Perks of Living at Home, Part Two

My mother is a genius cook. My brother “Zed” calls her a culinary hacker, and indeed she is. She prepared several meals beforehand that could be either eaten cold or heated using a sternos set-up. She filled any and every bucket, bottle, jar or gallon trash can in the house and yard with water. Water for drinking, water for dishes, water for toilets, etc. We brought out the flashlights and brought up the batteries. We got an emergency radio/light/thing. We put boiling water in a thermos to stay warm for hot cocoa and tea. We brought out the camping percolator for coffee. We baked zucchini bread (which, by the way, finished baking in a hot oven about 40 minutes after the power had gone out), we made granola, we bought pop tarts! My dad strung a blue tarp from the roof to the ground taut, to try to direct shedding water away from our basement and foundation to prevent flooding downstairs. We brought out the giant cooler to store perishable but often used refrigerated items like 2% milk, salad, and  little balls of mozzarella cheese. Everyone started carrying their flashlights around, just in case (at least, I did). Not much besides prep and some rain was going on for a while…