In these days of summer heat with air conditioning systems running full blast, we know there's a chance the power is going to go out. Some substation might blow, and a whole neighborhood loses power for hours.

"We must eat the ice cream to save it!"

And then a little bit later it all flickers back on again.

But what if we lost all communication devices? You still have your air conditioning. All electronic equipment works, but there's no phones. No TV. No Internet.

Suddenly we are small islands separated from each other because we don't, collectively, know what's going on a few blocks or thousands of miles away.

Last night, a little before five, the cable went out. And with cable going out, Internet, and in some cases, phones, went as well. It didn't come back until sometime between midnight and nine this morning.

I have no idea how big the outage was, just that my neighborhood lost it all. It was quiet. No one seemed to mind too much. Maybe they all have satellite TV.

I was going to watch part of the Royals game on WGN. I hadn't seen a Royals game since our free all baseball games all the time got switched off in mid-June. I didn't see them last night either (they lost, I discovered this morning). I took a nap instead.

The out and about activity for last night was going to a play. It had received a rather bad review in the Journal on Friday. There were four of us there to see it, but that wasn't enough for it to go up. The general rule of performance of any kind--rock bands have the same axiom--is always perform for more people than are doing the performing. Seven actors. Four patrons. No show.

I went home and watched a DVD, which doesn't require cable to view.

How long would a true communication outage take to start driving people crazy?

If phones, TV and Internet didn't work because all of the satellites were knocked out. It might not take too long.

Phones would be the first thing to freak people out. If their little handheld fetishes didn't show any bars, couldn't connect to anything, were only useful for inane apps of lame games? This would shake a lot of people in a short amount of time.

But how would you find out what was happening? No TV or Internet means there would be no ready explanation. And since everyone wants their information right when they want it, would people begin to wander around and wonder aloud about the gods of communication?

The biggest barrier to normalcy, however, would be this: you couldn't use credit or debit cards to buy things. You'd have to use cash. And ATMs wouldn't work, either, because they couldn't talk to the bank to confirm your balance and pin. You'd have to work with cash on hand.

Most stores would close because a lot of people don't carry cash anymore. Sports bars would be ghost towns without the TV screens showing whatever sports might be available. Rock bands, however, would probably still play.

Would we all trust that somehow, sometime, an explanation would reach us? How long would we wait? And how, if communications were never restored, would they (whoever they might be) tell us the answer?

Would there be police on blowhorns driving in the backs of tanks or SUVs telling everyone to remain calm?

Fifteen years ago, the effect would be less. Sure, TV would be out, but phones would still work because we'd all still have hard lines. And the Internet wasn't so integral to anyone's lives that we'd even miss it. Cash would be a bit of a problem, but less so.

The biggest question is this: would we learn how to communicate with each other again if we all had to talk face to face?

Matt Worley was mostly worried about seeing the World Cup final on Sunday than anything else.