Good evening. I seem to have been a little unaware that I had no previous post written and in the queue for Thursday, and noticed Thursday night. I would say it won’t happen again, but we both know it will. I’m only human.

The power is out on campus at the moment, and has been for the past 2 hours actually. Upon returning from retrieving some dinner for my roommate (the power went out whilst microwaving hers) and me attempting to use the backup lights in the hallways to get homework done, I figured I would blog.

Electricity is truly something we take for granted. It is always working and always there for us, but suddenly gone in the blink of an eye. I never realized how truly dependent we are on electricity. I say as I type on my laptop, which has a mere 47% battery left and no word on when the power will be back on.

After the power flickering on and off multiple times, and it not returning on after it had left the final time, my roommate and I peeked into the hallways to see that the backup hallways lights illuminated the otherwise dim building. Screams were heard outside of our building and inside as well. I heard many things but the most prevalent ones were “HOW WILL I CHARGE MY PHONE” and “I HAVE AN ESSAY DUE AT MIDNIGHT,” an essay that I will presume they have yet to even start or simply look at what it is on. This got me thinking.

We use electricity for virtually everything. From cooking dinner, lighting our houses (or dorms) to using our phones and computers. The human race is ever so dependent on electricity. And the fact that people were more concerned with how they would charge their phones rather than “will my food in my fridge last until the morning” or how will I be able to get filtered water if the filter isn’t working properly.

My roommate was livid. She’s from a decently wealthy background and couldn’t understand why this school, where she lives, isn’t equipped with the finest backup generators that California can provide. She couldn’t wait a mere 30 minutes to see if the power was back on before ordering about $20.00 worth of food from a vegan restaurant about 20 minutes away from campus. She had me accompany her to pick up her food, driving slowly enough so that her phone would charge above the 60% that she had upon leaving the dorm.

Personally I didn’t care. Honestly, yeah it would be great if my phone was charged and I could bring it to the gym in the morning to listen to my music, however the gym does have a pretty decent playlist so not having my phone wouldn’t be the end of the world. Honestly my number one concern was whether or not the gym would have power in the morning and if the showers would have hot water, post gym trip. It seems as if I was the only one concerned with these things. Things to keep me clean, healthy, and safe. Rather than my roommate and many others who actually had the audacity to ask if we were able to use the elevators and if they were working or not. I live on the 4th floor of my building and the trek of 3 flights of stairs for one night will not kill you. I made that ‘journey’ multiple times every day. Thank you fitbit for motivating me to go 10 flights of stairs everyday.

It’s funny too, how people were turning their laptops on, to see if the wifi was working, much to  their dismay, it wasn’t. So, instead of just being content with no electricity and technology for a few hours, they logged onto their iTunes accounts to watch whatever movie they had downloaded when they were younger or to see if they had something to watch on their phones, while turning low power mode on just in case the power wasn’t on in the next 3 hours.

I do agree that electricity and technology have their benefits- weather, news, traffic, light, microwaves and fridges, etc. However, if I had to pinpoint the fall of humanity, the answer would also lie in technology. I’ll discuss that in another post.

For now, based upon the light that just flickered on above my head, and the jumping and screaming for joy heard outside my window, the electricity crisis of 2016 has come to an end and the San Diego State community will finally be able to continue on with their lives just as if the power outage had never happened

Talk to you all tomorrow (hopefully)
Alicia