Loss of Power

Around 10 o'clock Friday night, a massive storm blew through the greater Washington, DC area.
I had already gone to bed and Ray had already curled up on his futon, but when I heard the wind start to blow, I got up and went back downstairs. We have enormous trees in the backyard, ones big enough to take out the entire upstairs, and when the wind blows hard, it gets a bit scary. I tried to convince Ray to come back downstairs with me but he wouldn't budge (until he realized I wasn't coming back up, then he wandered down and curled back up on the couch).
The minute I walked downstairs, the power went out. Gregg and I sat in the dark and watched the lightning show. We rarely have power outages, so both of us expected the power to kick back on pretty quickly. It didn't.
As soon as the wind died down, I went back to bed, but as the night wore on and the upstairs got hotter and hotter, I retired to the couch with Ray. It's long enough that I can stretch all the way out and still have enough room for a curled-up dog at my feet.
The next morning, we were up by 5:30. It was hot inside, but not nearly as hot as it was outside.
"I'm going to take Ray for a walk before it gets even hotter, " I said to Gregg.
"I'll join you," replied my lovely husband.
We headed out.
"It looks like there was a parade and everyone threw leaves instead of confetti," I said as we walked down the block.
The streets, sidewalks, and yards were littered with leaves and branches.
By the time we got home, Ray was done in. While I cleared the backyard of blind-dog booby-traps (small branches that trip him up and branches large enough to impale him), Ray took a nap in a cool spot against the foundation of the house.
For the rest of the day and most of the evening, Ray lay splayed out in the front hall, expending just enough energy to lick his hot spot.
That night, we all slept downstairs. Every once-in-awhile I would get up and go outside to see if it had cooled enough to open a window. Even though the air inside was hot and stagnant, it was still cooler than the air outside.  At 3:45 a.m, power returned to the house.
With the return of the A.C., Gregg has been reenergized. Ray and I however still think it's too hot to do anything.
So we're doing what Shel Silverstein talks about in the last stanza of his poem, It's Hot:
"I've tried with 'lectric fans, and pools and ice cream cones. I think I'll take my skin off and sit around in my bones."