"It's SNOWING!"

People in Texas get crazy when anything but rain falls from the sky. If it's any solid form of water - sleet, frozen rain, or "snow" - drivers freak out, schools close either early or completely, and the city decides that it's time to salt/sand the roadways immediately. If you were in the same conditions elsewhere, say Chicago, things would resume normally and in routine fashion. But here, everything is BIG, including the hype about the winter's first "snow."

I put "snow" in quotation marks because it does several things that do not constitute qualities of genuine, meteorologically correct snow. When it "snows" in Texas, it stick for a minute and melts in a second, snow men typically only amount to about three feet high and wide, and we only get about two to three inches of "powder" if you can call it that. About two or three weeks ago, North Texas got about a foot and a half of snow, something that our region hadn't seen for as long as I've lived in Dallas. So today, Central Texas/Hill Country got a little taste of it.

The snow flurries were huge this morning on my way to work, but I didn't start see them falling right until I got off 183 to exit for Westwood. By the time I pulled into the parking lot, huge snowflakes began to come down, so I pulled out my umbrella and hurried inside, where there was a bit of chaos with administrators and office staff, but I made it to the room on time and safely. Dad called, but I couldn't answer the phone since A) a student was in the room making up work and that would be unprofessional (but my ringer was on so she heard it go off, -10) and B) we can get ticketed for using a cell phone on campus premises. I just had to text him very quickly that I made it to the school safely and couldn't talk. I did call him when I got home, though.

So yes, the administration decided to do a 1:30pm early release for all RRISD high schools, so Missy sent me home immediately after 6th block since we'd be out after 7th/conference block. I later found out, however, that the students were released early but staff was not, so all teachers had to stay until 4:10pm.

RRISD will be on a 2-hour delay tomorrow, so I get to sleep in! I'm excited about working with the Pre-APs tomorrow, and I'll be leading them in another APMC practice passage with annotation tips and test taking strategies. If nothing changes by the morning, I'll hopefully be able to squeeze in at least a couple more hours of sleep before I head back out for the school day! The Gods have spoken and decided to give me a break! :)

Best,
Ms. L