Pretty sure I'm among a pretty big crowd planning to avoid being without electricity during upcoming blackouts.

I've been looking at options and can't quite justify a whole-house, automatic starting system. But I could run my fridge, my A/C and or furnace (I have natural gas) and lights, fans, etc., with a 5,000 watt propane-fueled generator.

A licensed electrician will install the manual transfer switch for me. I could do it myself but I'll probably sell this house in a few years and it's always good to be able to show that a "real" electrician did that kind of work.

Yeah, June 1st is a ways off, but they're forecasting a busy season. I'm near Willowbrook Mall (far northwest) so I'm not terribly worried about hurricanes, but we know it doesn't take too much of a storm to bring power failures.

Anyway, I'm just curious whether anyone here has been out looking at generators, and if they're seeing inflated pricing or are having a hard time finding the generator that would be ideal...

TL;DR - Is it dumb to look at backup power generators in Houston right now? If yes, when will it be smarter?

I walk my two dogs every evening and I'd estimate that 1 out of every 3 back yards I pass has a dog in it. The sad thing is that those dogs that give us "hello" barks are in those yards no matter what time of day or night I walk my two.

Okay, so sure, you feed them and give them water, and some pat-pats at least a couple of times a day. They don't know anything different so maybe it's not such a difficult life. Better than being locked up at B.A.R.C. or S.P.C.A., right?

Well, this weekend is going to be a miserable one for a lot of animals.

Please consider at least letting them stay in your garage on the colder nights. If you can't or won't give them a place inside, would you please be sure they have a dog house or SOME kind of protection from wind, sleet and cold?