Tidings...

 

"Its December the 24th, and I'm longing to be up North..."

So sings Neil Diamond in his version of 'White Christmas'. In Denver the temps have been in the 60's over the last few days and on the Winter Solstice it was probably as warm here as in Phoenix. In the mountains its a completely different story. What would the Holidays be in Colorado without a snowstorm to snarl all those travelers heading to grandma's to sample some homemade pumpkin pie.

I'm staying put for Christmas which seems to make sense given our newest iteration of Covid. Omicron (really, who comes up with these names?) has swept in faster than Santa on his sleigh and it didn't even need ole' Rudolph to lead the way. My wife and I are supposed to head to Florida for an organized bike tour in January and the last thing we need is to catch something named after the 15th letter in the Greek alphabet. The naming system used by the World Health Organization supposedly makes public communication about the virus easier and less confusing which I guess is true because most of us are still scratching our heads trying to figure out how to properly pronounce it. 

But its Christmas (or Kwanza, Hanukkah, Pancha Ganapati (Hindu), Modraniht (Saxon), Saturnalia (Roman), Yule (Pagan), Soyal (Zuni and Hopi), etc.). Suffice it to say there's a whole lot of us celebrating something this time of year and whatever it is that's special to you and yours I'll simply say "Happy Holidays". As I write this I'm looking out the window and its actually starting to rain which is definitely not what one would expect in the Mile High City the day before Christmas. Maybe there really is something to all this hoopla around climate change? Just saying. 

Anyway, I'll leave you with the following 'Christmas Postcard' sampling some of the sights and scenes of the holiday season:

Hopefully you've created some happy memories of your own this season. Since I started with a song lyric I'll just close with another: "We wish you a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year!" which hearkens back to the grand old year of 1500 which I don't think had any Greek letters featuring prominently. It did however have many Christians in Europe believe that the apocalypse was due to occur though a mistaken misinterpretation of the Book of Revelation. Aaahhh, the more things change...