Another month (plus) has come and gone without me writing. I think I have a good reason why I got a little distracted. In February we had an event with many nicknames. My favorite is "Snovid" although "snow-pocalypse" ain't too bad. If you live in Texas you know what I'm talking about and can skip this entry. I'm writing this for posterity's sake and so that I can look back and realize that I'm tougher than I know. Let's go about this logically and look at things day-by-day.
Wednesday, February 10th - I heard that we had a major winter storm coming in (Uri was its name) so I went to the grocery store. I like to be prepared and I figured it sounded like the roads might be icy for a few days and I didn't want to run out of milk, mac & cheese, etc. I also bought a a lot of granola bars because I figured if worse comes to worse and we lose power for a day, we can eat granola bars. They aren't the best meals but we wouldn't be hungry.
Thursday, February 11th - A few of our neighboring school districts had a delayed start or didn't even have school. When I woke up I thought they were silly because it was just really cold, no precipitation at all. By 10am I realized how wrong I had been. Our district announced that we would close at 12:30 because the precipitation had begun and the temperature outside was literally freezing. I ended up spending a big chunk of my time at work helping get students out of class because their parents were coming to pick them up early. When my spouse and I got to our car, it was frozen shut. No joke, all the doors were frozen shut. My spouse was smart and grabbed a hammer and a large eraser (for his white board) from his classroom. He placed the fuzzy part of the eraser along the edge of the car door and then tapped it with the hammer. He repeated this until enough of the ice had broken so that we could open the doors. We then blasted the defroster and I chiseled at the ice on the windshield with our ice scraper until it was safe to go home. We purposefully took the least travelled way home in the hopes that if we spun out we wouldn't hit anyone else. We made it home safely.
Friday, February 12th - It was a cold, icy day. School was canceled. We stayed home, read, and watched tv. Not a bad day. Our district announced that the county had 300 COVID vaccinations that they were giving to them because they were going to go bad if they weren't used this weekend. I signed up myself and my spouse, Matthew, to receive it.
Saturday, February 13th - Matthew and I realize that we kept losing power overnight because our Alexa (the smart speaker) kept on making noise as it had to reconnect to the internet. In our backyard we find the reason. We have a big oak tree very close to our house and our electric line runs from the pole, under the oak tree, to the house. The tree was so weighed down with ice that its branches were resting on the power line to the point that it was taut. The forecast called for more precipitation and we weren't going to be above freezing for days so we knew that if we wanted to keep power we would need to act soon. Knowing that it might damage or even kill the tree, we cut the branches. They were now at least 3 feet off of the power line. We then spent some time enjoying the snow that had fallen overnight. I have never seen snow so deep in Texas! We had at least 4 inches in the road! It was cool to watch the snow swirl as it was blown across the top of the ground. Our big accomplishment was making it downtown to get our COVID vaccine. To this day I am so incredibly thankful for all of the volunteer nurses and other staff who came in during freezing weather, on their day off, to give us the vaccine.
Sunday, February 14th - Monday, February 15th - My "Oh, it's nice to be cuddled up at home" has definitely changed to "Oh, goodness. Are we going to be ok?" I'm constantly checking in with friends to make sure everyone is safe. Many have lost power and some have lost water as well. We were supposed to have rolling blackouts but that's definitely not happening. My anxiety starts to climb especially because the forecast says Wednesday night we will have more precipitation and it won't get above freezing until Thursday at the earliest. My spouse and I have not lost power nor water. Our macaws are in our sunroom which has a dog door. This means that it isn't keeping heat as well as the rest of the house is. We forced the dogs inside at night (they were LOVING the frigid temperatures) and cover the dog door. We also placed our folding room dividers between the bird cages and the windows in the hopes that it will give just a little more insulation for them. I'm constantly praying "Thank you God, for keeping us safe. Please help those who have lost power or water. Please keep everyone safe."
