EDITOR’S NOTE: Informer editor Andrew Perzo is on vacation and will return Jan. 1. Today’s column features questions and answers that first appeared earlier this year and in 2007.

Has it ever snowed in Lake Charles on Christmas Day?

Not as far as the National Weather Service knows.

According to data compiled by the local weather service office, Lake Charles has never had a white Christmas — at least not in the 100 or so years covered by the agency’s records.

We came closest in 1989, when less than a half-inch of snow fell on the area three days before the holiday.

Measurable snowfalls, ranked from greatest to least, according to data posted online by the local weather service office:

Feb. 14-15, 1895 — 22 inches.

Feb. 12-13, 1960 — 5 inches.

Jan. 11, 1973 — 4 inches.

Jan. 23, 1940 — 3.4 inches.

Jan. 22, 1935 — 3 inches.

Jan. 30, 1949 — 2.4 inches.

Jan. 23, 1948 — 2 inches.

Feb. 7, 1988 — 1.6 inches.

Feb. 12, 1958 — 1.2 inches.

Jan. 19, 1978 — 1 inch.

Jan. 31-Feb. 1, 1951 – 0.6 inches.

Dec. 11, 2008 — 0.4 inches.

Feb. 23, 1968 — 0.3 inches.

Jan. 18, 1940 — 0.3 inches.

Dec. 4, 2009 — 0.2 inches.

Dec. 22, 1989 — 0.2 inches.

Jan. 13, 1982 — 0.2 inches.

Weather service calculations show that Lake Charles — along with Lafayette and Beaumont, Texas — see measurable amounts of snow every 6.76 years.

• Online: www.srh.noaa.gov/lch/?n=snowclimo.

D’Hemecourt song released in 1990

Is there a Cajun “Twelve Days of Christmas”?

Yes.

The song, performed by Jules “Tee Jules” d’Hemecourt, appears on “Merry Cajun Christmas: Volumes 1 and 2,” released by Swallow Records in 1990.

The items given throughout “dem” 12 days:

• A crawfish in a fig tree.

• Two voodoo dolls.

• Three stuffed shrimp.

• Four pousse-cafe.

• Five poules d’eau.

• Six cypress knees.

• Seven fleur-de-lis.

• Eight crabs a brewin’.

• Nine oysters stewin’.

• Ten pirogue paddles.

• Eleven duck decoys.

• Twelve shotgun shells.

The items — the first seven refer to birds — that feature in the traditional song:

• A partridge in a pear tree.

• Two turtle doves.

• Three French hens.

• Four colly birds (blackbirds).

• Five gold rings (ring-necked pheasants, not jewelry).

• Six geese a-laying.

• Seven swans a-swimming.

• Eight maids a-milking.

• Nine ladies dancing.

• Ten lords a-leaping.

• Eleven pipers piping.

• Twelve drummers drumming.

The song, which has been around for several hundred years, reportedly originated in France and later became popular in England — though that popularity has waxed and waned over the years.

“Such good old carols as the ‘Twelve Days of Christmas,’ although now banished to the nursery, were formerly great favourites, and were played as forfeit games, each player in turn having to repeat the gifts of a day, incurring a forfeit for every mistake. …,” reads the “Monthly Chronicle of North-Country Lore and Legend,” published in London in 1888.

“This old carol was early in the century a favourite New Year’s pastime in the North of England, but has almost died out of memory.”

Another version of the song — the one presented in the “Monthly Chronicle” — rearranges the order of the gifts presented after the milking maids and instead lists nine drummers, 10 pipers, 11 ladies and 12 lords.

The Informer answers questions from readers each Sunday, Monday and Wednesday. It is researched and written by Andrew Perzo, an American Press staff writer. To ask a question, call 494-4098, press 5 and leave voice mail, or email informer@americanpress.com.