School is . . . Cancelled?

Thursday morning Nate and I woke up to something we haven't experienced in the 6 years we've lived here in southern Arizona - our pipes had frozen and we had no water (of course it would happen on the morning we all needed to be ready and out the door by 7am!). So Nate headed out, armed with new-found knowledge (isn't the Internet wonderful?) and my blowdryer and had the water running in less than an hour. Kiersten had a great time telling me every 5 minutes that we didn't have water because the water had frozen in the pipes, and then proceeded to turn on every faucet she could find to prove her point. I think she was the only one disappointed when Nate got the water flowing again!

When it was time to take her to the bus stop that morning, Nate checked the weather, and we saw another shocker . . .I think it has, on rare occasions, gotten down to the mid- to upper-20's, but this is the coldest I've seen it, and before this week I'd never seen it down to the single digits once you factor in the wind chill. Kiersten couldn't understand why we wouldn't let her just wear a cardigan sweater and a fleece jacket to school that day. We were really grateful that Grandma Berrett had a very nice wool winter coat made for her - one we never thought she'd actually need!

It sounds like we got off easy - so many of our friends had pipes burst in the middle of the day, and one friend was without water for the entire day. One of the Raytheon plants out here - unfortunately not the one Nate works at - had a pipe burst and everyone got sent home earlyon Thursday and didn't have to work on Friday since there wasn't water in the building.

That evening we got the news that school was being canceled on Friday "due to weather related concerns and reasonable foreseeability of continued conditions." The part of the announcement that got me was, "Therefore, in the interest of student safety and minimizing the chance for disruption of the educational process and causing a stressful situation for families, we have determined that this course of action, although less than ideal, is the reasonable and prudent course of action. " Does the school board think that having Kiersten home ALL day so she and Tanner can fight ALL day is less stressful than having to go get her in the middle of the day if there is a problem?

And I remember when I was growing up making fun of places that would cancel school when there was just a dusting of snow on the ground, and now I live in a place that canceled school when there wasn't even any snow!