Unexpected Holiday

Phoenix, Arizona USA averages less than 10 inches of rain per year.  The whole city is paralyzed with an inch of rain in one hour.  Add to this gusting rains of 70 miles per hour (112 km per hour) and there are downed trees everywhere.  The road where the school that I work at had giant cranes removing trees and debris....without any street signals traffic was snarled everywhere.  The trip to arrive was hazardous.  When I arrived at the school, all the teachers were outside and most of the gates locked.  No power = No lights = No students = Holiday that will have to be made up later in the year.  Northern cities have 'snow days', we have 'rain days.'  It was such a relief for me.  I've been feeling super stressed and today was going to be a tough day.  Instead, I spent the day running back and forth to the store in search of an alarm clock that I can hear without hearing aides.  Three alarm clocks later I think I have a winner.  I will find out in the morning if it can wake me up.  I tried testing it by taking out my hearing aides and doing dishes when the alarm rang.  I have high hopes.  I didn't think it would be so difficult to find one loud enough.  One I purchased specifically so I could change the volume of the alarm.  Their idea of loud and mine don't match. I drew the line at the one that sounded like a fire alarm.  I didn't think starting the day with a panic attack was a good plan. 

I also spent time looking to replace the hard drive that died.  It is horrifying to open up the drive to work on wedding pictures and have them all gone.  The folder said there was nothing there.  Several hundred pictures gone.  I was ticked.  (Mildly angry.)  I knew I had a complete back up but it meant purchasing another one.  Fortunately, I did find the receipt on the bad drive.  Hopefully, I will get a refund for the one that is no longer working.  Hard drives are very important to me for storing all my pictures.  I am copying pictures now.  Six months worth of pictures will take 3 hours to copy.  Yup....lots of pictures.  Restoring back ups will take time.  I would love another day off but I don't think I will get it.  Fortunately, a 3 day weekend is coming up.  More time to resolve all the issues from the dead drive.  With hard drives, you don't ask, "What are you going to do if your hard drive dies?"  The correct question, "When your hard drive dies, where is your back up?"