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Try answering this without any rationalization:
In my middle school science lab, a thermometer showed me that water boiled at 99.5 degrees C and not 100. Why?
I suspect you have a point that I'm missing.
My take is: either the reading was wrong (experimental error of some kind), or it wasn't wrong. If it wasn't wrong, then your water was boiling at a 99.5 degrees. There are a number of plausible explanations for the latter; the one that I assign the highest prior to is that you were at an elevation higher than sea level.
So, my answer is in the form of a probability distribution. Give me more evidence, and I will refine it, or demand and answer now, and I will tell you "altitude", my current most plausible candidate (experimental error is my second candidate, first with how (where in the water) you measured, then with the quality of the thermometer. After that trails things like impurities in the water).