The month just ended gave us a good kick in the wallet, with below-normal temperatures sucking heat from our houses and burning up costly fossil fuel to put it back. Here are the numbers:

The month began very cold, with 14 of the first 15 days coming in colder than the average. There were five more cold days after that, but the last six days averaged well above normal. The coldest day was the 14th, which averaged just 20 degrees - 17 degrees below the average for the date. The warmest was the 29th, averaging 45 degrees, or 11 degrees above average.

All told, we finished at 34 degrees, 2.7 degrees below the long-term average for a December at Baltimore-Washington International Airport.

The month was wetter than average, too, with 3.9 inches of melted precipitation, a bit more than half an inch above the norm. Some of that fell in the form of snow. We finished with six inches in all at BWI, well above the 1.7-inch average. The snowiest day was the 9th, with 2.2 inches.

No new records were set. The wettest day was Dec. 15, when 1.23 inches of rain fell at the airport. The second-wettest was Christmas Day, with darn near an inch (0.91 inch, to be exact) falling.

There were 93 "degree-days," 10 percent above the average. That means the demand for heat energy was 10 percent higher than in the "normal" December. Add to that the sky-high cost of natural gas and oil this season and you get a big hole in your budget. My own gas bill set a new personal record. I've turned the heat down, and we're all now wearing sweaters around the house. I'm even throwing a wool blanket over my lap when I read or watch TV. I feel like an old coot.

The coldest reading at BWI in December was 15 degrees, on Dec. 14. The warmest was 58 degrees on Christmas Eve.