Parts of Butel, Karpoš, Kisela Voda and Šuto Orizari go without electricity today because of planned work on the distribution grid. EVN says it's routine maintenance and an upgrade of the network, with the goal - to quote the standard phrasing - of "more stable supply in the future."

The schedule by district goes like this: in Butel and Karpoš the cut runs from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Kosturska and Tale Hristov Sloga streets, in Kisela Voda, specifically Dračevo, from 8:30 to 2:30 p.m. on part of Justinijan Prvi street, and in Šuto Orizari longest of all - from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Pelagonija, Brsačka Buna and Indira Gandi streets.

Power cuts are part of everyday life and rarely worth dramatizing. But one thing is worth noting: outages of seven or eight hours, like the one in Šuto Orizari, are no small matter for the households that end up without a fridge, without water if they rely on a pump, without the option of working from home. When maintaining the grid routinely takes half a workday with no power, the question is how "routine" that actually is - and how much it's a sign the network has long needed more than patching.