You're kidding.......RIGHT?!?

I love FALL! I especially love when we have a Fall where the cool weather does not wait until Thanksgiving to get here! This year, thankfully, we began getting cool weather by the 1st few weeks of October! YAHOO!

I was totally psyched! The moment it was cool enough, I turned off the air conditioner in our home, opened the windows and let the air do all the work! I naturally turn off all lights when we are not using them, so I am pretty savvy about keeping the electricity bill as low as possible. However, to be able to keep my AC off as well???? I was thrilled!!!

Then, Monday, the new energy bill arrived. I was almost as excited to hear what our bill was as I would be hearing that someone just randomly sent us a check in the mail for $500! I called Scotty, and he assured me it had arrived. I waited in anticipation over the phone as he opened the envelope............................

Was it as low as $60?!?

Was it $80?!?

TELL ME NOW!!!!!!

Then, I heard the words.........

"Honey, our electricy bill is $300."

"WHAT?!?" "You're kidding with me, right?"

"No." "$300."

I was sure somehow he had forgotten how to read the bill. So, I rushed home and sure enough the bill was for $298.75! HOW? On top of the bill read: "Estimated Bill", so I called Stream Energy Customer Service. After sitting on hold for 30 min, a sweet lady got on the phone. I kindly explained to her how I loved Fall, I had been turning off my AC, opening windows and did not understand how my bill (which is never over $120) can now be almost $300.

Then, she kindly replied: "Well, since not everyone in the Texas/New Mexico power grid has recieved their power back yet, we are not getting current, accurate reads from everyone's meters. All residential customers are getting what we call "Estimated Bills". Which means, whatever your residence paid last year at this time in energy, we are billing you. So, you do owe the $300. It is due by the due date or you will be subject to having your power cut off."

uh..........yeah

So now, apparently, I have to manipulate the budjet to find an extra $100 or so to pay this bill of energy we didn't use. The good thing about the deal is that when they finally do get an accurate read, if they realize they over-charged us, our next bill will be a credit and could be as low as $0. Geez.......I sure hope so.