Without power, mobile phones couldn't be charged. Petrol pumps don't work. Food rots. Relying on generators, the hospital didn't have enough power to run air-conditioning. On top of the cuts, people were presenting with chest pains and some were beginning to show signs of heat exhaustion. The floors were slippery with moisture. We put water and NBNs underground, but not the considerably more dangerous power lines like the ones that continue to be down around Yeppoon 48 hours after Marcia cruised through. Granted, some of the lessons from Tracy have been learned. The new houses, built under stricter building codes, were fine – the odd tree not standing notwithstanding. After all, the wind was "only" 150 kmh. It was, unsurprisingly, the old houses that provided disaster fodder for the cameras. But power still ran on poles and the lines were down all over the place in numbers that meant speedy repair was impossible.

"They talk about gold-plating electricity," said my friend. "I wish they'd just copper-plate it underground." It's another reason, he said, for getting off the grid. The solar panels on his house came through the storm undamaged, despite being in an exposed position. If mains power is unreliable in cyclone country, why bother to have it? And if more people leave the grid, it will become more expensive to maintain for those remaining. And that in turn will mean it won't be maintained as well.

"Queenslanders are mad. We should be selling the poles and wires while there's still someone silly enough to buy them. It's a shrinking market," my friend said. It had been a long, very hot day. He had someone bringing generators from Mackay so he could open his surgery on the morrow to look after his patients. He'd like power underground in places that are likely to cop a cyclone. He's a good man, my friend, so I told him he'd gone soft, wanting air-conditioning. Probably part of what's gone wrong with the Reds. Harden up, son. You only had a kerosene lamp when you were growing up, didn't you? "Oh well," he said. The dogs are doing well out of it - they've scored all the meat in the freezers.