On August 31 the I woke up to extreme heat and realized that the power went out at the apartment I live in. And like it usually does a few minutes later the generator kicked on so I went to flip the switch to generator power and got the AC running again. No big deal I have to reset a few clocks and stuff nothing major. I went to work the next morning and when I got back I was surprised to find the generator still running. This was strange since they normally the main CUC (Commonwealth Utilities Corporation) power is fixed by that point. But I went on with my night fixed dinner and eventually went to bed. The next day I discovered that a transformer had gone bad and it would need to be replaced. I assumed that they would rush order the transformer and install it as soon as possible to get electricity working for the people who live here. But you know what they say when you assume...
On I think it was Friday morning I went to talk to the maintenance guy about it and he handed me a paper with a schedule on it. When I first looked at the schedule I thought these must be the times they're offering counseling for the tenants who are having trouble with things that Donald Trump does or says. Then I realized wait a minute this isn't United States College campus, this is real life, this must be a schedule of when they're going to allow me to have electricity. My first thought was, "Okay the airport is only 20 minutes away, I can probably be on a plane with-in the hour." Then I thought you know this schedule isn't too crazy I can live with this most of the time I'm at work anyway it won't be that bad. And for a few days it was good, I had to be careful when I cooked and I had to deal with the room being a bit hotter when I slept but all in all not terrible.
A few days later things got worse when they decided to take hours away from the evening when people cook and relax and add them to the middle of the night when everyone is sleeping, granted it was nice to have the AC while I slept but the constant on off of the power woke me up so often I couldn't sleep much anyway. And I could forget about sleeping in. But I dealt with it and figured a few more days will be fine. That was over a week ago. That's when I really started to get frustrated. Not just me either, others who lived here too. And its not like we cant live without electricity. I love camping with no power and often think about life without it. But when everyone around you has it and you don't it is kinda like being extremely thirsty, just dying for a cup of anything wet, and there is a glass of water right next to you but you cant have it. It's just sitting there, beads of condensation rolling down the outside of the glass tempting you with every drop. But no matter what you cant have it. Lucky for me once the power was turned off I had a few "cap fulls" of the precious water, or in this case electricity. I had my batter backup UPS and could get about an hour of internet + gaming if I really wanted.
Anyway fast forward until several more days and we are at Monday. It's finally time to fix the transformer right? Wrong! Someone forgot to fill out the proper paperwork, I hope it wasn't the owner because they are spending a lot of money to run the generator. So they couldn't fix it on Monday we get it on Tuesday right? Wrong!! We got moved down the list. They came on Wednesday and told everyone that It was a four hour job, So lets give them an 8 hour day to fix it.. I'm sure you can guess where I'm going with this. Correct they did not finish, So they came in this morning to finish, still not done they had to work in the afternoon, and finally got the power back on.
Now I am very thankful to them for all their hard work on it and as a Maintenance person I can give them plenty of forgiveness for not fixing it in the four hours they quoted. Things happen. But what really got me is they didn't ever start work until close to 8 or 9 and they never worked from 12 -1 and they never stayed a second past 5. When that many people are out of power it seems to me like it would be a priority. And I got thinking to myself.. What kind of company operates like that. I mean PG&E from back in California, despite all the awful things I have said about them do a fantastic job of getting things done quickly and efficiently. I attributed it to "Island Time" but after some research I realized a key difference between PG&E and CUC. PG&E is privately owned and CUC is "government run". (however they are attempting to privatize, Good for them.) When a company is responsible to no one they have no motivation to finish things quickly. Now I know this a generalization and not all Government run things are run poorly. The US postal service does a fantastic job, (but seriously guys, I'm still waiting on my new projector.) But certainly in this case a little privatization would go a long way.
I am very thankful to all the hard work of the people who fixed the power for me and to the maintenance worker here at the building who turned on and off the generator for me. But that being said, Two weeks is ridiculous On the bright side of it, it did force me out of the house once in a while and go explore new places so I will count it as a half win. Anyway a few people have been asking me why I hadn't posted in a while and here is the answer, I wanted to wait until my power returned and its back now. Hopefully it will stay that way, knock on wood.
On I think it was Friday morning I went to talk to the maintenance guy about it and he handed me a paper with a schedule on it. When I first looked at the schedule I thought these must be the times they're offering counseling for the tenants who are having trouble with things that Donald Trump does or says. Then I realized wait a minute this isn't United States College campus, this is real life, this must be a schedule of when they're going to allow me to have electricity. My first thought was, "Okay the airport is only 20 minutes away, I can probably be on a plane with-in the hour." Then I thought you know this schedule isn't too crazy I can live with this most of the time I'm at work anyway it won't be that bad. And for a few days it was good, I had to be careful when I cooked and I had to deal with the room being a bit hotter when I slept but all in all not terrible.
A few days later things got worse when they decided to take hours away from the evening when people cook and relax and add them to the middle of the night when everyone is sleeping, granted it was nice to have the AC while I slept but the constant on off of the power woke me up so often I couldn't sleep much anyway. And I could forget about sleeping in. But I dealt with it and figured a few more days will be fine. That was over a week ago. That's when I really started to get frustrated. Not just me either, others who lived here too. And its not like we cant live without electricity. I love camping with no power and often think about life without it. But when everyone around you has it and you don't it is kinda like being extremely thirsty, just dying for a cup of anything wet, and there is a glass of water right next to you but you cant have it. It's just sitting there, beads of condensation rolling down the outside of the glass tempting you with every drop. But no matter what you cant have it. Lucky for me once the power was turned off I had a few "cap fulls" of the precious water, or in this case electricity. I had my batter backup UPS and could get about an hour of internet + gaming if I really wanted.
Anyway fast forward until several more days and we are at Monday. It's finally time to fix the transformer right? Wrong! Someone forgot to fill out the proper paperwork, I hope it wasn't the owner because they are spending a lot of money to run the generator. So they couldn't fix it on Monday we get it on Tuesday right? Wrong!! We got moved down the list. They came on Wednesday and told everyone that It was a four hour job, So lets give them an 8 hour day to fix it.. I'm sure you can guess where I'm going with this. Correct they did not finish, So they came in this morning to finish, still not done they had to work in the afternoon, and finally got the power back on.
Now I am very thankful to them for all their hard work on it and as a Maintenance person I can give them plenty of forgiveness for not fixing it in the four hours they quoted. Things happen. But what really got me is they didn't ever start work until close to 8 or 9 and they never worked from 12 -1 and they never stayed a second past 5. When that many people are out of power it seems to me like it would be a priority. And I got thinking to myself.. What kind of company operates like that. I mean PG&E from back in California, despite all the awful things I have said about them do a fantastic job of getting things done quickly and efficiently. I attributed it to "Island Time" but after some research I realized a key difference between PG&E and CUC. PG&E is privately owned and CUC is "government run". (however they are attempting to privatize, Good for them.) When a company is responsible to no one they have no motivation to finish things quickly. Now I know this a generalization and not all Government run things are run poorly. The US postal service does a fantastic job, (but seriously guys, I'm still waiting on my new projector.) But certainly in this case a little privatization would go a long way.
I am very thankful to all the hard work of the people who fixed the power for me and to the maintenance worker here at the building who turned on and off the generator for me. But that being said, Two weeks is ridiculous On the bright side of it, it did force me out of the house once in a while and go explore new places so I will count it as a half win. Anyway a few people have been asking me why I hadn't posted in a while and here is the answer, I wanted to wait until my power returned and its back now. Hopefully it will stay that way, knock on wood.
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