Day 3 of the natural gas “service disruption.” Service has been restored to Albuquerque, naturally, and it’s gradually being restored to parts of northern New Mexico, but it won’t be back on in Taos today, and maybe not tomorrow.
I went to the grocery store yesterday and it was colder inside the store than outside, at least outside in the sunshine. The deli part was closed and so was the seafood counter, but the rest of the store was fully stocked. Some of the produce looked a little “tired” so I bypassed the red bell peppers, but I got the essentials – milk, cat food, chicken, potatoes, etc.
It was strange to drive through town yesterday and see all the empty parking lots at restaurants. From the fast food places to the fancy restaurants and everything in between, they’re all closed because they use gas for cooking. I don’t know what the tourists are doing for food.
Fortunately (I guess), there aren’t that many tourists. The hotel where I work had 5 rooms filled last night (at first). We put a space heater in each of the rooms and those are the only space heaters we have. At 4:00 a.m. a man came in and wanted a room. Brian, the security guard, explained the situation to him (no heat, no hot water, and no more space heaters), but he wanted a room anyway; he’d been driving all day and night. Brian offered to provide an extra blanket from one of the other rooms and he was happy with that. Several people have called to cancel their reservations.
I stayed close to the space heater at the front desk as much as I could last night. It’s small (it sits on the counter), and can’t really put out that much heat. If I got more than two feet away from it, I started getting cold. I need to wear more layers tonight. It was such a relief to get home this morning to a warm house and crawl into a warm bed with two blankets and a comforter.
At least the weather is getting warmer, relatively speaking. The high today was 37; anything above freezing is warm. The low this morning was 5; anything above zero is very warm.
We’re supposed to get snow tonight and as I was writing this, Ron called me into the living room to see the forecast on the Weather Channel. High temperatures on Tuesday and Wednesday will be in the single digits. Sigh.
1 comment:
I know what you mean about the blower on a space heater driving you crazy. I can't have mine on for long for that very reason. I have an oil-filled electric radiator that I prefer, because it's silent, but the little one with the blower works faster. It must be torture to have it so cold that the heater doesn't warm much *and* it's too cold to turn it off.
This is so distressing for your town's economy too. Except maybe the people selling the heaters and generators.
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