Let's talk about how freaking cold it is

Just like 2/3 of the country, it is colder than Alaska here today. 16 degrees right now.
 
Our pipes froze overnight, despite my boss's assurance that they wouldn't. So I'm wearing a ball cap and three layers of deodorant.
 
The girls' school had a two hour delay.
 
I had an 8:00 doctor's appoint for a UTI that came out of nowhere on Saturday night and already included blood in my urine by 2:00 yesterday afternoon, so they had to come to my appointment with me.
 
I got to pee in a cup to VERY LOUD narration- "Mama, why are you wiping your lady parts??" "Mama, why do you pee pee in that cup?" "Mama, what are you doing??"
 
Then Alexis dropped her knit hat in the toilet with my AZO-orange pee. That was fun- "Um, do you have a plastic bag? No, for the urine soaked hat I have here?"
 
 
 
 
And it's cold. I'm feeling very whiny and cranky this morning. I just want a shower.
 
On the up side, I have two employees at my house trying to thaw my pipes. Fingers crossed they're successful!

 

Steph-I hope you can get your water pipes thawed and dont have any burst. 
 
We had -28 degree wind chill yesterday and schools closed.  Today we are looking forward to a balmy 30 degrees, lol!

 

I'm cold.  I don't think the heat in my office is working correctly.  It was 6 degrees when I drove to work this morning.  My girls have a 2 hour delayed opening
 
Step: I hope your pipes unfreeze quickly.  I remember what a pain in the but a frozen pipe can be, we had the pipe in our shower freeze one year, ( turned out we had a blown fuse in our bathroom and didn't know it so the kick toe heater was not working)

 

School is open here but not buses (which is good for me because picking kids up off the bus after school yesterday was a trip on an ice rink. I jammed my butt sliding, didn't fall but ouch!
 
I was laying in bed thinking about cancelling my drive tonight at 7 when the phone rang with the office cancelling it so there is that. 
 
I do wonder how many kids we'll have tonight. We are basically a walking/driving school but all day care kids (save the 3 on the bus) are drive kids. I have some parents with serious commutes and I wonder how that will go. 
 
No outside play today.
 
My joints are really complaining about the cold which is good.

 

It's not too bad here. I think it was 23 yesterday and now it's going to be 40s for the rest of the week. I figure as long as it's going to be cold we should get some serious snow. I LOVE snow and have total snow envy of my friends and family in Michigan.

Steph, I hate taking kids to my doctor appointments. It makes me cranky.

 

It's actually finally reasonable here (-6C aka 21F). I think our cold went your way.

Sounds like it's been an incredibly frustrating morning Steph! I hope things look up for you the rest of the day. :hug:

 

Freezing pipes: run your water at a trickle continuously. And note that the flooding doesn't happen until they unfreeze and the pipes warm up. If your pipes have been frozen or you suspect they will be, turn your water main off when you leave the house just in case. That is my public service announcement of the day.
 
Steph, I am really sorry about your UTI and frozen pipes.
Kendra, I am sorry about your creaking joints.
 
And everyone, I am sorry -40 is crap! We deal with those temperatures all the time in the winter and they're not fun, but if you're not prepared for them they can be very, very dangerous. Stay warm and safe, everyone. Don't take any chances you don't have to on the roads.

 

Our oldest has been out of school for the past 2 days because with the windchill it is -45 to -50 degrees!  I can't wait for spring!  I feel like a hermit because I don't want to take our twin 10 month old girls out at all in this cold.

 

It's cold!  Really, it's not so bad if you are prepared for it (which we are), but so many down here are NOT!  My kids all have really warm coats, and hats and mitts, but they still wear tennis shoes to school.  My water pipes are okay but my drain pipe for my washer is apparently frozen.  When my washer hit the spin cycle this morning I had water fountaining up out of the drain pipe, thankfully I was still at home and shut the washer off ASAP! Now I have a washer full of water and clothes sitting there until David gets home tonight.

We also didn't put antifreeze in our camper water lines, so right now I'm praying hard they aren't all cracked from freezing overnight.  If they are I don't even want to know what it's going to cost to repipe it.  Or at least praying it's only the water traps that crack.  We drained the lines, but the traps will still have water in them :/

It was 11F this morning, but it's up to 19 now.

 

Yes, freakin' cold!  Our outdoor temperature gauge is reading -4F right now.  My husband's big bad diesel truck broke down 10 minutes into his trip to work today - he thinks his fuel gelled up from the cold.  It is a nice bonus to have him home today!

 

Its cold here in NY too.  My girls had a 2 hour delay this morning for school because of the cold and the potential for icy roads.  Its supposed to be back up to the 40s by the end of the week though so I won't complain too much.  But then again I didn't start my day with a hat in the toilet at the doctors… then i would be whining with you.  Steph hope your day has improved after that craptastic start.

 

It is freezing. School cancelled for the second day. Work (I'm a lawyer) declared a casual, stay warm jeans day. But, in true Ohio fashion, may be in the 50s this weekend.

 

NE PA is also dealing with the same cold - it was -4 when I walked out of work this morning...of course my kids school cancelled at the last minute...I'm so freakin tired of my kids being home!  they had 2 weeks off for Christmas, which they shouldn't have had because of the teachers strike that kept them home the entire month of september...of course they're home so I can't sleep...
 
So they'll be in school until June f'in 30th...I still won't be sleeping and I may kill one of them if they don't stop FIGHTING AND WHINING!

 

My DH did not wear a suit yesterday or today.  I think he was planning on a sweater this morning, but I have no clue since I was asleep when he left the house at 6 am.

