No Power?

It is not unusual for Pepco to get called on the carpet for lousy service. Pepco is the electric company in this area. But I can't say that I can blame them alone for all power outages. Luckily in our neighborhood, all the wires are underground. It makes for a better "historically accurate" feel on Capitol Hill. So we don't have to worry about trees falling on wires and knocking out power- but that does not keep the neighbors here from leaving tall and overgorwn trees unattended so they can fall on their houses. We were regularly inconvenienced by power outages in Milwaukee...  it usually happened because a squirrel was chewing on the wrong thing, and because we had a lousy connection that affected just our block. We learned early on to keep the trees away from the house, and had them either cut down or regularly trimmed back. While in Alexandria the other day, it seemed obvious to me why the power goes out so much - there are so many trees hanging all over the wires. But the people who live there don't want them cut. So it's a lot easier to blame the power company than to take any responsibility for not so bright decisions. I wouldn't expect anyone here to get in front of the eight ball. For some reason, most people prefer to remain behind it.

Wires everywhere!