Arizona, your teenagers are assholes
October 6th, 2009 | by TJ |I was cooking dinner on Sunday night, and I was making three different things at once, and they were all going to be done AT THE SAME TIME. I feel like I really need to preface this story with that fact. My dinner-cooking goal was in reach and was heartlessly snatched away from me. I’m giving up. From this point on, I am microwaving one thing at a time, serving it, and microwaving another. How was your dinner roll? Good? Are you still hungry? Ok. I shall now make the green beans. Did you have enough green beans? Are you still hungry? Really think about it, because I am not getting up to make the chicken if you’re all full on bread and green beans. That is our new life.
Anyway, so I was cooking dinner on Sunday night and was just warming up the last dish while another had a couple of moments left in the oven and a third was resting for a minute, when all of a sudden the power went out.
Normally, Phil’s first priority in the power going out would likely be to fumble around for the flashlight, running into things until he found it, but knowing me, and knowing that I was standing next to a hot pot and a hot oven and a hot dish, his first order of business was “Stay there. Don’t move. Don’t move. DON’T MOVE. I will be right back,” and I stood in place while he ran upstairs to grab his iPhone, the Modern Choice for Lighting Your Way.
Once he started to light candles, I moved over to the sliding glass door at the back of the house to peer out, and, best as I could tell, we were the only house without power. Knowing that (well, being relatively certain, but now beginning to question the fact) we had paid the electric bill, this was pretty confusing, but there wasn’t that much time to think about it, since at right about that point, all of the smoke alarms which are wired into the security system started to go off, and I do not react well to loud, rhythmic noises, so once again Phil was off and triaging the situation, poking smoke alarm buttons all around the house.
Once the candles were lit and a flashlight was found and the smoke alarms debeepered, the power still hadn’t come back on, so Phil decided to check the breaker box. I went along, because up until that point, I didn’t even know where it was, and I figure that’s something I should probably be aware of.
Turns out, it’s outside. On the side of the house. And the door was swinging open, with the main breaker flipped.
Ok, setting aside the fact that, what the fuck Arizona, why are all your breaker boxes outside, it had obviously been done on purpose and Phil immediately started swinging the flashlight around while I tried to decide if the breaker was thrown so that an axe murderer could sneak into the house and I was better off outside, or if the breaker was thrown to cleverly LURE US TO OUR INEVITABLE AXEY DOOM and I should run INSIDE. Then I remembered the dog was inside, so I ran in to protect him (also, he has pointier teeth than I do).
Phil found nothing and the power was back on, so I finished up cooking dinner (the noodles were COLD) and we ate, and when we finished, Phil called the non-emergency police number, just to let them know what had happened in case there was some kind of rash of power-turning-offing in the neighborhood.
The rest of the night went on as usual, but come to find out later from someone on the Internets, opening breaker boxes and throwing the main breaker is kind of the Arizona teenager’s version of Ding Dong Ditch.
What the fuck, Arizona!
Instead of ringing the doorbell and running, teenagers turn off the main power to someone’s house. That is the most obnoxious thing I have ever heard in my life. They even call it “powerboxing.” Ringing someone’s doorbell and running is a dick thing to do, but cutting someone’s power?
Think of all the clocks we have to reset!
The improperly shut down computers!
What if I’d been carrying hot food and dropped it on myself or the dog?
What if we had someone in here on some kind of medical equipment?
Oh my god, you guys, WHAT IF WE HAD BEEN DVR’ing SOMETHING?
By Adlib on Oct 6, 2009
Oh man, I know about the cooking thing. I was have been so full of rage I couldn’t see straight. Wow. I wonder if there’s a way to cleverly rig the thing so you can catch them if there’s a next time.
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By Ebby on Oct 6, 2009
Okay, this is what you do. You put bear traps (the humane ones that just trap the leg so no one gets sued) all around the breaker box, so that if they try it again, SNAP! and maybe the little bastards will think twice next time.
Or rig a net to fall on them….or mouse traps. Or a net filled with mousetraps, or live mice…..or something.
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By john the diver on Oct 6, 2009
Hate to break it to you. It is not just Arizona. Here in California our breaker boxes are outside too. (I wonder if this is a “It doesn’t snow so put those bad boys outside” kind of thing) When I was a kid it was a pretty common thing for all the boys in the neighborhood to kill the power at who ever had a sister with a sleep over party going on. That way we got to comfort all the scared girls.
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By Steve on Oct 6, 2009
Aside from pranksters, it’s much safer for a power box to be outside of a place of residence, especially one with pets / children. There is a lot of voltage running through those babies. (The power boxes, not the children :-D)
With that being said, are you allowed to install a lock of some sort on the outer metal box? Some places have regulations on that. If you do, I recommend a combo-lock, keeping track of keys these days is a pain.
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By Steve on Oct 6, 2009
There I go again, giving advice where it isn’t asked for. :-p
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By Kusamoto on Oct 6, 2009
It’s even more irritating when it’s 110 outside and you have the a/c going full blast. In the time it takes to power back up and reset those 60′s-era central air behemoths, your house feels like Dante’s 3rd circle of Hell. We had kids in our neighborhood growing up in Tucson that would do that crap. My grandfather, who used to play football (back in the days of leather helmets) because he enjoyed hurting people legally, only had to catch one of them at it once. That was amusifying.
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By Kelly on Oct 6, 2009
Wow. Those Arizona teens totally SUCK. I will let my niece and nephew know that if they EVER do that as teens (or pre-teens or post-teens), I will fly out there and wup their little heinies. Of course, after my sister-in-law gets done with them, there may not be much left for me to wup. (And when I get around to moving out there, I will make sure to put a lock on my box.)
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By Pyewacket on Oct 6, 2009
It’s why you have to keep a lock on it. Mine is almost always locked unless we’re fiddling with the power for some reason.
This is the time of year they love to flip those switches.
By a small keyed lock – lock the box and put the key someplace where you’ll know it will always be.
Welcome to the great AZ :-P
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By Shawndra on Oct 6, 2009
WTF, TJ?!?! Don’t go giving these miscreants in California ideas. You know, some of them read the internet…
:P
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By Em on Oct 7, 2009
I’m in Florida, but I’ve often wondered if THIS would be the day that those punks flip our switch. So far, so good. They’d rather break into your car and steal an iPod, apparently.
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