That is always confusing to me. If I am on a bus stop: “This bus” doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t exist yet. Next bus, is the next occurance of event “Bus”.

If it’s Wednesday, the “this Friday” doesn’t really make sense. There doesn’t exist a Friday in Wednesday, that you call this. Next Friday however is quite clear - it’s next occurrence of event “Friday” on the timeline, so it’s the one in two days.

from their parents

Is that the case though? I thought children home = parentless children? It is potentially quite a better outcome for those particular kids

Not sure where you are in the US, but that is definitely not my experience. Cars usually stop the moment I stop on the side of the road. At least In California