WELCOME BACK TO THE 21st CENTURY

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

    About 3:30 AM Monday Lana said it sounded like something fell over in the garage. I mumbled groggily about the cats and went back to sleep.  A few hours later I spotted this. What she heard falling was the power pole with PG&E, Charter and AT&T lines. 

      We were back in the old west and stranded. We were unable to leave our driveway, even on foot. The road was closed as well. 

    Some 12 hours later a PG&E crew that had been following the storm damage down the coast showed up and began the first step of liberation, cutting the lines across the drive and removing the downed pole. 

    The drama heightened. 

    Fortunately our gas fireplace and gas range permitted us some heat and the opportunity to prepare warm food as the power remained off into the night. We read by lantern. I dug out my shortwave radio that had been my steady companion on assignments when I was off the grid and in the wilderness or in areas of conflict.

    The already tired PG&E crew was surprised to learn a pole was down. Their assignment said lines in trees. None the less they labored on until 4:00 AM Tuesday and after about 24 hours we had a new pole and power again.

   But as one day lead to another and to another and to another we were without those essentials of life-the internet, cable tv and phones.  But the high drama continued

   The shot below is of one of my new heroes. Evan was the cable tech who put us back into modernity. He and a delightful local Charter employee Harmony are stars on this street. Neighbors compared notes as we chatted around our drive ways. Trying to speak to a human, let alone a local person over the course of 3 days gave us plenty to talk about. The tech calls were frequently frustrating, useless and it seems we never got a straight answer. When? That is all we wanted to know. Just give us an idea, a guesstimate, tell us something!  Instead we sometimes heard, "we have no report of an outage in your area," a not particularly soothing response, or "turn on your television and tell me what you see." What did they not understand about "my cable is in a mud puddle!?" To be sure there were a few helpful and sympathetic types, but it was not until I was able to speak with Harmony that we finally got straight and knowledgable answers.

   This adventure leaves me with a couple of new wonderments.

       As one of the Charter guys said of an AT&T man who was in the area-he's not a happy guy. Nor were the Charter guys who there a couple of days ago.  Cut lines like these are still

     stringing through the area. When the PG&E crews arrived a lot of lines got cut and tossed. So I wonder why there isn't some courtesy or first response protocol that would enable these utilities to watch out for each others back. Shouldn't/couldn't there be a kind of combined mutual protection? There's a lot of useless hardware, cable, lines and etc. Ever the Scot, I see this and calculate loss that translates as increased costs.

    Another wonderment is why can't businesses and utilities  respond with greater facility when it comes to keeping customers informed. PG&E has an exemplary service of texting or calling with frequent updates so even though you may be in the dark, you are not in the dark about where the recovery is. 

   So with lots of reading caught up on we can now rejoin the 21st Century just in time for the beginning of March Madness!

    See you down the trail.

AFTER THE WINDS

GETTING BACK INTO THE 21st CENTURY

 The moon was the brightest thing on Main Street last

night during what was supposed to be the annual

village "Hospitality Night."

 Revelers were either detoured by or working at

sites like this.

 No official count yet, but many trees were felled

by the highest winds in more than a decade. Some say

more trees than any time they can recall.

 This is a block from our home. The scene was repeated through out Cambria.

 I can't tell you how many times in the last day and half

that I've walked into a room and flipped the switch.

We are dependent on that convenience aren't we?

 I read by lantern light, we used the fireplace for 

heat and hoped the refrigerator would hold it's cold.

 All evening we waited to be surprised by the return of

of power.  But when it was time for the

festivities to begin on Main Street, we were all

in the dark.  Merchants provide treats and snacks as 

the locals stroll through the stores.  It is a village 

tradition to kick off the gift buying and party season.

 But the combination reunion, party, social event

was illuminated only by headlights.

 As always when there is a power outage,

there was one place, powered by their huge

emergency generator-The Main Street Grill.

 You've surmised where people headed.  It was said several

times last night, if we sit here long enough we'll see 

everyone in town.  That was almost a literal truth.

 TODAY, BACK UP IN THE AIR

 Some were lucky to get power last night, but many

woke without toasters, coffee makers, radio, TV

and the Internet. It was also chilly in unheated homes.

 These signs were all over the village.

Ice for powerless refrigerators was flying out of the Cookie Crock Supermarket.

 PG&E guys told me they had been at it 30 hours

non-stop and have a 4AM call to head to Santa Cruz

tomorrow. I'm not sure the overtime pay is enough. 

 These scenes will explain why I'm at Mike and Jacque Griffin's sending this post.  That stuff you see on the downed line is the Charter gear.  Looks like cable, phone and the Internet will down a while.  

Great idea of "bundling" the services eh? 

Wondering now why I bought it. 

 This is a bundle of another sort.

Once the PG&E crews depart, the Charter guys

will have to jump it.

 WE LOVE OUR TREES, BUT

 Cambria is one of only a handful of places in the world

where the Monterey Pine grows naturally. They are a

unique tree and as you can see very shallow rooted.

 It doesn't take much to send them over.

Cambria in the Pines is one of the historic names

for our village.  Our friend Robert quipped today

we should change it to Cambria in the Pains or the Monterey Pain tree.

After 30 hours the power came on at our home on the 

ridge.  Nice to have lights at the flip of a switch, 

heat, a washing machine.  And soon, I hope, Internet and 

cable.  Spoiled aren't we?

Oh, and if you are out this way, the Hospitality night

will apparently be re-staged as a Friday night

sigh of relief.  The historic winds are gone but

so are some of the trees.

See you down the trail.

THE CABLE & THE ROCK WITH ICING

SERVICE WITH A SMILE
You've read earlier laments about an
interruption in phone or computer service.
Interruption is truly disruption of 
the flow of a day.  We've had frequent
Charter outages over the last couple of weeks.
The quality of assistance of the voice at the other end of
my cell phone has ranged from belligerent and nearly hostile to truly compassionate, helpful and friendly.
Generally the tech or service assistant has 
been pretty good.  It is more helpful when the other 
person is in the US.  I'm not a xenophobe, but over the
years I've learned more good things happen when 
the service rep is in the states. Speaking to a 
fellow citizen does not guarantee better service,
but the odds are better and I can understand what they say.  During our last outage-this afternoon-the young male rep was very helpful, apologetic and explained the problem
was with a "node" in the office and he was surprised
by how frequently the problem has occurred.
He was a pro. 
 Companies make mistakes
when they don't train and insist that service and 
sales representatives put the customer first.
We may not always be right, but it doesn't hurt to 
train the staff to at least make us feel that way.
One of the absolute best at doing this is
 IN AND OUT Burgers. There you get quality 
service with a smile.  Today's Charter
rep also gets a star. It is our money we pay,
for service we expect, and when things go awry
it helps if the "help we call" seems to 
understand that equation.


A ROCK WITH TOPPING
Morro Rock, looking like cupcake maybe.

See you down the trail.