That's good info. But what I am doing is filling my 5-gallon Sparkletts container with regular tap water and then running that through the Brita filter, just like I normally do before I drink water. I didn't mean to give the impression that I was taking raw rain/river water and running it through a Brita.
"In case of emergency" is the reason. At one point the storm was heading straight for Austin, so we went out and bough essentials, nothing like being prepared. For those of you youngsters on this board, I can understand your querry, but if you have kids and a family, it is FAR better to be safe than sorry. DD
Luckily, I knew of this small hidden gas station in Pflugerville so I could get some gas. My car was completely empty. My father had driven up on Thursday and needed to fill up. My wife and I went grocery shopping on Wed night. We had been without our refridgerator for over a week while in repair. We just needed to have food in our house. I couldn't believe the people. This was the HEB @ Parmer & 35. No water. No bread. The idiocy of it all just blew me away. I don't understand what people think would happen to Austin, even if the storm took a turn for the west.
The media machine, that's all. And yes, Houstonians DID panic and acted like a bunch of you know what. But, I don't blame people as much as I blame it on the post-Katrina syndrome, it is similar to post-9/11 syndrome that we went through for a while. It's hard I guess to blame people when they watch all the coverage of death and mayhem in NOLA after Katrina, I guess its normal human reaction. I guess most forgot that the damage in NOLA was from the levees being breached, not the Hurricane itself. Oh yah, and the local news stations are riding high on ratings now, so no doubt they have some interest in being over-dramatic about this whole thing.
