I should know better

Another power cut. Only four hours this time, and I am well used to them – I can easily lay my hand on the candles, the emergency light, the oil lamps and the Faraday torch..

They go with the territory. My power comes in like my phone – on wires strung on rickety, leaning old poles that lurch in a drunkard`s walk through the wood. I know better than to rely on it

The worst outage I can remember lasted five days. An enterprising criminal – a bright spark, even – had dressed up as a power worker and stripped all the copper wire from half a mile of poles at the far end of the line. I was still working then, and was phoned frequently at work by the foreman of the repair team with progress reports. This didn`t go down too well, so, to impress my colleagues with the severity of my plight, I decided to put the next call on the speakerphone.

The foreman was apoplectic.

“The work has collapsed!” he screamed.

I was at a loss. Had the power company gone belly up?

It turned out that when they had laboriously strung up the half mile of new copper wire and then tried to tension it, the whole line of wormeaten tipsy poles had gone down like dominoes iin a cloud of dust.

The man was beside himself.

“If I could just lay my hands on the wee bastard who stole the wire!” he bellowed to the fascinated audience of my colleagues gathered round the speakerphone. “The last one who tried that got himself fried on the power lines and I was the one who had to go up and chip off the charred bits – and , know what? – I enjoyed it! He got what was coming to him! I wish I`d found this one fried onto the line!”.

There are ways to make an impression at work. As I looked round at the pale horrified faces I realised that being publicly phoned by a raging psychopath probably wasn`t the best to choose. The room emptied quickly, andd I was left alone with the tinny ravings from the phone.

I refuse to sum this up with any comments such as “electrifying experience”……….

Electrifrying, maybe……..