Ice, Lent, and Various Suffering

 

And I thought last week was stressful. 

1.) I'm using my phone to Blog. 

We're in the path of that massive winter storm that blew into Texas this past week, and have been dealing with a "brownout" since Sunday. 

This means that's there's enough power in an outlet (selectively turned on via breaker) to power up phones, but nothing bigger than that. 

So I apologize that the formatting isn't as nice as usual, but it's kind of outside my control. 

2.) Ice, Ice Baby. 

We weren't supposed to get an ice storm on Sunday, just cold weather. 

We got an ice storm. Everything outside ended up with a half inch glaze, all the bridges were closed, massive power outages ensued, and we even lost cell service for a couple days. 

The ice lasted outside until Wednesday. For you living in the ice belt wondering why this was such a big deal, in South Texas we usually only get an ice storm overnight once every three years or so, and all the ice is usually melted by noon the next day. 

We simply aren't set up for "real" winter weather. The cities have no trucks for sanding or salting roads, many people live in uninsulated homes and heat with small electric space heaters, and our power systems aren't weatherized. Texas, especially South Texas, is a mild winter state, to the point that "winter Texans" moving here in RVs for a few months every winter is a normal occurrence. 

Just to give some context for why things seem to be melting down. The last time temps got anywhere near this cold was 1895. 

3.) Propane is Wonderful, and Amazing, and Running Out, and in VERY High Demand. 

Hank Hill was right, dangit. (And for the record, that show is slightly more accurate than is comfortable. On SO many things). 

4.) Mardi Gras was Very Traditional this Year 

I've mentioned before that the old tradition of Mardi Gras is to clean out your pantry and larder of all the stuff you're not supposed to eat during Lent. 

When you suddenly lose power to your fridge and freezer, that becomes necessity. 

We put everything we could into coolers on the back porch (thank goodness this has been a cold snap and not a hurricane, at least as far as that goes) and have been eating everything we can out of that without opening the freezer (a big no no when the power cuts out-- keep that sucker closed as long as possible to keep the cold in). 

We did eventually open the freezer on Tuesday (I had some frozen king cake in there, and our surprisingly large glut of leftovers was finally worked through), and the meat is all still frozen solid, though we've lost some frozen produce. 

I looked up how to can pork in the pressure canner just in case. 

5.) I Did Laundry With a Plunger 

I put dirty clothes in a small trash can, got water and detergent in there, then pumped up and down with the plunger like I was churning butter, reaching into the water every so often to reposition the clothes. 

It actually got the clothes as clean or cleaner than using the machine. We have an indoor line in our bathroom I hung them to dry on. If I have to do this again, I'll wait for a sunny day outside. The clothes took forever to dry, in part because I couldn't wring them out properly (first time I've ever genuinely wished I had an old fashioned clothes roller/wringer), and in part because they were hanging inside, where there's less air circulation.  

A friend of ours in the city has power, so we're making the drive in today to get laundry done. Hopefully that'll last us until the power comes back, but I'm glad that skill is there if I need it. 

6.) Lent 

In the midst of all this, we have two wiggly little kids who need to be entertained. Liturgical themed crafts are a relatively easy go to because the idea is already more or less formed (thanks to a kindergarten RE curriculum we have for some reason), and we have the type of kids that enjoy that sort of thing. 

I put up the photocopied copy of the Lenten countdown calendar from Catholic Icing that we've had for three years (in a brand new sturdy plastic sleeve someone gave us rather than a flimsy thin, wrinkled plastic page protector-- we're moving up in the world!), and we colored in the first square with wipe board markers. 

Then, since the photocopier won't work on reduced power, I took big chunks of contractor paper and copied the text from a Kindergarten worksheet, "I will show my love by...", and then had the kids write and/or draw a way they could show love this Lent. Kept them happy for a good half hour. 

We didn't make it to mass this year for Ash Wednesday. It isn't a holy day of obligation, and we got the impression last Sunday that our pastor was trying to gently discourage a big crowd for pandemic reasons. That paired with the weather, the fact that we're in a much higher stress situation than usual, and our children's utter inability to handle mass on any time other than Sunday morning (seriously, it borders on bizarre) made mass a no go this year. 

7.) Closing Thoughts 

I'm grateful for a lot. The school district closed for the week, so I'm grateful Chris is home. I'm also grateful for the fact that he's lived in the ice belt, and that he lived through hurricane Katrina, so we sort of kind of know what we're doing. 

I've learned that the prepper/ off grid research rabbit hole I fell down a couple years ago has paid off. There's a lot of odds and ends that have come in handy. 

As I write this, our power has shut completely off, and the pressure on our water well tank failed (it's run off electric power). So we're without power or running water now. Hopefully it's been shut off so that they can fix it-- but it may not have been . Things have pretty much all finally melted into a wet soggy mess, but we're supposed to get another front and a freeze tonight. 

The adventure continues. 

Update: power is back on. Praise be to God. 

Since I have my computer back and can link stuff now, here's a post I wrote awhile back about surviving Lent when you have severe scruples. It's possible to do it in a way that's healthy, without living in constant, agonizing fear of slipping up. (I also linked a couple things in the takes above...feels so good to be back). 

Check out the rest of this week's takes here on Friday.