Monday, August 31, 2009

An Interesting "First Day of School"

So today was the official first day of school. The only problem was that there were no students, no teachers, no books, no pencils, nothing. The reason is this


The Station Fire, which began last Wednesday as a small brush fire in La Canada has decided to burn the whole Angeles National Forest. This is a picture from the playground on Sunday afternoon. (I took this picture before hearing that I was not supposed to be there). The air quality is so bad that we just can't hold school. Currently, school has been cancelled for tomorrow as well. We hope to begin on Wednesday with our new classes. The fire could not keep me away. Today, my wife and I went to the school to see what was happening:


In this picture you can see the Valley View sign on the corner and plumes of smoke towering high above the playground. I did not go on campus this time. The police officer is there because the entire neighborhood north of this point is under evacuation orders from the city of Glendale. Those living way up the hill have been required to evacuate. We could not get past this police officer without an ID having the proper address. As I write this I would estimate that 1/4 t0 1/2 of our student population is under evacuation orders. This is because fire fighters are conducting controlled burns at the base of the hills above Valley View.

Since we could not go to work today (Laura works at Fremont Elementary), we went shopping at the Americana. Here is a picture of me at my new favorite place to get dessert:

Did you know that you can get an ice cream sandwich made out of any cookies you want with any ice cream you want? I was in heaven. My favorite thing to get when I am at any ballpark is the Tollhouse Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich. The Tollhouse Booth at the Americana is my new favorite place. This is peanut butter cup ice cream sandwiched between two chocolate chip pecan cookies. Yummy!!

What has been your experience during the school closures? How has the Station Fire affected your family?