This weekend the transformer for our road blew, and we were temporarily without power. My elderly neighbor, *Elaine*, drove to our house to see if I'd called the power company yet. (I had.) She asked would I please call them (she was too flustered to find the right number) and ask if they could hurry, because her husband, *Joe*, had been put on oxygen last week, and was having to use his emergency tank... and was having trouble breathing in the heat. (He's a very sick man, but this is a brand new development.)

When I called back the power company, asking if they could put us at top priority, since there was an elderly person at risk, they basically told me that "I hate to be cold-hearted, but those folks need to be prepared for things like that. There isn't anything I can do. They should have expected this might happen."

So... I asked this person... "Are you saying that elderly people with life-threatening illnesses don't get top priority? Is this what they can expect during Y2K?"

They answered, "Well, uh... oh, no... I mean... I'll call the dispatcher right away and see if they can speed things up."

Keep an eye out for your elderly neighbors... sounds like they're in for a rough ride.

georgia peach

(To make matters worse, the men that were sent out may have ended up setting the pasture on fire... with things as dry as they are here, it wouldn't have taken long to reach our house. Luckily, the phones were working, to call the rural fire department. The area near the transformer mysteriously caught fire and burnt up an acre or so of land.)

-- georgia peach (the.patch@worldnet.att.net), September 13, 1999

Answers

Peach, you are a peach!

-- Mumsie (Shezdremn@aol.com), September 13, 1999.

Georgia, the elderly will most certainly be in grave danger should the power go out for any extended length of time in January.

We've concluded that, whatever idiocy, myopic tunnel selfish laziness contributed to the Y2K catatonicastrophy, NOW it has become a .system conscious Cull Opportunity. Big fast way to eliminate all that enormous drain of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, etc.

Entitlement Coffers to Coffins. Koffinsky in charge. Let's reinvent Government!

Stocking streamlined shrouds ... think they've gotten that far, the .gov .system .biz .establishment with quick nitty-gritty-grungy for-real COVER-UPS, contingency plans "final solutionized?" Got grave diggers? Got enough crematoriums?

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 13, 1999.

Cascadians...

Hey... that's yucky! But seriously, I'm glad my neighbors GI... they sort of freaked out when they heard about y2k... this may have actually done them a service, in that they'll really want to be even more prepared. Atleast, I hope so.

georgia peach

-- georgia peach (the.patch@worldnet.att.net), September 13, 1999.

Don't have gravediggers here. We have meat bees! I have lived here for almost 50 years and have never seen them as bad as they are this year. (Northern California-Sierra Nevada) Is God preping by sending in His own little cleanup army? Those little suckers bite and I'm not even dead yet.

-- Sharon L (sharonl@volcano.net), September 13, 1999.

Georgia, you can help your neighbors. Hopeful scenario: Buy them cans of Progresso soup at a discount-type outlet, bring them the receipt; they'll be happy to reimburse.

We're helping an elderly couple, both 85, stock up. They have a chance because their son lives nearby. But it will be very difficult; they're barely able to get by now with everything purrrrfect. When ppl start getting near 90 fragility becomes more pronounced. And all the meds -- 80% of raw materials come from overseas ... health care industry behind ... trying to help but not scare.

Praying for less than a BITR.

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 13, 1999.

Been a GI since '97. Mother-in-law moved in months back. She uses oxygen due to her empha..., empha...bad lungs. I'm embarrassed to say that it was only in a discussion with my wife LAST NIGHT that I realized that we would face some very tricky choices in the event of serious power loss:

1. Spend ALOT of money on spare tanks not knowing her life expectancy and the y2k outcome.

2. Using the generator to run her oxygen tank, in turn, risking running out of gas (300 gallons) a whole lot faster than I had been calculating. (I plan on using the generator to use the newly- retrofitted well pump for the bulk of our water needs.)

3. I can tell you that I would hate to risk the rest of the family's well-being, while at the same time risking her dying a day before the power turned back on. As Diane often says, [sigh].

-- Dave (aaa@aaa.com), September 13, 1999.

Peach,

Just a quick note to share that when a transformer "blows" there is a likelihood of it causing a fire in surrounding grass/trees - so it may have started something smoldering which flared up later in the day/night. They really are explosive sometimes when they blow. Good luck and good for you for thinking about your neighbors!

-- Kristi (securxsys@cs.com), September 13, 1999.

Dave, Set up a Generator/Deep Cycle Batery/Inverter system to power the O2 pump.

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), September 13, 1999.

I am a Registered Nurse for 10 years who does Home Care for Adults and Children. I've worked with people on respirators and O2 dependent. From what I know, anyone who is on a respirator and/or Oxygen is allowed to call the Utility Company and request to be put on a top priority list for any outages in the future. If they can do this, they will (hopefully). I would recommend anyone who knows someone in this circumstance to have them call their power company or you can do it for them. I'm not saying this will help in a Y2K situation where the power goes Kaput, but at least this is worth a try for any power disruptions now and hopefully later.

-- Debi (LongTimeLurker@shy.com), September 13, 1999.

The small and slow are always at greatest risk when there is a stampede. Always has been; probably always will be. (Don't shoot me, I'm a messenger, not the cause.)

www.y2ksafeminnesota.com

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), September 13, 1999.