My new user picture, not exactly smiling at you from the top right of this page, is precisely one year old. Last Christmas Eve, we drove up Mt. Lemmon, a little past Windy Point, to play in the newly fallen snow.

It was the perfect prelude to the evening's festivities with Kim's parents and her brother Kim's family (see kdotdammit's entry about Vertigo a few weeks back for clarification). We got plenty of exercise -- always important during the stress-inducing holidays -- and Skylar was able to overcome her conviction that it couldn't really be Christmas without the white stuff.

Interestingly, it was only the third Christmas Eve or Christmas in which I experienced appreciable snow.

The first time was a beautiful night in Pennsylania, as I watched the Miami Dolphins -- Bob Griese era -- battle the Houston Oilers -- Earl Campbell era. It was actually falling pretty thick for a while, out outdoor floodlights illuminating the show.

Every year it seemed like the threat of snow might prevent my mother's mother and sister from coming on Christmas Day, but they always made it.

We actually got a lot of snow some winters, but it came after the holidays.

The second time was in Germany. It didn't snow on the holiday, but there was some snow on the ground from earlier in the week. Trudging through the snow to a Baroque chapel for a Christmas Eve service made the quantity seem more significant.

This year, sadly, it's warm enough to swim and there's no sign of snow on the mountain. And the place we went last year was incinerated in the past summer's huge fire.

But we did get to see snow in D.C. I even had a chance to shovel a bit.

Mode: lead-legged
Muse: Carpenters' Christmas CD in the other room