Friday, January 8, 2010

Feeling The Cold


It's times like this when I miss living in Southern California. It's the middle of winter, and it's still 75 degrees in Los Angeles.

Here in Austin, it's about 28 degrees, and tonight it will drop down to 14 F (-10 C).

That is freaking cold. Ok, ok, I realize that in other parts of the country, it's even colder than that. I read somewhere that North Dakota was going to have a low of -50F at one point. Forgive my ignorance, but isn't that something like instant death once you step outside???

My point is, being a Southern Californian, I've never experienced a winter this cold in my entire life. Never. It didn't get this cold in Taiwan, either.

We just got our electricity bill today, and it was $116. For us, that's a lot. Our normal electric bill is around $50, so now it's double because we have the heat on constantly. I was a little shocked at the bill.

"If our electricity bill is $116 for this apartment, imagine what it's going to be once we are living in a house." I told Christy. $200? $300? Oh, I just can't wait for all the little financial surprises that are going to come my way once we move into our house.

Luckily for Austin, there isn't any rain in the forecast over the next few arctic days, so we won't see any snow out of this. Although I would love to actually see some snow here, I think it would be chaos on the roads.

So, it looks like this weekend will be spent mostly indoors, trying to keep warm, like most of the country is trying to do.....except Los Angeles...you lucky bastards!

2 comments:

  1. It's gotten into the minus degrees here, which it doesn't do every Winter. I think this kind of cold only happens every so many years. So, chances are that next year it'll be not nearly this cold.

    Yes, your heating bill will be higher in a house I imagine. But it surprised me that this house we are in right now is cheaper to heat than the one we lived in in Emporia.

    So, don't worry too much about it yet.

    California is so far out in left field nowadays. Things cost so much more there that you might have higher rates than you have in Texas anyway.

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  2. I feel your pain. It has dipped down to 20 degrees here. That is about 68 to you Fahrenheit types.

    Minus 50F will not kill you instantly but whenever it gets that cold in Moscow it does kill thousands of old people rather quickly.

    If your apartment utility bills surprise you, wait until you are in a house.

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