We are nowhere close to being accomplished pros at this streaming thing, but we've managed to create, what we believe, a decent product. There are technical issues in virtually every episode. Despite the snags, we still do it. It hasn't even been a full year and we are still plodding along and making it happen. Last week, marked the end of the streak. 

Steve was ready well ahead of time. This was rare for a Thursday episode. All of the media was ready and cued up. The lighting was all set. He even had time to do some casual web surfing. Melon joined in and that was when the first technical issue popped up. He could not hear Steve. 

After a couple restarts of the software, Steve discovered a conflict. An update made only a couple days before has seriously fouled up the audio settings. It was quickly with over 30 minutes to go before we went live. 

During all of this, the storm was ramping up in severity. There was a fleeting moment when Steve thought, the last time we had a heavy storm like this, my car was struck by lightning and eventually totalled. I'd be so screwed if that happened now.

Erock texted that his internet had gone out. His service was always tenuous at best. We've had to do the show without Erock before. Not optimal, but doable. 

"Yay!," said Steve, "I fixed it! You can hear me, Melon! It was a software-" 

CRACK!! K-ZEEERRRRT!

Silence.

After a mad dash checking breakers and surveying the property Steve knew then that the stream was not going to happen. A fourteen inch diameter, thirty foot long branch had broken off the tree in Steve's backyard right next to the power pole. Not only did it yank the power line to Steve's house from the pole, but to the neighbor's house too. It had broken off several other branches of the neighbor's tree and squashed their garden shed. 

Steve's power was out for 48 hours. Four men, four trucks and forty-five minutes later the power was restored at 6:45 pm on Saturday. We had enough time to do our feature moovy stream, but the rest of the gang had already made other plans and Steve just wanted to soak up some air conditioning for a while.

The gang is back up and going strong. The gang has decided the break was refreshing. We may end up taking a short break from streaming once in a while. We'll see.