It's A Marshmallow World

It's time for play, it's a whipped cream day, I wait for it the whole year round. I guess Dean Martin meets Bing Crosby today. As the French would say, "Il neige". What I'm trying to say is that it's snowing again here in Colorado right now. This year, we had our 1st real white Christmas that I can recall! Back at home on the East Coast, there have been pretty dustings of snow a couple of times on Christmas day, but never a real holiday snowstorm like this.

A common misconception is that Denver is snowy and mountainous, but it's actually on the Western edge of the high prairie. In fact, the Eastern edge of the city is flat and resembles Kansas. As such, White Christmases here are actually fairly rare here in the city itself, and you must often head West of the city and into the Rocky Mts to find appreciable snow.

If you define a true White Christmas as having one inch of snow on the ground, the chances of having one out here are about 35%. But if, like me, you consider a White Christmas as one with a measurable snowfall, the chance drops to 10%. Check out this map for the odds of seeing flakes in your part of the US on any given December 25th.

The blankets of snow sure make things cozy. There's a pot of bean soup on the stove. There's a new Cribbage set in this house--a Christmas present from me--which will be put to good use over steaming mugs of hot chocolate splashed with Bailey's. It's a toss up between Cribbage or Scrabble now. My newfound love for Mah Jong came a little late for my holiday shopping list, but there's always next year for a new set.

My high-altitude baking adventures out here have gone well, as evidenced by a batch of popovers (the 1st I've tried making out here) that puffed and swelled to my delight, thanks to an extra egg. Here's a 'lil baking advice from up high: decrease the sugar, decrease the fat, increase the egg, increase the liquid, increase the flour except in cookies, and crank up that oven a little higher.

Heading south to New Mexico tomorrow, for adventures on the Turquoise Trail in the Land of Enchantment. My mind is dancing with images of southwestern azure blue skies, cacti, Pueblo ruins, turquoise jewelry, hatch green chile peppers and Georgia O'Keefe paintings. So long for now!