Spring Sizzle: People Admit To Playing Hooky From Work, School To Enjoy Warm Weather

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- People were out enjoying the warm weather Wednesday, as temperatures soared into the 80s in many areas.

An air quality alert is in effect until 11 p.m., urging people to be careful not to overextend themselves in the heat.

For some people, the day was just too nice to stay inside, so they played hooky from work or school. Many said they earned it after the cold, wet days they endured in April.

As CBS2's Elise Finch reported, it seemed everywhere you look in Rye people were eating lunch outside, enjoying the park or getting sun at the beach. Quite a few of them were ditching work to make it happen.

"I called in sick, I emailed this morning at 6 in the morning, 'I'm not coming to work,'" Ardsley resident Louis Bastion said. 

The broadcast engineer at the United Nations played hooky so he could take his 3-year-old daughter to the beach, and he convinced his wife, Alessandra, to join them.

"You just need some Vitamin D and relaxation sometimes. It's necessary to survive," she said.

Others felt the same way, because they also skipped work so they could play.

"I should be at work at a salon I own in Mount Kisco," said one woman. "I had to go in to open the salon, so everybody saw me with my bathing suit on and my shorts. I was getting all kinds of dirty looks sneaking out, like bye!"

"I manipulated my schedule to give myself the day off," a man said.

"Since it's a family business, I just didn't show up," another added.

Finch also met seniors from an all-girls Catholic school who skipped class in celebration of so-called "senior skip day."

"Some people skipped at home or just stayed home. Forty of us came to the beach here, and we're just enjoying the beautiful day," one girl said.

"It was planned a couple weeks ago and then it just happened to be the perfect day and the hottest day of the year. So we're really happy it worked out," another added.

The first burst of summer weather for the season had plenty of people up biking and running through Central Park early Wednesday.

"Long overdue," Upper West Side resident Michael Ash told CBS2's Janelle Burrell. "I'm a big cyclist and I've been cycling since the middle of January."

Throughout the city with so many people opting to pedal their way to work in the mild breeze, available rental bikes have been scarce. Jackie Piccolo got the last one at one location, having to walk an extra 10 blocks from where she lives.

"I've been riding them since it's been 30 degrees out and this is the first time that this supply and demand issue has started," she said.

For those whose businesses depends on the weather, days like today are what they've been waiting for.

"You triple your sales basically," said Candilo Caraballo, who owns a cart on Central Park West where he is stocked with extra drinks and ice.

"Water sells like water," he said. "Spring till the end of July. It's heaven."

Temperatures are expected to climb even higher on Thursday. To see the full forecast, click here.