A Christmas Party and some cold weather

What a Christmas season! We have a ton of fresh snow which had everyone out shoveling, plowing and snowblowing. Add to that a bitter cold snap with temperatures dropping to 40 below and you have a real northern winter. We don’t have many “official” thermometers on the North Fork, just a lot of semi-official “Monkey Ward” thermometers so reports ranged from 32 below to 45 below zero. That did not include any wind chill so you know it was really cold. This is harder to deal with than any amount of snow.

With 30 below or colder you burn a lot more propane or wood to stay warm. Worse, generators, cars and snowblowers may not start and you have to just hunker down and wait for moderating weather. That is always what I did, but some folks like to fight back.

Even with the snow and cold, the county did a great job of clearing the main road and most folks cleared their driveways to enjoy a fantastic get-together at Sondreson Hall.

Mark and Margaret Heaphy and Jan Caldwell were the main hosts but they had a lot of help. Tom Holycross plowed the parking lot — twice. Others helped with decorating the hall and keeping the fire going.

And the food!

Ray Brown did a monstrous ham and there were turkeys and a ton of side dishes. Same with desserts which filled two tables. I estimated 80 folks filling the tables with laughter and filling themselves to capacity.

As usual, Joe Novak made a quantity of great gravy.

After dinner we were regaled with Christmas songs rendered by folks who could really sing and accompanied by folks of varying ability. I am such a lousy singer I just lip-synced, but I and everyone else enjoyed the meal and the company of great friends and neighbors.

I drove from town for the celebration and returned Christmas night. Even though I thought the road was good and I had no trouble there were two cars in the ditch — the result of poor tires or bad driving. The weather has warmed up this week and that is when the road can be really treacherous. Water on ice can defeat the best drivers, so I hope everyone is careful and lives to see the New Year!