What A Week in West Texas……
When my wife and I moved here from Chicago last summer--we thought for sure we had left frigid temperatures, piles of snow and ice behind coming to West Texas. I mean--we knew there was a winter here... But we were told over and over that it only really snows once or twice a year and even if it's a considerable amount--it's gone typically within a day. Fast forward 7 months down the road--and Texas gets an arctic blast with snow and ice and frigid temperatures it apparently hasn't seen in years. It was as if Chicago was saying to us: "Hey--you may be gone but we don't want you to miss us this winter!!!".
It's certainly been a week. For all of us. And even though it's been rough with our power being off at the house to begin with for 13 hours the first day (Monday) to switching to being on for 4 to 6 hours then off for another 9..... We haven't had it as bad as some have with no power at all--and STILL no power here at the end of the week. Our hearts go out to those families who have suffered and who have lost. Lost oved ones, have to deal with property damage due to burst pipes, and who haven't had heat or water for days.
We were lucky that even thru the power ups and downs--that we have a gas fireplace at the house that we were able to work around the electric ignition by putting two D batteries in it--so we still had heat from that when power went down. Of course I can't even tell you how many trips I made to and from the radio stations because power would come back up--so I would meet Leo from our sister station B93 here and we'd get the building all back up and running, only to have the power get cut again a few hours later. It was crazy!
What HAS been uplifting--is seeing how the people in this amazing community have come to the aid and rescue of our neighbors in need. So many great stories of people checking on each other, taking in neighbors with no heat, charging phones for people who had no power, taking people to the store, you name it. The people of the Basin stepped up to help. And we'd love to hear YOUR stories of how you received help and someone's kindness, or if you were one coming to the rescue! Call us in the morning and tell Gwen and I all about it! 432-563-8923 or 432-561-8336. And stay warm out there! We're almost out of the woods!
TIPS: Here's how you can prepare for power outages