Our chances of a White Christmas look pretty good. We’ve got a substantial blanket now, and more is expected overnight. It’s always possible that it could still melt off before Christmas, but the balance of power has tipped.

I may very likely have to shovel snow in the morning.

It was a frustrating weekend. I’d planned to do some Christmas shopping, but Mrs. Hermanson failed me. (I mentioned this problem a few days ago, but it got worse.) The Chevy Tracker has an ignition system that requires the operator to depress the clutch while turning the key. Lately I’d been having trouble with it. It had been taking several minutes of repeated attempts to finally get her to turn over (my leg’s still stiff from bearing down on the clutch). The thing was, I’d had this sort of problem before, especially in cold weather, so I didn’t figure it was serious. But Saturday I found myself stranded in a shopping center parking lot. So I called AAA, and they towed me to a shop where (thank the Lord) a loaner was available. They didn’t get to my car until today.

Not surprisingly, it turned out not to be the simple thing the mechanics predicted, but something about twice as expensive. Add in some other prudent maintenance steps they suggested, most of which I had to admit were necessary, and I dropped three Cs today.

Ah well. That’s why God gave us credit cards.