Of interest to photo fiends: New York Newsday's gallery of blackout shots. When you're done with that, click over to The Payphone Project's terrific pic of New Yorkers waiting in line to use a Long Island City payphone during the outage.

Me, I'm fine. I was home when the lights went out (4:11 pm), so all I had to do was sit in the dark and sweat and drink copious amounts of water -- basically an average summer evening around here anyway.

Couldn't sleep much. Kept the radio on -- the announcers didn't have much to report on in the wee hours, but I was calmed somewhat by the repetitive hum of the headlines and bureaucratic speeches. Didn't want to blow out the candle I was using for nightlight. Only really got three hours of sleep. Had to go outside to stop myself from going stir-crazy.

It was beautiful in the pitch black around 2 am. My neighborhood gets pretty quiet once the businesses shut down and the professionals go home, and with the rubberneckers confined to the Promenade and the party animals quarantined on the Manhattan side of the bridge, I could actually hear cicadas and the rustling of leaves on my block. It would have been nice to fall asleep out there on the front steps, but Brooklyn Heights doesn't take kindly to vagrants.