Hating on Texas

The last 12 hours or so have been, perhaps, my worst since coming to Texas. So this may get a little snarky, but I need to get it off my chest and move on...

It all started at 2am this morning, when a very crazy, or very incapacitated, woman totally lost her shit and started breaking out the windows of an SUV parked in a driveway off the alley behind our house. She was definitely pissed off at whoever was in the SUV, and was screaming and sobbing, and basically loosing her mind trying to destroy this car. I wasn't sure exactly who was in danger in the situation, but I called the police and soon enough 3 cruisers were on the scene to sort it all out. I would estimate we were awake for an hour and a half, listening to her ravings and the car alarm and arrests.

When my alarm went off at 6:15, I rolled over to Tom, wished him a happy birthday (yep), and said I wanted a do-over on the day. Unfortunately, that middle of the night rude awakening was an omen of the additional fun the day had in store for us.

While a majority of the rest of the country has been dealing with a major winter weather event, Austin has "suffered" the fate of temps dropping below freezing for an extended period of time. It is definitely cold here, and none of us is really acclimated to such weather, so it can be hard to cope. However, the ineptitude, incompetence and general ridiculousness displayed so far today simply cannot be forgiven.

Let us start with our pipes, which froze over night as the low temp dropped to 16 degrees.  They froze in less than 7 hours, although our heater was cranked up to 74 degrees to counteract the lack of insulation and old, leaky windows. I literally could not believe it. I lived in Chicago for 10 years, experiencing weeks on end where the HIGH temp wouldn't get above the single digits. But as long as you had he heat on, it was fine.  But apparently here they don't insulate their pipes... even if you are building a pier and beam house, which will guarantee that your water pipes will be all but exposed to the elements.

The excuse I have heard is that it almost never gets this cold here, so why waste the money? Instead, let us once or twice a year leave all of our faucets running for days to ensure we don't freeze up. Unfortunately, no one mentioned we should do that, regardless of how high our heat was cranked. I know ultimately this situation is sort of our fault, but come on, Texas! I will say that our landlord was really sweet, and is taking the blame herself for this one. She knows we are Yanks and she admits she should have called to school us on the cold weather protocol.

And then there are the rolling black outs. Just at the time when one might need electricity the most, the grid has been overwhelmed here in Texas, and state-wide scheduled blackouts have started. It makes sense that an increase in heating usage would tax the system, but we all knew the coldsnap was coming.  It turns out that the power plants in Texas are built different than those in colder climates, and some of them here in Texas have shut down, or slowed down because of the cold.  That is right. I said, because it is this cold, the Texas power grid cannot perform at peak output. Is this for real? Although it is somewhat rare, it does get really freaking cold here sometimes. And it happens even more often further north, in major cities like Dallas. And when this happens, people will ALWAYS want to turn on their heaters.

Finally, and hopefully this really is the final thing to wreck my day, the heater at the School of Nursing is broken. It was on this morning, but went down around 10am. No word yet on if/when it will be fixed, and for right now, my office is colder than I would like, but not intolerable. But I tell you what, I am not coming here tomorrow if it isn't back on. It is already literally freezing in our lobby, with students and staff coming in and out all day, and it is just too cold outside for the building to sit over night without heat and still be habitable tomorrow morning.

The good news is that Tom just call to say that we have cold water again (and there is a well stocked liquor cabinet waiting for me when I get home).