So Justin has this great theory of what caused The Ol' Electrical Fiasco of '03: it was the French, causing mass inconvenience.
I'm not sure I'm 100% behind this theory, instead, after a bat plunged toward the borrowed car I plunged through the darkness in back to NYC (after several Middling City gigs), I believe now that a bat chanced into a portion of the grid resulting in mayhem for many. The bat was a flutter of brown and highlights and it whacked the car above my head, loudly.
So I was at Parsons having a smoke with others, watching black smoke billow on the eastern horizon. It's a fire - or explosion - at the ConEd plant, someone offered.
I attempted to take the 6Train to Dorota's and Union Square station was about 150 degrees and half the lights were off, the other half were blinking discoically. Both 6s were sitting idly, forlornly. I walked down Broadway and all stores were dark, all ATMs were dark, all cell phones were not dark but useless.
No ice, no delis, no cabs, no streetlights, no elevators, no Starbucks, no buses, no trains, no city lights, no looting, no mayhem, no non-cash sales, no chance of quickly escaping the largest power outage in the history of America if you were in Manhattan. Until the next afternoon. At first I heard the rush of fountains nearby and I knew the power was on as I had wanted to sit by the fountains the night of the blackout and realized that fountains, although they're all elementally water, rely on another element - fire/electricity. So when the fountains came on the children danced and screeched and sporadic whoops of joy were heard on the streets.
I borrowed Erin's vehicle after arrangments via the spotty cell phone service and walked to Brooklyn/Park Slope to fetch the car.
As soon as I drove into New Jersey I realized a curious thing. The gas stations and pumps were operational, as were all the other electrical devices. Laura and my father, the two I called early on Friday following the 4PM darkening of Thursday, seemed to not realize the impact of the outage: But Katie Couric's on t.v., Laura said. A quote from my father: The media sure isn't playing up this whole outage thing (to paraphrase).
So the Wired Studio websites are on hiatus, Act of God Clause in full effect.
I am in NYC, I am at Parsons, I am thinking, I am writing, I am ending this post with love of change and Love.