Walk Along Old Dominion

Last week it was ugly out - a lot of rain and dreary. It was too wet to walk in the neighborhood park. But we also didn’t have our car for the week because it was getting repaired after being rear ended two weeks ago. So we didn’t want to drive a rental anywhere just to avoid any potential issues - especially in to DC where anything is possible. So we took a different route on our morning walk along Old Dominion Drive. We certainly have been that way many many times before but never walked there. Every time we do drive on it I noticed a pedestrian bridge that was recently updated last year. So we headed that way. Neither one of us liked walking along a busy and noisy street. But when we finally reached the area where the trail leads further from the main road was more interesting. We passed by the “river” and decided not to take the muddy path by it and kept on the main branch. We strolled by several homes with back yards fenced in - it’s the sort of community that was built all at the same time because the homes all looked the same with a mid century modern vibe. When we turned in to the subdivision cul de sac it looked very quaint. There were three homes with 2022 graduate signs in front. A brand new subdivision was being built with three huge homes in process. Then we turned back and in the end racked up a lot more footsteps than usual. It was an interesting trek but I prefer the park and the rides in to DC. But I’m glad we gave it a try. 

Power Outage - Again!

As we were drinking coffee and catching up on the news this morning there was a loud bang - and then the power went out. But the refrigerator was still on…. I wasn’t able to get through on the app because the internet wasn’t working, and I didn’t have the phone number to call Old Dominion power to report the outage. So we decided to go for our morning walk and see if the phone worked outside. And it did. So I got on the app and reported the outage and it said the cause was “pending investigation” and it should be corrected by five PM. Usually the cause is something a little more specific. We are getting familiar with this process because it has happened at least 5-6 times since we moved to northern Virginia. It was also one of the first questions I asked about the building. And the answer was we would have a building generator. The trouble is is that the building generator only supports the emergency building items like the elevator and hallway lights - not inside of the condo units. Luckily heat nor air conditioning is needed at this time and it was morning and daylight. We saw the power trucks parked around the very ugly power poles on our way back to the house. We ran in to another building resident and he said some of the units had lights while others didn’t; some had hot water and others didn’t, etc. Apparently everyone who needed to be contacted was and it was just a matter of time. So we took the car out for a short ride and on the way back we received a notice that the power was on followed by a phone call saying the same. The odd thing is that only one clock needs to be reset in the house. This was the strangest power outage. Why it only affected parts of the building will remain a mystery. All we know it was due to a “foreign object” - whatever that means.