POWERLESS

Sometimes it's not a terrible thing to have to get up several times a night to deal with a 59-year-old bladder. Last night, somewhere between 1:15 and 4:45 a.m., we lost power. I immediately set my cell phone alarm so we wouldn't oversleep. Then, being wide awake, I started worrying about all the food in our fridge/freezer. Of course, I had done the week's grocery shopping yesterday afternoon. Unlike the rest of my family, we do not live in a hurricane-prone area, so power outages are not routine. If we do have a power outage during a major storm, it usually doesn't last long. In our assessment of the situation, Tony checked the circuit breaker box to make certain the problem didn't originate there. Nope, everything good. So it was time to call the power company. Let me tell you that they were uber responsive. I'm not kidding. They were out in our alley within an hour of our call with 3 huge trucks and a team of professionals. They removed the cover from the transformer (?? not my area of expertise) box and immediately diagnosed the problem, which affected about 8 homes in our immediate vicinity. Fire ants. Yep. Apparently because of the record-setting rainfall we've had during the past 4 days, those pesky critters have been flooded out of their normal abodes and have begun to take up residence in such toney digs as transformer boxes. Being hungry as well as homeless, they start eating wiring, conduit, etc, causing blackouts in the neighborhood. The guys from the power company said they see it all the time. They had the problem fixed in a couple hours, and we're back up and running. Whew. It seemed like days, but we were only without power for about 7-8 hours. The food in the fridge is fine. My panic at not being able to work has abated. Speaking of which, better get going. So, FYI, next time your power goes out, don't discount the possibility of fire ants as the source. I never would have believed it had it not happened to us.

Why so Socialist?

If I still had children in school, there's no way on earth I would send them to school next week to be forced to listen to Obama's indoctrination/propaganda speech. Geez, where are we living? Hitler's Germany? Chavez's Venezuela? Castro's Cuba? How is this guy getting away with implementing his Marxist agenda? Okay, he was fairly elected. But we conservatives easily saw through his smokescreen of "hope and change and unity" to his underlying determination to transform our nation of freedom and liberty to his own personal socialist experiment. Why did his faithful blindly follow him even though there were so many red flags? Many of them are intelligent and reasoned. I just don't get it. I would hate to have to put my kids in the position of opting out of the speech and being singled out for ridicule by teachers and peers. Fortunately, the Lewisville Independent School District has decided not to waste its students' time by showing the speech on classroom time, and I applaud the administration for this valiant position. Unfortunately, though, many school districts in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex are not so brave. Or else they're drinking the Kool-Aid along with the rest of those who worship at the altar of Obama. I feel sorry for their kids. This is how the left works, subtly infiltrating the minds of the children who, in turn, take the message home to their parents. It's happened before in other countries, and it has failed every time it's been tried. We need to review our world history pronto and take action so we don't lose our beloved country.