The Blackout

The Blackout
Some of you may know while others may have no idea, but Monday night there was a blackout on Virginia Tech’s campus. Most students were not affected other than the internet or cable TV going down for a little bit, but some were affected greatly by this nuisance. The blackout hit around ten thirty p. m. and lasted into Tuesday morning until around one a. m. To some students this was a great burden because it hindered their ability to study for the exam they had the next day, but for others the blackout started a night of fun and festivities.
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10:30 p. m. ~ Blackout
I was sitting in my room watching my favorite show Scrubs on my lap top when all of a sudden everything in the room went black; the only visible objects in the room were two confused faces illuminated by the soft glow of the two laptops. Hoping it was just a temporary inconvenience we waiting for a couple minutes to see if the electricity would come back, nothing happened. I decided to attempt to make my way through the darkness to open the door to see if my room was the only unfortunate one. We were not alone as the whole hallway was pitch black and part of the quad. A couple minutes later the hallways emergency lights came on and everyone began to wander out of their rooms, wandering what had happened.
11:00 p. m. ~ Going Out
With nothing else to do my friends and I decide to take a trip to Deets to grab some drinks and pass the time, when we finished our drinks we headed back to the quad to see if there was any change. As we came down the stairs in front of D2 we still saw darkness. Amongst the darkness we also saw a blue flicker of light flying through the air. NIGHT ULITMATE FRISBEE!!! We knew what was going on as soon as we saw the blue flying disk. All six of us darted as fast as we could to join the game.
11:30 p. m. ~ Ultimate Frisbee and Volleyball
The game was riveting. The intenseness filled the air as the teams struggled for each point. In the end my team won five to three. After all of the hype from Ultimate Frisbee had died down, volleyball was the next game on the agenda. The first ball was hit. Bam!! Just after a short flight the ball smacks the kid next to me. Complete silence. The silence was soon after interrupted with a roar of laughter from the surrounding area. After about thirty minutes of failed attempts we decided to give it up.
12:30 a. m. ~ Cookout
After our activities for the night we realized all the food in our refrigerators was going be bad in the morning if the power company was still unable to fix the problem, so we had a cookout. We had hamburgers, hot dogs and chips. The RA’s felt so bad for practically stranding us outside; they brought everyone out half melted popsicles and mini bottles of warm water. Very nice of them I though. Not only was food brought out, but many of the residents in OSHAG brought out their guitars and an IHome was brought out to keep us entertained.
1:15 a. m. ~ Lights are back on
Like a flip of a switch our lights suddenly brightened our quad and everyone’s already smiling faces. Is it finally time to get to bed some asked? Maybe for some, but not all. Some went to bed as soon as possible, others continued to study for the dreaded chemistry exam they had later that day, others destined themselves to start a bonfire in the grill. I was not ready to throw the towel in on the night that I felt had just begun. We started the fire by gathering small twigs and dry leaves from the ground as kindling. Next we decided we needed the fire bigger, we went for the bottom branches on the dead tree outside of OSHAG. After we had burned all of them up we decided to go on a climb for some more and bigger branches. When we tossed the branches on the grill the flames began to rise to a couple feet. Soon after the blaze started rose we saw a figure making its way toward us. Seeing that it was our RA we jokingly asked if he had any marshmallows. He did not see as much humor in it as we did and informed us that we could get in trouble if anyone other than him had seen us. Soon after we put out the fire and went inside.
2:00 a. m. ~ Time to go inside
We finally went inside after the night of festivities and started to wind down. After a little bit of homework I finally went to bed only to wake up at noon the next day.
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This just goes to show that if you try a little to have fun in a bad situation something good can come out of it. We could have sat in our room and moped, but we decided to go out and make a very memorable night.