Carson Nugget serves up 4,500 Christmas meals

For the 42nd year in a row, the Coffee Shop in the Carson Nugget has offered free Christmas dinners to anyone who told the cashier, "I am a guest of the Nugget." Christmas of 2000 was no exception.

"This has been one of our better Christmases. It was busier than we expected," said Nugget Executive Sous Chef John Clark on Monday night.

The Nugget dished out 1,500 pounds of turkey meat, 500 pounds of ham, 50 gallons of giblet gravy and about 400 pumpkin, apple and mincemeat pies.

Clark estimates the coffee shop served between 4,500 to 5,000 Christmas meals and 1,300 to 1,400 to the needy.

"It's been fun," Clark said.

Across the nation it was Christmas as usual, or as unusual for some.

For Peter Deng and Clement Garang, Christmas this year had an extra special element: snow.

The teenage refugees from Sudan, two of 3,600 the U.S. State Department hopes to settle in America within a year, say they're fascinated by the almost mythical wet, white stuff.