 

It's cold here!  The wind actually hurt my face this morning!  Our school was not cancelled, though the kids reported that 6 kids were out today.  A friend of mine reported that her children's class had half the children out.  I think Thursday we are supposed to get back into the 40's and then we can wonder why so many people are sick.
Stephanie, I hope the pipes unfreeze and I hope no one has had problems.  

 

it was the perfect day for the whole school board-wide computer system to decide to malfunction and toss out a FIRE ALARM! It was at 8:45 so not many kids in the building (bell is at 8:55) but day care kids weren't ready yet.  they did grab coats and some blankets but they were out in indoor shoes. 

 

I'm sorry about your pipes, Steph. That sucks. On the news tonight, they showed lots of people whose pipes had burst here locally too.
 
Yes, it is very cold. It was 2° this morning when I took the dog out. But I can handle this cold much better than the 32-40° damp, rainy cold we normally get this time of year which somehow seems much more bone chilling cold than this. Heck it was sunny and beautiful today. Just darn cold. My office had no heat so I got sent home. Bonus!
 
My poor parents are having a bout of it though. (They live in Northern Wisconsin.) Monday the low was -29° (not sure what the wind chill was but somewhere close to -50°). The high for the day was -21°. On their local news web page it actually said this, it will be MUCH WARMER today. The high was projected to be -4°! Relatively speaking I guess that was warmer but it made me laugh anyway.
 
Oh, and when I talked to her at 3:00 pm this afternoon it was still only -14° so I guess they didn't get as "warm" as they had thought!
 
Anyway, cold weather sucks. I would much rather be sweating in 90 degree weather than shivering in the cold.

 

Our windchills last night in Wisconsin were 60-65 below :nea:

 

Not that cold here, in the teens at night, 30's during the day. I think it's supposed to be back in the 50's/60's in a day or two. But oh my god the locals are freaking the f. out.    Every business I go into has the heat CRANKED so I'm sweating everywhere I go and people are bundled up like they are going on an Arctic trek.  Good ole Florida.   I know I'm used to the cold being a crazy Northerner but c'mon, it's not that cold.

 

Cold here in central PA - below 0 this AM. DD school cancelled today, 2 hr delay tomorrow. My DH works outside part of the day and his eye froze shut this morning!

 

I'm in Virginia....they said it was the coldest weather we have had in 20 years.  Actual temps last night were about 1-2 degrees, and with wind chills, it was -20.  That is crazy cold for here.  All the local schools were on a 2-hr delay yesterday and will be again tomorrow.
 
It's supposed to be in the upper mid-30's tomorrow and the mid-50's by the weekend, which is warmer than normal for January.  Crazy!

 

High 50s this morning and 62 by the time we left for school.

 

Cold here also (SE Michigan).  Kids haven't had school for three days and I have worked from home the past three days.  It is a heat wave today, we are at 1 degree.  I would rather deal with the snow we had on sunday/monday instead of these cold temps.  Over here they only use salt on the roads and salt doesn't work at these low temps so all the roads are glare ice.  We are supposed to warm up starting this afternoon so hopefully the road can get cleared up. 
 
Stay warm everyone!

 

Drive-by posting:

I'm about to lose my ever loving mind. My on-demand water heater has a split heat exchanger. The hx cannot be replaced and is not under warranty. I have to buy a whole new water heater. They're $900 MY cost (contractor rate). I'm shaking right now.

 

Oh man, really? I'm sorry. That just sucks. No other way to put it.

 

The cold I'm used to, it's the heat in the summer that makes me hunker down in my house! If we have too many days above 100, I'm ready to melt and don't want to do anything because it's too hot!
 
What I'm wondering about is all the freezing pipes. I know the temperatures some of you are having are much colder than your area is used to. Are building codes different depending on state or region? The temps most of you are sharing are normal winter temps for us (the way below zero ones we get as well, just not all the time) and we never, or very rarely, have bursting pipes. Do the pipes not have to buried as far down in the (typically) warmer regions? Is it the type of pipe that differs? I really know nothing about building codes/materials, it just seems weird to have so many stories of broken pipes due to the cold.
 
Oh, and our temps right now are nice. Sorry some of you have such extreme temps!

 

I know my mom and dad's house in WI is insulated way more than our house here in TN. And they also have a basement which also makes a difference. Houses up north are built to withstand these temps. Not so much down south. We need to take precautions here when the weather gets so bitterly cold to help make sure our pipes don't freeze like leaving the door under the sink open at night, letting the faucet drip cold water (just a trickle) all night, etc. Our schools are still closed here today since several are dealing with burst water pipes and heating that went out.

 

I think our water pipe is 6 or 8 inches below ground here in south carolina.  So if we have several days of below freezing temps, it's going to freeze down to my pipes.  As Kim said, my house is not insulated for such cold weather, and my windows aren't made to keep heat in/cold out as well. 

 

Yeah, in colder climes the insulation is better and the building codes require that you don't have pipes on outside walls. The water main is buried quite far down, and comes up through the basement. Houses also have a lot more insulation up here. But mainly, no pipes above the freezing line.

 

The good news is that my carefully controlled rage has got a senior member of the manufactuer's warranty department scrambling. Maybe, *maybe* I'll get another unit for free. I'll still have to install it, but that's something.

The bad news is that there's no resolution today. Maybe tomorrow.

I'm feeling very emotional over hot water. I wonder if I'm PMSing?

 

No you're just dirty from your bird baths.

 

Building codes are definitely different.  Above ground water pipes are all over the place here.

 

Babe, you have no idea. Come love on me and see just how fresh I am.

 

To properly demonstrate your freshness, you need to play tennis, run through a field of wildflowers or ride a horse.

 

Thanks all. I figured codes had to be different, but never gave it much thought until this recent cold wave and everything I'm hearing on the news.