The Longest Night

Today, on Friday, December 22, at 3:27AM GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) the winter solstice occurred. That was in Greenwich, England. Here, where I live, in central Virginia, USA, the winter solstice occurred yesterday at 10:27PM. "So what?" you ask. So this:

The night of the winter solstice is the longest night of the year. Beginning today, our nights will grow shorter and our days will grow longer. On a solstice, one of the earth's poles reaches its maximum tilt away from the sun. This happens twice a year, in June and December. If it's winter where you live, you experience the winter solstice, with the longest night and shortest day, at this time of the year. If it's summer where you live, you experience the summer solstice, with the longest day and shortest night, at this time of the year.

Nights are cold here, so the longest night means I burn the most heating oil. In fact, I can hear the boiler in the basement running right at this moment, burning a gallon of fuel oil per hour. When I recently filled up the oil tank, they put in about 300 gallons for the low, low price of $4.40 per gallon. I have to fill the tank twice each winter. If it sounds expensive, let me tell you about the annual event called "maintenance" which involves cleaning out soot, replacing the fuel nozzle, replacing the fuel filter, and adjusting the spacing of the ignition rod tips. I may have omitted a few items.

Nuria just came in. She's been out with Carmen, one of her girl friends. Nuria brought me lunch. It's Mexican food. There was rice and black beans. There was a dish with strips of sauteed green Bell pepper and white onion, and strips of grilled chicken and beef. There were several sauces, including green hot sauce that I have eaten with oriental meals. There was more, including soft tacos, or perhaps they were tortillas; I'm not sure what they were.  Here's a bonus fact: the Aztecs and other Nahuatl speakers called tortillas tlaxcalli. Regardless, it was a lot of food. I was able to eat about half of it. 

The shopping centers are crazy busy now. You wouldn't want to go near one. I can't even imagine what Saturday and Sunday will be like. But I suspect that some people actually thrive on all the busy-ness happening at this time of the year. More power to them, but don't make me a part of it.