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| Our house looks pretty darn cute |
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| Look how deep that snow is! |
Tuesday, February 16th - I offer up my home to some friends who don't have power. I tell them that if they can get to us safely they are welcome to warm up and eat some hot food. My best friend texts me and by noon we have decided that it's best for her family (herself, her wife, their daughter, and their two cats) to come over and stay with us. They have no power and there was no telling when it would come back. We had room so it just seemed logical. Bonus, they are from Chicago so the slushy/icy roads aren't nearly as terrifying for them as they are for me. They safely arrive a while later and we get settled in. They were kind enough to stop by the grocery store so we are definitely set for the long haul.
Wednesday, February 17th - We are doing alright talking, reading, watching movies, and playing board games. I was especially proud of their 9 year old daughter who was taking this all in stride. Internally I am completely freaking out about the additional storm that is about to hit us. During the night I could not sleep. I woke up at every little sound which is very odd for me. I'm nearly in tears because I'm convinced that each sound means we have lost power and that my birds are going to get too cold and die. At the same time I know there is nothing more to do but wait until the morning. Eventually I start signing "Silent Night" over and over in my head because it seems to calm me a little. I slept fitfully.
Thursday, February 18th - We awoke to find out that the storm that was predicted didn't really happen. I literally spend the rest of the day thinking/praying, "Dear God, thank you. Thank you for keeping us safe. Please continue to keep everyone safe." My bestie's wife attempted to go to work because she is the regional manager. They got their SUV out of our driveway and found out that they didn't really have any control over the car so they pushed it back into the driveway. We again spend the day reading, playing board games, chatting, etc.
Friday, February 19th - My bestie's wife was able to get to work around noon. My anxiety was finally back to normal levels. I realized how close I was to completely losing my marbles on Wednesday night. I was really thankful I didn't. Not much to report this day. Since I felt like things were getting better (just above freezing this day!) I finally run a load of laundry.
Saturday, February 20th - Another chill day. My bestie and her wife went back to their home to check damage. They came back and reported that they still didn't have electricity but it looked like there was no major damage from what they can see. They kept in touch with their neighbor who was still at her house to find out when electricity had been restored.
Sunday, February 21st - Electricity was back at my bestie's house so they returned home. I now felt comfortable using electricity like a would during a normal day. It was good to be on the other side of all of this.
During the entire storm my family used Marco Polo to send short video updates to each other. Two of my siblings lost power for a while. My brother and I had power the entire time. I'm very happy to report that none of us had any catastrophic damage to our homes. What's odd is that Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday somehow came and went during the storm. I barely noted it, honestly. My brain was dealing with too much to think about religious observations.
I'm not going to comment on the reasons why this all happened (I mean in the sense of why the eff Texas lost power) but I will find it interesting to come back and read this entry in a few years. Did anything change? Did power companies winterize their equipment? Do we go through this again?
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This week is interesting at work not only because it's the week before Spring Break but because we have three people in our front office out. Basically there are nine of us in the front office. I'm not including the AP secretaries because they are not literally in the front of the building, they are throughout the building. When more than one person is out at a time, we can "feel" it because we have to change up who is covering reception and the attendance window (where parents pick up their kids for doctor's appointments and such). With three people out possibly all week, it's been a bit chaotic. For the record, they all really need to be out. One had a death in the family and two are out for medical reasons. I don't want anyone to think my co-workers decided the start their vacation early! I just keep praying that we keep up with things. It's been ok so far. We just need to make it a few more days.
Well, like usual I have made this much longer than I meant to. *shrug* I mostly keep this blog for myself so I don't know why I feel bad when my posts are lengthy. I'm sure there's some deep psychological reason there that points to me needing therapy but we are going to ignore it for now. ;) If you're reading this, I hope you are doing well and that you too survived Uri without too much damage!
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| This is what our dog, Freyja, wanted to do all day every day. |
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| Loki wasn't as big of a fan but he does whatever Freyja does. |
