Barbara J. Hamby

Happy Holidays

This is a very strange Christmas for us. We haven’t left the premises since last Friday. We still have too much snow and ice in our parking lot for us to walk around safely. Since we were invited to Floyd’s family’s traditional Christmas Eve crab and spaghetti dinner, and could not be there, I cooked spaghetti tonight. I had no ground meat, so I cut up a pork steak into the sauce. We ate it by candlelight in honor of the season, not because we don’t have power. We are among the lucky ones who have had electricity all during this severe snowstorm.

If we are still snowed in tomorrow, our menu will be non-traditional and consist of whatever we have in the freezer or refrigerator that sounds most tempting. We will light more than the two candles we had tonight.

After more than a foot of snow, our temperature finally got above freezing today to allow some thawing. Most of the trees are green again; drooping branches have snapped back into place and water is dripping from the roofs and the cars. If the mercury drops below freezing tonight, it will be really messy with all the slush on the roads frozen.

Our housekeeper was unable to get here on Tuesday and my vacuum cleaner is not working, so we’ll start the New Year with a less than spotless house. We will probably have some delayed celebrations.

Happy Holidays to all my readers!