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There It Is

Texas Again...

Some Texans say they're getting massive electric bills following the winter storm that caused chaos throughout the state this past week.

NBC News reports that some Texans are getting bills as high as $10,000, while local ABC News affiliate WFAA in Dallas says one man's bill shows him owing more than $17,000. That's per month. How does anybody pay those kinds of rates? My bill this month was $65.15 - glad I live in the frigid Pacific Northwest - and in a three-bedroom home!

Rio told NBC News that the bill for his two-bedroom home is usually between $125 to $150 a month, but this month his bill exceeded $3,000. Rio claims the house, which is empty and for sale, only ran the heater at 60 degrees to prevent pipes from freezing, but that lights and other utilities remained turned off.

Typically, the cost runs to around $50 per megawatt used down there, but it's a lot higher these days.

 

 

Turned The Heat Back Down

Seems to have done the trick, as it was running constantly. Now things seem to be better, so whatever. It's still a bit toasty in here, but not too bad. At least it's not running all the time.

That's a big plus.

 

More Texas

What a hoot! Granted, not much of one, but it's what's happening in Dallas today. Iced over indoor doorways, too.

At least he still has internet, sort of. Things don't seem to be improving much, down there.

 

 

Understandable Temptations, But...

A dramatic case took place in the early hours of Wednesday when Houston Police found a woman and child dead from carbon monoxide poisoning after using a running vehicle in their garage to stay warm. As Breitbart Texas reported, law enforcement officials near Houston also found families burning charcoal indoors.

Even if you leave the garage door open, chances are that the colorless, odorless gas will still take you out - and a lot of folks don't even open the door; they're trying to stay warm, after all. What this means is that you assume ambient temperature.

I do feel for the lives lost, but doing stupid things is unlikely to prolong expectancy.

 

 

Houston Store

That's what it's like in parts of Texas right now. If you want snacks, you may be sort of in luck. Other stuff, not so much. Canned foods, fresh foods, milk, bread - all are in short supply, assuming that any can be found at all. The same goes for water, power, and heat. Houston's like a third-world country. 

Oh, and they're on boil-water orders, which has got to be hard to do, as many areas lack a way to do that. Presumably, a lot of folks are going to be relying upon government-provided bottled water, for now.

As of early Thursday, more than 450,000 homes and businesses across Texas remained without power, down from a peak of more than 4 million earlier in the week. The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced plans to deploy more than 700,000 liters of bottled water, more than 60,000 blankets and industrial-sized generators to help power hospitals and other critical structures.

Harris County officials included a feature on their official website where residents can click through and see which major food stores are open.

Assuming, of course, that people can even get to the website.

Things have not been going well, thus far.

Glad I live in the Pacific Northwest, where we don't have such issues.

 

Oopsie!

A group of Taliban jihadists gathered at a mosque in the village of Qultaq on February 13 to receive training on how to assemble bombs and improvised explosive devices (IED). An explosive device accidentally detonated, killing at least “30 Taliban fighters including six foreign nationals who were expert mine makers,” according to the Afghan Army’s 209th Shaheen Corps, which confirmed the deadly blast in a statement released Saturday. The bodies of the six Taliban-affiliated foreign nationals were rendered unidentifiable by the blast, according to the statement.

Well, they're off to a good start!

May others follow their lead.

 

Now Dole's Got Stage 4

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Bob Dole, a former longtime senator and the 1996 Republican presidential nominee, announced Thursday that he has been diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer.

It's not quite an epidemic, but it's beginning to seem like one.

First Rush, now Bob.

 

Shot Over A Cheap Drug

TACOMA, Wash — Police are still investigating a shooting in Tacoma that left one teenager dead on Jan. 29. A 13-year-old and a 15-year-old are charged with the shooting over what Pierce County prosecutors say was a drug deal and failed attempted robbery.

But the shooting highlights a destructive habit that some say isn’t being looked at closely enough: acid use among adolescents.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and guess that none involved were (or are) white.

 

No Heat, No Power. Welcome To Texas.

I understand that some folks are burning furniture down there in an effort to get some heat.

Compounding the issue is that Texas's electric system of ERCOT is isolated from the rest of the country, partly as a way to avoid federal regulation. So it cannot simply import power from elsewhere to make up for the shortage.

Rugged individualists, down there....

 

Oddities

You'd think that at his age, Springsteen would know better, but evidently not. So he's off to court in New Jersey next week to answer the charges of drunk driving that he incurred a while back.

What a class act.

But for real oddity, check out this woman recently in Alaska:

HAINES — Although Shannon Stevens was prepared for the sting of cold when she bared her behind in a Chilkat Lake outhouse last weekend, she wasn’t expecting the sting of a bear tooth.

Yep, bit on the butt by a bear that happened to be lurking for no apparent reason under the outhouse.

“She was still standing there with her pants down. I said, ‘What bit you? Where is it?’ And she said, ‘In the hole.’ I shined the headlamp and opened the lid, and right there at the level of the toilet seat was a cinnamon-colored bear face, big enough to fill the hole.”

The siblings slammed the seat shut and ran from the outhouse.

It was gone the next morning. It's highly unusual, though, as they don't usually hang in the pit of an outhouse.

“I have heard stories of people having scares near outhouses in the spring and summer when bears are normally out, but never in winter and definitely not from underneath while sitting down,” Koch said. He said he’s not sure why the animal was drawn to the outhouse.