No Snow Day

It’s brutally cold in Denver: Minus 19° overnight and a high today of only about 20°. All I want to do is burrow in somewhere cozy and wait for warmer weather. One of the disadvantages of working or studying at home is that you don’t get any snow days. We didn’t get much snow out of this storm, so nobody’s getting a snow day today, and I thank my lucky stars that I didn’t have to join the rush hour madness this morning.

When I face new students at the University of Phoenix, one of the first things they always ask me about is weather cancellations. They react with surprise when I tell them that we just don’t do them. Denver’s national reputation for cold and snow aside, our weather really isn’t bad. The bigger issue, though, is that dealing with the impossibly full schedules of adult college students is extremely difficult. We can’t just cancel classes and forget about them; we have to make them up within the same week, a Herculean task.

Staying cheerful in freezing temperatures can be an adventure. Yesterday ten people showed up at my church to go caroling even though it was only 5°. We had a good time and maybe even brought a few people a little Christmas cheer.

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