When we arrived back in Leran after our quick jaunt along the Pyrenees, the power was off in the house. We puzzled over it for a bit and reset the switch on the breaker box. Our two young house guests, Jenny and Becky, were leaving after us, so we asked them to turn off the lights and lock the door when they left. We thought it odd that they would turn off the power, but maybe that's how Brits do it. It wasn't until several hours later that it occurred to us that "power off" would include the refrigerator/freezer. The chicken in the freezer was now thawed and ready to cook, but nothing else in the fridge had suffered too badly.
Later that day, Sally called and when Doug mentioned the power being off in the house, Sally cleared up the mystery by informing him about the tremendous lightning and thunderstorm on the night we left. That explained the breaker blowing and no one being here to reset it. Guess those Brits don't do things that differently after all.
The next morning, with so much moisture still on the ground and in the air, the evidence of some rather hard-working spiders were glistening in the sun. Their webs had probably been battered around during the storm, and they wasted no time resetting their nets.