OT: Where were you 19 years ago today?

I was either in Atlanta or in Chicago with my fiancee (now wife) celebrating her birthday and planning our wedding. 

I remember getting stuck with a buddy away from home because we ran out of gas and none of the stations nearby could sell us any. His dad had to come bail us out. 

Just moved into an apartment and was getting ready to go to work and all the power went out. My first thought was the electrical wasn’t transferred to my name or something. 
 

I was a student at the time, working at UPS, and unfortunately they had generators so we ended up starting late rather than getting to go home.

I was in Madison; we didn't lose power.

When I moved to Toronto, there used to be a mural honoring the blackout on a building not too far from where I am now. It's been painted over since then.

I was completing the third leg of a business trip that took me to Fort Meyers, FL and to Dayton, OH. Was driving from Dayton, OH to Flint, MI with two coworkers who I had meet up with in Dayton. Started hearing about the blackout on the radio. We were still not in the area of the blackout but Flint was in the blackout area. My first thought was to hurry up and get home. One of my coworkers had a much better idea. Pull over and get gas and food before we do hit the blackout area. We stopped and had a leisurely meal before continuing on to home and the blackout. 

I was just over a year into my time in the Army and getting ready to go to Iraq on my first and only deployment. I was stationed in Hawaii so fortunately and unfortunately we didn't lose power but I remember talking to family back in Michigan about it.

Not sure about the exact date but i was beginning my second year of grad school at UC Berkeley, which mean i was probably stressing over which lab to join for the next 4 years.

Glad I didn't join Jim Allison's lab, because he soon left for Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (2004) then to MD Anderson Cancer Center at University of Texas (2012). He did win a Nobel Prize so good for him.

As I was in Cali, there was no great blackout. Just numerous rolling brownouts but those always happened.

Like many NY'ers, the relief it was not a terrorist attack, made it all pretty nice. I worked downtown, so headed across the Brooklyn Bridge. It was a sight to see. So many people, so it was slow going and it was hot. 

Once in Brooklyn Heights, people were hanging out at cafes, the convenience stores were giving away their frozen treats. I heard other areas had lots of live music, bands just going outside and playing. I walked home, chatted it up with my landlord as best I could (she spoke about 5 words in English, and the rest was Italian). I grabbed my bike and rode around enjoying the calmness you sometimes only get on major holiday weekends. 

I think it would be nice to have an anniversary celebration, and shut off a lot of things in the city (not elevators of course). I actually worked on a design proposal for a fully low income building near the world trade center and one of the things I wanted to reinforce is accessibility. So we included ramps up to the 5th floor, as well as communal farms (and some communal living) inside the tower.

Afghanistan.  Never heard of the blackout.  My wife and kids were in North Carolina, so they must have been ok, since again, I never heard of it.

I had just finished working a summer job in Ann Arbor and headed back home to IL for a few weeks of R&R before UM started school up again in the fall.  My parents' place was just outside of where the grid blackout ended, so we had power at home the entire time.  I came back to Ann Arbor a few weeks later and heard all the stories from friends.

At the time, I was living and working in Chicago, and I have absolutely no memory of this event.  Are there other Chicagoans At The Time out there that can confirm we weren't impacted?

I was here in Kansas and we did not lose power. 

In the hospital watching my wife give birth to my sweet baby girl!  She turns 19 today and drop her off at Appalachian State Wednesday. 

I was at my girlfriend's house in Canton when the power went out.  Had to drive back to Commerce Twp, so I sat on Haggerty for almost 2 hours.  

The craziest is I flew out the next morning.  Cars were all over the side of the freeway, and lines for security were wrapped around multiple times. 

I did not lose power. I vaguely recall the news stories and thinking "how third world", but I have no specific memory of what I was doing otherwise on that day. It was just another day in summer 2003.

I was living in NYC but happened to be on a 2 month secondment in Asia.

Coincidentally I was in Hong Kong, immediately after SARS. So I just missed SARS and then by going to HK just missed the blackout in NYC.

Waiting for MGoBlog to start 

I was 2nd month on the job after graduation.  I was working on the west coast and read about the outrageous online, but since we had power, it was hard to imagine the scale/impact of it.