Is it just me, or does this blog seem to have taken on a heavily food-oriented bias? Not to be outdone I include herewith a picture of the sideboard for "Christmas in Kabul" in preparation. There were of course several other dishes and a number of other things on the table -- tinned cranberry sauce, quince jelly, and so on. And none of it, needless to say, contained Spelt, Flax Seed, or other foodsubsitute items. And you guys always wondered why I secreted away ginger snaps and fig bars! I hesitate to wonder aloud why, exactly, the fixation in food. None of us appears to be terribly underfed!

Ah well. I am able to post this morning because of one of the phenomena of life in Afghanistan. The office is powered by a generator (actually there are three -- a primary, a back-up, and a teeny one to keep the computer room running at night). Everything was good. Until it got cold. And by cold, what I mean is that it has not reached 0 degrees (celsius) day or night in a couple of weeks. Of course one of the things that happened was that electrical heaters sprouted like mushrooms in the offices of the HEP. So far, okay, except..... Apparantly when the generators were sized and installed, the load calculations were based on June's weather conditions! So I am at the residence this morning while the generator folk come in to split circuits, move things around, and so on in hopes of dealing with small problems like dim lights, straining computers, and so on. One of the things I will quite enjoy on leaving here is the prospect of flipping a switch and having the glow of lights instantly at hand, without crossing my fingers and holding my breath every time! The other is working toilets, but let's not go there.

Matthew, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for having this idea. Food fixations aside, this is very nice. More photos of Ema please, and in the next batch kneel down and shoot upwards so we get the REST of Keiko in the picture!