Where Were You When the Lights Went Out?
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- Written by: Joanne Wallenstein
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After a spate of days of cool, dry, September sunshine, Westchester was hit with a scary storm on Tuesday evening. High winds and strong downpours had everyone fearing the worst. During one strong gust we heard a crack and something hit the roof. We peered outside into the darkness and eventually made out a big branch in the yard – but the branch had fallen in an open spot and the damage appeared to be minimal.
Our friends on Greenacres Avenue were not so fortunate. At 6:30 pm on Tuesday a large tree fell at the corner of Kingston and Greenacres Avenue and knocked out the power for a section of homes on the northern border of Greenacres. They spent their evening in the dark but their power was restored about four hours later and we all went to sleep thinking the worst was over.
Wednesday dawned cooler but bright and I hunkered down on the computer to make up for lost time. I was making good
Not so bad I thought – I assumed the outage would only last a few minutes while Con Edison made a quick fix. Quickly rearranging my day I decided to go out and shoot some photos. As I prepared to leave the house I glanced out the garage door – which was closed. Ugh! We have an automatic door and my husband said we had misplaced the key. With no electricity and without any other access to the garage, the cars were locked inside.
My options for the day were dwindling and by now an hour had passed with no sign of the power. I decided to take a walk to see if I could figure anything out – and after stopping a few joggers I found out that Con Edison was at work at Walworth and Fenimore Roads. I asked one of the men in the truck when the power would be restored and he was vague – mumbling something about later tonight. He also revealed that Con Edison had turned off the power for a portion of Greenacres and Fox Meadown in order to make a repair caused by a downed tree at Fenimore and Brite Avenue. The stoplights were out too – and police were stationed at every corner directing the snarled traffic to a detour as Fenimore Road was closed.
What happened to Con Edison’s robo-calls and the Village emergency system? I’ll never know as my phone line was out as well. I contacted both the police and the village and both said that the storm had affected very few customers. From what I saw, I was among more than a few who were inconvenienced. The power finally returned at 6:30 pm – an eight-hour outage without a word from the authorities. Hmmmmm.
In response to my inquiries I received this email from the Village this morning:
Because the storm did not cause a great deal of damages or outages, Con Edison did not assign a liaison to the Village to update us on the status of local power outages. Nevertheless, the Village was in contact with Con Ed and as of last night all of the power outages restored with the exception of a section of Greenacres, which is estimated to be restored by 11AM today. The best way to track where power outages are and estimated times for restoration is Con Edison’s website .
Scarsdale's Finbar Kantor Excels in Fiddle Competition
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Finbar Kantor, a junior at SHS placed third in the fiddle slow airs category at the All Ireland Fleadh held in Cavan Ireland in August, 2012. He played Where You at the Rock and The Sweet Irish Boy. Finbar, a Scarsdale High School junior, studies classical violin at Hoff Barthelson Music School and Irish fiddle with renowned Irish fiddler Brian Conway. Finbar plays weekly at Brian Conways traditional Irish session at Dunne's Pub in White Plains.
Over 700 Participate in JCC of Mid-Westchester Day of Chesed
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Over 700 people came to the JCC of Mid-Westchester in Scarsdale on Sunday, September 9th, to remember the tragedy of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States through volunteer work and helping those in need. This event, in honor of the federally recognized September 11th National Day of Service and Remembrance, commemorates the day by bringing the community together for a day of good deeds and charitable activities. The day was made possible by a grant from the Corporation for National and Community Service, as well as corporate sponsors Arizona Beverages, Houlihan Lawrence, Seasons and Staples.
The event, a Day of Chesed (kindness), Service and Remembrance, was hosted by the JCC of Mid-Westchester in Scarsdale in cooperation with UJA-Federation of New York and brought together participants of all ages from throughout the county to support myriad activities and programs benefitting 14 local agencies. These included:
- A formal program that honored the memory of all who lost their lives on 9/11. As part of the program, County Executive Rob Astorino addressed the audience, and the Solomon Schechter Westchester 8th Grade Girls A Capella Group sang “Hatikvah”, the Israeli national anthem, and “The Star Spangled Banner”.
- A blood drive for White Plains Hospital, resulting in over 40 pints of donated blood.
- An opportunity to register with the Gift of Life Bone Marrow Foundation, resulting in 18 new registrants.
- Packaging of Rosh Hashanah foods to be delivered through Bronx Jewish Community Council in cooperation with UJA-Federation of Westchester.
