The Pipes

"Oh, Danny Boy! The Pipes! The pipes are caaaalling!"

Just kidding. Talk of pipes just made me start singing an Irish classic from my Sheldon High School days:

Magnificent sunset behind the school.

I missed some excitement while I was away for the weekend. Just like most of the other cities across the west (or country), Caldwell is experiencing an extreme cold-snap. FUN! Nights especially, but days too, have routinely been temperatures in the single-digits. Absolutely frigid... We finally got several inches of beautiful snow over the weekend, which at least makes the appearance of outside a lot better! (I'm from Oregon: anything beyond half-an-inch of frost is an exciting novelty! And Eugene got seven inches this week!?)

Cute dorm chapel.

I was still in Walla Walla on Monday, but later Gem State students recounted the events of their early morning to me: two portions of pipes in our good *old* dorm had about as much as they could handle and BROKE around 6:00am (one on boys' hall, and one by the kitchenette), resulting in a gushing flood in both locations... and the blaring fire alarm. A c-c-cold dorm evacuation promptly followed. Poor people. Deans and students staggered outside, it was still dark, and it was very cold. Dean Fitting and Dean Morauske spent the entire remainder of the day in bundled layers and snow pants, racing around with the repairman, trying to get the water and heat back.

By nightfall on Monday, only shortly after my return, the water was temporarily off again, and the boilers were barely revived. Shop-Vacs were roaring in the kitchenette and upstairs, sucking up the standing water from the flood. After so long without circulating heat, the dorm was pretty chilly, even in the lobby with the fireplace and consolidated activity of the students. It was even icier upstairs on the kids' halls! Most of us congregated downstairs with our puffy coats, blankets, and even gloves! It was a memorable (venture to say... festive?) evening.

Study hall and worship were held in the heated cafeteria. We even entertained the idea of letting all the ladies sleep in there... But thinking of the required supervision and preparation for such an experience... was too daunting. Besides, after getting toasty and warm in the cafeteria, it was more feasible to stay bundled and snuggly in our own beds, getting a better night's sleep, most likely. We sent two *separate* groups of ladies and gents traipsing over to the Ad. Building locker rooms around 9:30 and 10pm, for those who desired hot showers this night.

The thing is, our building is heated in a very, very antiquated (AND INEFFICIENT!) way: by water. Water heats up in the furnaces underground and then circulates via pipes throughout the dorm, warming registers in each student's room without posing a fire-threat. Brilliant. But as it is, the heating registers are fairly weak and unreliable. Especially after a day-long hiatus in this weather, there's no way the icy pipes could sustain heated water on its way up into the building! Dean Fitting shut off the shower circuit for the night so that the boilers could focus on heating the building first, instead of the plumbing. When he turned the circuit back on at 5am, sure enough, showers were miraculously warm for us when we got up! And the dorm was a little warmer, too. Hooray!!!

I'm sure we've got nothing on Mt. Ellis Academy in Bozeman, Montana, where my good friend Ian is deaning and teaching. He told me he had a kid with frostbite this week. Can't top that. But here, things continue to improve, and I even went to sleep last night without camping socks and a hooded sweatshirt on! At least we have had electricity through it all. Thank you, Jesus. :)

Winter at GSAA

The Assistant Deans Posse :)
Such a difference from college-- nobody drives yet!
We almost have the lot to ourselves!