Well, suffice it to say, I survived the Great Texas Freeze of 2021. I'm going to get a few things out of the way before getting to the meat of this journal. One of those things is that as much as I'd like to avoid getting political, the nature of the situation here has made that extremely difficult. As some of you may have heard, Texas has an isolated energy grid, which our state government decided to do for a number of reasons, including to avoid energy requirements coming along as a result of the climate change debate, and to allow for a "diverse market", so Texans aren't forced to pay a ridiculous amount to one and only one energy provider. I'm sure there are other reasons and details that I'm unaware, but that's my understanding of it at this point in time.

The second is that I have seen and heard a number of comments from people who normally get very cold, icy, snowy, etc. winters in their neck of the woods that essentially are making fun of people here for having no idea how to handle such freezing weather. These comments and such are, by my observation, a minority of people so it's nothing worth getting worked up over. Those who do wonder, whether you're reading this journal now, or have a friend or family member who keeps asking "What's the big deal with Texas getting ice and snow?", we generally have very mild winters. In the summer time, it can get up to around 110 degree Fahrenheit, and winters will get to between the low 30's-40's as far as temperature goes. Strong winter weather does occur every 5-10 years, but it's not a frequent occurrence.

Finally, and possibly the most important issue, is there's an argument being pushed by many, including our governor, that dependence on wind energy is to blame for our power grids failing as badly as they did this past week. Even if this was true, which it is not, a similar weather event happened in 2010 and our energy commission was informed that major changes needed to be made to weather proof our power stations to protect them from extreme weather. This warnings went unheeded, and now people are dead. Whatever energy source was used is irrelevant, our Government decided to make our energy and power independent from the rest of the nation, so they made all the decisions from that point. Of course our governor was also quick to throw ERCOT under the bus, which they 100% deserve, but he's still shifting the blame.

Our leadership in Texas failed at every level, it seems. So I'll urge the rest of you to take unlikely, but certainly possible, weather events into consideration and prepare accordingly. One of the reasons why I'm here is because I had some goods that kept me from freezing to death or tripping over shit and killing myself in the dark. I'll make a more detailed journal about that soon, but I digress. Learn what the possible extremes are in your area and prepare for them. Stocking supplies and equipment to handle a power outage during a heatwave offers some similar, but different, challenges than freezing conditions. Find out what you need keep on hand. Again, though, I'll post a more detailed journal on what I had available and exactly what I had to contend with.