Cardmaking for overseas troops - Card-making and a collection of DVDs for overseas troops through Operation Support Our Troops.
- A clothes drive for Kid’s Kloset of Westchester Jewish Community Services that provides new and gently-used children's clothes and items to local families in need
- A toy collection by the Pinwheel Project, which supports hospitalized children and their families.
- A cereal drive for HOPE Community Services in New Rochelle.
- A pet adoption through PetRescue.
- A school supplies collection for Food Bank for Westchester.
- Hair donations for Locks of Love, supporting children with medical hair loss.
Over 140 teens participated in the Teen Tribute, a teen-specific approach to remembering and service which included making blankets for hospitalized children through the Pinwheel project, a car wash that raised $590 for Gift of Life, decorating over 200 cupcakes which were delivered to local fire and police stations, and making 50 lunches for HOPE Community Services. Other activities included creating a paper Caring Quilt that will be presented to a local hospital, a concert that brought children, teens and adults together for a performance by Rockmitzvah, a professional rock band, that included jamming with some of the teen volunteers, and a lemonade stand run by children that raised over $250 for Sunrise Day Camp, a UJA funded camp for pediatric cancer patients.
(Pictured at top:The teen car wash raised $590 to benefit Gift of Life Bone Marrow Foundation)
Meet theSkimm
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Have you ever found yourself in the middle of a dinner party when suddenly a topic comes up that sounds like gibberish? Or been so busy running around with the kids that you open the paper and haven't heard of anything on the front page? You know the gist of what's going in the world, but not enough to jump in to a conversation about it. Somewhere in your routine, time for reading the paper or watching the evening news disappeared and a quick online scan of the headlines only gets you so far.
Cue theSkimm , an online newsletter that simplifies the headlines for the woman who knows enough to know she needs more. Their concept is simple: they read, you Skimm. With daily fresh editorial content, theSkimm gives you what you need to know and why you need to know it. theSkimm is quickly becoming a morning addiction – what goes better with coffee than a morning Skimm?
The two girls behind theSkimm came from the news world and grew up more Morning Glory than The Social Network. It took them a lot of guts and white wine to make theSkimm a reality.
Founders Carly Zakin and Danielle Weisberg, are both in their 20s and hail from New York and Chicago. There’s a touch of romance to their business story as they met on a rainy day in Rome while studying abroad in college. They learned early on that you never know who you’ll meet, so always be friendly. They fell out of touch after that semester and reconnected years later while working in Washington, D.C. By that point, they were both professional storytellers, as producers for NBC News- working in breaking news, political news, and documentaries. After bonding as colleagues, friends, and then roommates, it didn’t take long for theSkimm to take shape.
theSkimm grew out of two basic things : 1) Zakin and Weisberg are news junkies who quickly learned that their career paths didn’t hold the same relevance in today’s digital environment. 2) They saw a market that wasn’t being served by traditional news outlets.
Since women are now leading men in degrees and paychecks and the newsletter’s founders wanted to provide an accessible and palatable way for busy women to get their news so they would feel confident leading in whatever situation – a date, a meeting, an interview, a dinner.
Whether you are a working women who is trying to balance your professional and social or a stay-at home mom, theSkimm breaks down the walls surrounding the institution of ‘news’ and invites any and all questions.
Sign up here to receive your daily Skimm
Airline Nightmare for Greenacres Residents
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No matter how many bad airline stories you have heard, this one will shock you. Longtime Greenacres residents Bill and Susan Liebman were vacationing with their family in California last week when they learned that Susan’s only brother had passed away in Detroit. They made arrangements with Delta Airlines to fly from LAX to Detroit, as Delta is the only airline that flies direct between those two cities. They inquired about using Delta’s bereavement fares, which are advertised as a 50% discount off the regular rates, reserved seats and thought they were set to attend the funeral. But this was not to be – due to the airlines incompetence, cold heartedness and benign neglect they never made it to Detroit.
Grief over their loss quickly turned to frustration and anger when they arrived at the airport for their flight, only to learn that due to an error by the reservation agent on the phone, they had been booked on an earlier flight that had already left. Furthermore, though there was another flight that night, the clerk would not allow them to board the plane While they made desperate appeals for help the plane left for Detroit without them –in spite of the fact that there were seats available. Stunned, they missed the funeral and had to watch a stream of the service on a laptop computer.
The Liebman’s daughter, Jessica, is the Managing Editor of the website Business Insider and wrote an account of her parent’s harrowing tale with Delta on the site.
She agreed to let us share it with you here.
