Dec. 22: A recent history

While dawn breaks in DUBUQUE with an air temperature of minus-12 Fahrenheit, I am reminded that this time last year I was enjoying ENCHILADAS MINERAS (cheese enchiladas with potatoes, carrots and red sauce) under the sunny skies of GUANAJUATO, MEXICO (pictured).
HERE ARE SOME OTHER HIGHLIGHTS FROM PREVIOUS YEARS ON DECEMBER 22:
2006 -- We opened some Christmas gifts in Dubuque. One I received was the first season of "Ultraman" on DVD.
2005 -- My sister Inger arrived in Dubuque at 10 p.m., for a Christmas visit.
2004 -- The girls danced around while decorating the Christmas tree during a visit to Reno, Nev.
2003 -- Inger arrived in Iowa tonight. She brought me some CDs, including "Too Far to Care" by The Old 97's.
2002 -- We enjoyed a quiet day of listening to jazz albums in Farley, Iowa.
2001 -- Visiting Inger and I introduced the girls to The Beatles' "Yellow Submarine" cartoon film.
2000 -- Dubuque County's schools were closed because of extremely cold temperatures. Dubuque's daytime high was 1 degree Fahrenheit.
1999 -- After I misspelled another name in a newspaper article, the executive editor called me into his office to offer some advice: After writing a person's name in the reporter's notebook, have the person look at the written name to review the spelling. I have been doing it ever since.
1998 -- I interviewed a podiatrist about winter foot care, for a newspaper article.
1997 -- Freezing rain snarled traffic and closed schools throughout Iowa.
1996 -- I struggled to complete laying out the week's newspaper in Lakeview, Ore.
1995 -- With infant Kerstin, Jill and I drove from our Oregon home to my mom and stepdad's house in Sebastopol, Calif.
1994 -- I watched highlights of a Premier League match on television. Nottingham Forest defeated Manchester United, 2-1.
1993 -- I helped lay out the pages of the Christmas week newspaper in Lakeview, Ore.
1992 -- I covered a high school girls basketball game after helping to lay out the pages at the weekly newspaper in Lakeview, Ore.
1991 -- Jill and I attended a work Christmas party at the Casino Belle, a (now departed) riverboat gambling facility in Dubuque. Fans of the Green Bay Packers were talking about that day's firing of coach Lindy Infante.
1990 -- The daytime high temperature in Dubuque only managed to reach 0 Fahrenheit.
1989 -- I watched Frank Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life" in its entirety for the first time, after a busy day at work in Bel Marin Keys, Calif.
1988 -- Spent the day at a college apartment in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, listening to news reports about the previous day's mid-air explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 above Lockerbie, Scotland.