I woke around 5 this morning to the sound of steady rain. A little while later, as I lay in bed, I heard a sudden popping sound outside. The transformer on the pole. I rolled over to look at the digital display on my radio, and it was dark.

I'd lost power again.

I called it in to the power company and spent the rest of the early a.m. formulating a plan should this outage last longer than a few hours. I found it too much of a pain to bring my food to multiple other locations, some not so close to home, and then have to retrieve it all later.

I had learned that just a single bag of ice could keep necessities cool enough for 24 hours when poured into the 2 refrigerator drawers. Plus in my cooler. That would be a heck of a lot easier than racing around town to friends' houses. Although the offer was made again to me.

Luckily, the neighborhood got power back in 2 hours.

I spent most of the morning at the computer. At 1 pm, it happened again. Pop! There goes the power! What' in tarnation is going on?

Power was restored a second time in about an hour. Gee whiz.

Nothing else terribly exciting to report, except that it's been raining steadily most of the day, and it's mighty cool. Chilly enough that I'm wearing my old blue sweatpants and a flannel shirt. Feels like fall!

Of course, now that I've formulated a plan to sell a chunk of mutual funds when they once more top the 12,000 mark, the Dow is refusing to cooperate. Another big plunge for the third consecutive day. Patience, Patient Saver. Your time will come.