Anybody who knows me knows the passion with which I hate winter; however, it's not that I hate winter weather. I like cold as long as it isn't accompanied by wind. I like snow. I don't mind ice all that much, actually, although I'm not a fan of driving in it.

And this is the center of the distinction I would make in regard to my hatred for the season. It's not the weather I hate; it's the massive inconvenience.

In Oklahoma, more than 500,000 electricty customers are in the dark tonight -- and officials are resigned to the possibility that it could be a week to 10 days before power can be restored. My house is without power in Norman, and it's down to 50 degrees, just a few notches above the temp at which pipes could be irreparably damaged.

In Norman, trees are down everywhere, and they took powerlines with them, and it's caused a scene that can only be described as something out of a war zone. Officials with OG&E have already said it's the worst power outage in their history, and it's quite likely this will be the most costly natural disaster in Oklahoma's history.

However, this mess is not all an act of God.

Our electric companies will face a great inquiry after this event for what they could have done better to prepare for it. Unfortunately, this marks the fourth time this year my electricty has gone out for a significant length of time. It could merely be coincidence, but my electricity in Texas went out once (for a significant length of time) in a decade.

With as many tornadoes and winter storms and hurricanes (yes, we had what was technically a "tropical depression" in 2007) as Oklahoma has, OG&E and PSO and OEC and whoever charges us high dollar for power simply must come up with a way to protect this resource. Get the lines underground.

OG&E and others should be prepared to pro-rate bills for those of us who do average billing, too. In fact, I would support legislation that acts punitively against electric companies for outages. For example, customers would be refunded at a rate of 2X cost for every hour without power.

Fact is, a mild windstorm can knock out power in this state to 10,000 people, and it's what makes a mild winter storm something nearly unbearable.

Oh, and by the way, I should note that we're being told that a snowstorm could be a player in Oklahoma THIS weekend. Not necessarily a big, big event, but it would be snow with accumulation -- and if it even touches power lines, you can bet we'll have more outages.

And it's that -- and not the white stuff itself -- that's a giant pain in the butt.