For similar reasons, we picked up a pack of battery powered lights for my husband's elderly grandmother. She stuck them in central places - and uses them for spot lights - so she doesn't need candles if the power goes. They get several hundred hours per set of batteries.

They make great stocking stuffers for the college student or elder housing denizen on your gift list.

With no power on Tufts campus most offices got to go home early! Other than Republican Congressmen and Evangelical preachers, what other institution can claim to have be brought to its knees by a Flaming Manhole?

when I was in high school, one of my teachers said she used candles to tell when she was done writing papers at Harvard. She would light a candle and start writing, and when the candle was gone, she would stop. So, it's not just Tufts students to worry about.

Of course, since the Internet was down due to the power outage -- and because most students (unlike myself) don't use Twitter, nobody really saw the message to which you refer.

However, during a power outage last year (that was localized to the Tufts campus), a text message alert sent to everyone said, in part, "pls do not use candles."