Power out

Yesterday Jimmi and I were perfectly rested in our sofa, watching soccer on TV – first a cup game between the local heroes, OB (short for Odense Boldklub), and Broendby, and then F.C. Zulu (a soccer team created by the Danish TV station TV2 Zulu, constituting a bunch of guys who have never played soccer, or any other sports for that matter, before being enrolled in this project, where a former top-player has been their coach :-)) and their Spanish equivalents, with the Danish team targeting revenge for our real national team’s loss of a game to Spain at the World Cup back in 1986. Check out some pictures of the Zulu-boys here.

Watching the Zulu-boys play is always amusing, but yesterday the entertainment was abruptly interrupted: At 9:05 PM there was a complete power out in our area! The whole neighborhood was dark, although we didn’t realize that at first. We thought that maybe it was just our own cut-out relay playing tricks with us, but after having groped for a flash light in the dark, we could see this was not the case, so we looked out the window and couldn’t see any lights around our house either. We then had to find some matches and candles – this was actually very cozy :-)

As today apparently is officially D-blog day, you may wonder what this episode has to do with diabetes. Last night, when we were done lighting candles, Jimmi asked: “What do we do now? I want to take a shower and go to bed with a book. Only, I will not have enough light to read by in my bed”. His question made me think about how dependent our daily living and activities are on electrical equipment (TV, computers, powerful light to read and work in, freezers and fridges, etc.). We don’t think much of these facilities until we aren’t able to use them. On the other hand, it is commendable that at least the stuff needed to manage the D on a daily basis (meters, pumps, pens/syringes etc.), if anything, are battery-driven. We do not live in an area where natural calamities may cause power outs and/or other emergency situations very often, thus we have never really thought about having a plan for such situations. We usually have matches and candles (although mostly tea-light candles with a limitted number of burning hours) on stock, but batteries for flash lights and bike lamps are not something we always have in the house, because we primarily use rechargeable batteries for these devices – and once they are flat, they need electricity and a couple of hours to get back to work :-) I don’t even have an emergency kit of supplies and other D-related stuff packed for me to quickly grab if we for some reason or another would have to evacuate our home someday (luckily, I think chances are very slim that this scenario should ever arise). Anyway, I guess I actually ought to have such a kit, regardless.

Power came back on at 9:37 PM yesterday, so it wasn’t that long we were without power. Despite the cozy atmosphere created by the lit candles, I actually appreciated being able to test and treat that bed-time hypoglycemia (2.0 [36]) having sneaked up on me, without having to carry a torch around the kitchen to find the needed snacks in the fridge and cupboards. Although, maybe being a bit inconvenient, a torch-search for food might actually keep one from returning to the cupboards and fridge, over-treating the low? ;-)