Even before this week’s snowstorm, freezing temperatures were wreaking havoc around town. The Booth Library wound up closing for several days after a pipe froze, broke and water poured through the ceiling near the main circulation desk.

Judy Volpe’s Avance Esthetiques in Sand Hill Plaza was closed this week for renovations after a frozen sprinkler pipe burst and poured hundreds of gallons of water through the ceiling into her day spa.

Judy got a call at home on Sunday morning from Sue at Radio Shack after a passerby noticed water gushing through the front door of the spa. By the time Judy got to the store, the flood had triggered an alarm, bringing several fire trucks to the scene. The firefighters ripped off the front door to get inside, where the water was already three inches deep.  Although the water damaged much of the interior of the spa along with the furniture and the inventory, workers were busy this week trying to get everything ready for reopening by the weekend. The irony of it all, Judy said, is that she expects her business to be in this location for only a few more months. She anticipates moving by May 1 into a new, much larger location in the plaza’s enclosed mini-mall area. “I’m trying to look at the positive side,” Judy said. “I’m doing a major spring cleaning.”

The weather was causing problems for lots of other people as well, including Anita Harris, who was driving on Castle Hill last Friday at about noon when she skidded and lost control of her car, which flipped over. She was able to get partially out of the car, but not all the way. Two passers-by stopped to assist her until the ambulance crew arrived, and they took off their own coats in the sub-freezing temperatures to cover Anita as she lay on the ground. The ambulance crew arrived and took Anita to Danbury Hospital to get checked out, and the two anonymous Good Samaritans got their coats back and went on their way.

Fire Marshal George Lockwood and secretary Nancy Kokoski arrived at work long before everyone else Wednesday morning. The rest of the town staff was told to come in an hour later than normal to allow the roads to be cleared. The phone chain never reached George and Nancy.

Newtown High School boys’ basketball coach John Quinn spent all day Tuesday in Atlanta’s Hartsfield Airport. This week’s storm left him stranded there overnight. Fortunately, the Nighthawks’ game against Brookfield, scheduled for Tuesday, was postponed. John said he almost had to sleep in the street because all the hotels were booked because of this week’s Super Bowl. He did finally find a hotel room, and no he was not forced to share it with John Candy. John (Quinn, that is) was back in town by Wednesday and vowed he would never leave town again during the basketball season.

While most Newtowners seemed to stay off the streets during Tuesday’s snow storm, Don Elmer took to the sidewalks… with his snow-blower. The Main Street resident was spotted chewing through the four inches that covered the walkways in front of Booth Library and the Inn at Newtown. “I’m just having fun,” he said of his good deed. Don covered much of Main Street’s sidewalks heading south, and then turned around and headed back up the other side. A half-hour later, Don was spotted crossing in front of the flagpole.

Sue Shpunt contacted The Bee this week demanding a retraction to my announcement in last week’s Top of the Mountain that Bill Halstead recently turned 50. I was apparently wrong. He’s actually 51. Sorry, Bill, you’re even older than I thought.

William Wordsworth once wrote of examinations as a time “when the man was weighed as in a balance of excessive hopes, tremblings withal and commendable fears…” Students at Newtown High School might have been able to relate a little to the British bard this week, as it was time for midterm exams. Lucky for us that high school sophomore Andrew Rote was able to capture a little bit of the mayhem in his piece on “Midterm Blues” that appears in this week’s education section. When asked how he approached the biannual ritual, Andrew said this week that he prefers looking over review packets, which many teachers supply on the days leading up to the tests. “Usually I start [studying] a week before,” he explains. “This year I had a lot more work to do, so I got started back when we had our long weekend a while ago.”

I think I’ll take my lead from Andrew and get started now on my column for next week, so be sure to…

Read me again.