damage to the electrical infrastructure of Buffalo is massive.  Thousands and thousands of power-lines are down.  The apartment that i live in has store fronts on the street level.  I'm hoping that because I live in a high traffic business area, I might get power sooner rather than later, but who knows.  Amazingly, I have been able to pluck a wireless signal out of the sky all weekend.  I am the only person I know with an internet connection.  Things aren't so bad when you can still blog.

The trees.  Sigh.  Yesterday I went out with the intention of taking tons of pictures, but I found the experience too depressing, so I stopped.  The damage to the trees of Buffalo can not be overstated.  The trees have been devastated.  All of them.  The city is uniformly wrecked.  It will take a hundred years for the trees to look again how they looked on Thursday.  I guess I should be grateful that there was not more loss of human life, or property damage, but somehow the injured trees are absolutely heartbreaking to me.  Street after street of huge and broken trees is making me very sad.

I will post more pictures of the tree carnage once I have a better internet connection and more hearty tolerance for my sense of fragility.

Comments

[Courtney]

If you want to come over here to practice, you can. It's pretty warm here and we have electricity and a wireless signal. You can even have yer own bathroom.

[Jennifer]

Doesn't it actually feel warmer outside than inside? Last night I walked to Cafe Aroma and felt warmer outside walking than in the house at 7:30 pm.

I took tons of pictures too, and just couldn't believe my eyes, so very sad.

[Ellie]

Aw, hang in there, sis. Sorry about your trees. At least it brings you all together. Make sure the english horn player gets another chance!

[pretty]

We didn't have power either yesterday, Kitty (because of the earthquake). I got a taste of what you've been experiencing, but I think being in Hawai'i makes it quite a bit more bearable. It thought of you though, girl. I can't believe you don't have power until the weekend. hang in there, sport.