We had rain most of yesterday mixed with heavy, wet snow. The roads were messy and at least one of our neighbors couldn't make it up the grade past our house. Her husband and grandson were able to come and rescue her with their 4-wheel drive, fortunately. We spoke with our road commissioner in Cabot and he said the crews had been "up on the Plains" at least eight times by then, about 4:30 p.m. It was difficult keeping the roads passable, I guess.

I took this picture of the north end of the pond that we can see from our living room window. You can see the snow/ice patterns made by the strong south winds we had yesterday. Today is calm, the thermometer is reading 33 degrees and the sun is bright, so there will be a bit of a meltdown at least for a while, but our holiday weather picture is more of the same - snow, rain, or a mix, through the weekend.

This second picture is of our front yard, looking onto W. Shore Rd. and across to Rt. 15. We still have plenty of snow on our hills, but there will probably be some bare spots later today, and maybe even open water again. It would be rare for the pond to freeze over just once and remain frozen. We still expect to see open water at least in the big pond again before it closes in for the winter.

I wonder if any of you have any ideas that would explain the rash of burglaries and arson fires we've had lately? I'm a little surprised there has been nothing posted on the "Comments" page about it. Is it the economy that is the underlying cause? TV? stupidity? or just plain cussedness? Darned if I know . . .