Winding Down the Year

Time moves on and no blogging occurs. Actually, the days between the end of school and Christmas passed in a blur of running errands and getting ready for the holidays.

A trip to Palm Desert on the 21st was unfortunately cancelled. Still, a heavy snow storm that day and over the weekend created some good "burrowing" time at home in front of the fireplace.



This also gave us time to get those holiday cards addressed and packages wrapped.

Christmas came and went with a lot of cooking. I produced probably the best set of green chile, chicken enchiladas that I've ever done, followed by three dozen Lebanese butter cookies and a pan of rum soaked sticky buns. Oh yeah, I'm just Mr. Domestic this year.

After the food coma lifted, houseguests arrived from cold, snowy upstate York. On arrival they found themselves in... yep, you guessed it, cold, snowy New Mexico.

Many people have the impression that because Albuquerque is in the Southwest, its weather must resemble that of say, Phoenix; i.e. winter averages in the high-sixties, low seventies. Not so.

Although we average about 300 days of sunshine per year, central New Mexico also averages about 10-14 inches of snow a year. At the higher elevations (such as our house at 6300 feet), even more snow accumulates.

Of course, this year (because we just moved here no doubt), snowfall thus far is about triple that amount. This means that while there will be no pool-time for the weary travelers, there will also be no sunburn to take back East either. Fewer questions that way.