We're alive!
Power is on, probably temporarily, but we're charging stuff while the gittin' is good. Water came on this morning.
The power went out hard Monday morning 1:30am-ish. So all day Monday with no power in 20* temps, but we used the motorhome battery to power the furnace every few hours and ran the car to power our phones. Tuesday they decided to shut off the water. We use jug water anyway for drinking and had enough to last for days if we were careful, and when our 5 gal. toilet flushing water jug ran out Monello filled it up at the Laguna Madre and we had enough to share with neighbors.
What happened is that their wind turbines failed because of icing and cold. That put a load on the grid, which led to ERCOT (who is in the major doghouse right now) directing the power company to shut down electricity. Then it was determined that the water system was using too much energy, so they decided to shut that down as well.
The last two days there were long lines at the two gas stations that had power, and this morning they were all out of gas. Supposedly more is on the way.
We had a weather related death in the campground yesterday, no idea how many others locally or otherwise.
And guess what SPI local dorks were concerned with?
That's right, saving the turtles.
Not the people stranded with no water or electricity dealing with medical conditions, or the elderly, or those with infants and small children - turtles.
They turned the convention center, which could have been a shelter for humans, into a turtle rescue center. I'm not making that up.
Perhaps they did that to show solidarity with their kin because this emergency showed me without a doubt that liberal Democrats are post turtles. If you had one on your SHTF shortlist, take them off now because they're worthless in an emergency. They have screwed up priorities, they have no decision making skills, and they can't do anything for themselves. They are the ones who panic and wipe out the grocery stores instead of being prepared in the first place.
So anyway, hopefully the power will be on long enough to charge everything. Even more hopefully, it's on for good but I'm not counting on that.
I cannot stress this enough: when the weather is threatening, or better yet ALWAYS, have a full tank of gas in your car. Everything you need in an emergency boils down to having gas in your car. It can take you to find supplies, it can power your phone, it can take you out of the situation. If your car is out of gas, you are screwed.
