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Thousands skip school and work for 'Seahawk fever'

SEATTLE — Thousands of Seahawk fans left empty offices and classrooms behind to be a part of the city’s historic parade.  Meetings were cancelled as people came down with a 24-hour case of “Seahawk fever”.

Seats were easy to find at Yummy Tummy Teriyaki in Everett.  Owners usually depend on the shift change at Boeing for their lunchtime crowd. “Nobody came.  Only one customer here," said owner Jamie Song. "I would say 20 percent, a lot of them are gone, "said Boeing employee Ann Holmes.  She showed up to empty cubicles and desks at the plane plant. "In fact one of my meetings got postponed a week because half of the people who were supposed to be there were gone," she said.

Parents also pulled their kids out of school.  Some 50 percent of students skipped class at Kamiak High School in Mukilteo.  Absences were up 300 percent across the Everett school district.  More than 4,700 students were missing by the first bell. "It seems like no one's here.  There's no one around.  In Marysville, there's no one there," said Marysville Pilchuk High School student Conner Hansler.

Stores that stayed open were wide open—just like their parking lots. The drive time from Everett to Seattle—which peaked at 90 minutes—was still an hour when the parade started.  Some reveled in the chance to run errands—in the opposite direction. "I just posted on Facebook that the good thing about the parade today, is that the mall is empty,"  said Lynnwood shopper Natalie Lorenz.

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