Christmas Eve Eve

That's how I've thought of December 23 ever since I was a little kid, just one of those odd things that sticks in your mind from childhood. Today was a pretty good one, just colder than usual. We're recovering from a snowstorm that swept through the area yesterday. Now, those of you who live in more northern climes than Texas probably wouldn't consider two to three inches of snow and drifts twice that deep to be much of a snowstorm. But it was pretty white for around here and cold to boot, down in the upper teens. Supposed to be even colder tonight. I've seen the temperature here go below zero only once in my 51 years, and it's been down in the single digits maybe a dozen times. We were lucky yesterday and the roads didn't get very bad, for which I was quite thankful since I had to be out on them last night. The last two times I tried to drive on icy roads I got stuck, and I don't want to repeat that experience, thank you. That's a skill that I just don't have.

I finished Ian Rankin's KNOTS AND CROSSES. Frank Denton comments positively on Rankin lower on this page and hopes that I'll read more of his work. Based on this one, I certainly will, since I enjoyed it quite a bit. I'll admit that overall I like books set in the United States better than those set in England or Scotland (a reversal from my early days as a mystery fan, when I read all the Saint books and many Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham, and John Creasey novels). But these days I don't mind reading an occasional book set in the UK. While John Rebus doesn't seem quite as compelling a character as Harry Bosch, to compare him to another in the semi-burned-out cop genre, I liked him well enough. And KNOTS AND CROSSES is short and fairly fast-moving, always a plus as far as I'm concerned.