It took a while, but finally, around noon, the rain showers quit and the sun broke through giving us a beautiful day. The bad news is, the black flies are here! I knew it was time, the cherry trees are ready to bloom, and I knew our good luck not having to contend with any biting insects wouldn't last.

Fred is working on a new project. Ever since he and Jamie helped out one of our neighbors who couldn't receive signals from more than a couple television stations after the change over, Fred has been wanting to update our antenna so we could still get the local stations even when the satellite signal fails, as it often does in cloudy or stormy weather. He took down the big old antenna that's been on the roof for years and installed a cute little bristly thing - that works! Then Jamie said he and neighbor, Luke Persons, had tried a booster on Luke's setup, and that produced a much better picture - so last night when Bill Rossi suggested they go to St. Johnsbury today, Fred was up for it and made some calls to hardware stores and Radio Shack to see if he could find a booster.

While they were in St. Jay, they did other errands, like hunting for hermits at White Market, and returning some stuff I'd picked up at the mall earlier this week. Fred found a booster at Aubuchon Hardware to try. The good news is, with the right antenna, people can still get quite a lot of free TV. I've heard from quite a number of local folks who are retired, on a fixed income, and since the stations changed to broadcasting in HD, simply don't have any reception at all. I guess it has to do with location, among other things. One elderly lady in Marshfield said she lives alone and really misses it - TV was all the entertainment she has, but according to what she told me, she's had someone check it out and there just isn't a signal. Sort of like cell service in our area - lots of folks just don't have it.

Fred and Bill bumped into our Bill's wife, Monika, while at the mall. This is the end of her two week break. Then she'll be working at NVRH. I think she'll like it there, and it's close to home. Bill and Monika have invited us to their house in Waterford for Mother's Day. Bill said he's planned to have all my favorite food - shrimp and steak, I expect (!!!)

Another stop they made was to drop off some material Homer had given us about the Nenana Ice-Out in Alaska. A friend of his in Seward, Alaska sent him a bunch of stuff, including some complimentary tickets. Nobody here even came close, I guess - but the jackpot there was about $284,000, and there were two winners this year. While they were at Homer's, Rodney Sholan was busy getting helping Homer get his place place ready for summer. Rodney is a nice guy and a hard worker. That's him in the picture on the right.

As soon as Fred got home, we finished up the post on our garden steps that was broken when the weatherization trucks got stuck and slid into it last December. Nothing was broken, but it had to be dug out and reset and the hand rails reattached. Then Fred got back to the TV booster. He's quite at home on our roof, having spent quite a bit of time up there off and on over the years, cleaning the chimney, clearing snow on occasion, and working on the antenna and rotor. During the evening news, we compared reception, but I think we get a better picture without the booster. It's not sour grapes on my part; Fred admitted the picture seemed distorted. Maybe too much of a boost? I don't know what the next step will be, but right now Jamie is trying the booster on his setup. It's a guy thing, I guess.

I hear there's going to be more rain over the weekend, so it's good we had a break to get a few things accomplished today.

Sherry and Andre LaPrade are going to be here in a little over a week, and Phil and Joyce Rogers will be back next week, we think. George and Judy Anderson got home this week, but I think they've been pretty busy - we haven't seen or heard from them yet. Bryce and Esther Montgomery should be here by now, if I remember correctly when he said they'd arrive. Lots of folks back, and now we'll hope for more decent weather for them to get outside work done and docks in.

I notice there are quite a few more cottages around the pond that are going to be rentable this year. We don't have all of them listed on our site, but perhaps that will happen later, depending on how many weeks they have available. Quite often they are booked up before summer even begins. We'll see how it goes this year. Apparently the properties that are for sale, and there are a number of them, aren't getting much attention.

We had a census taker call on us tonight. She left off a slip of paper explaining the confidentiality of the census, but she didn't ask any questions or even come in to do a head count. Makes one wonder. Seems like a waste of time and tax payers' money. Even in our small town, you can't tell how many people are living at a residence without at least asking the question. We'll see what, if anything, happens next.