A military base(Fort Bliss) nearby used to store radioactive materials decades ago. Now it's leaking all sorts of bad radiation. Alpha, Beta, Gamma, the whole Greek alphabet. Well, time to be melodramatic and write that will.
Well, first you gain the super powers and then you can write that will. (But seriously, that sounds scary. Be safe~)
We're talking about a military base with round the clock security here. Do you really think a civvie would know about their radiation leak before them?
Well apparently there isn't Gamma radiation...I think. But Beta radiation isn't very good. Alpha radiation is something that can practically be ignored though. Plus I don't know exactly how far it is from El Paso...might not be directly on Fort Bliss but somewhere nearby. >>
You could go for the tinfoil look, tinfoil stops the Betas. A simple tinfoil panty will do if you' re more worried about having kids someday than about maximizing your life expectancy. Paper is enough to stop the Alphas so yeah, not that much of a threat. For Gammas you' d need a one meter large wall of concrete, so I' m glad to hear you don' t have those. ... But then back when Chernobyl farted the medias here downplayed the facts an awful lot to avoid creating a panic, if I was you I' d try to get my mitts on a geyger counter.
Alphas are stopped by clothes. Seriously, not the biggest of deals. I don't think tinfoil stops Betas though. You need something thicker.
That' s what my physics teacher told us, the one who took us on a trip to visit a nuclear plant. I' m not terribly anxious to check that out empirically.