Sometimes I'm truly amazed at the number of people who respond to something I've written here. The bit about Alfred Hitchcock having shot a movie at what is not the Burtt farm has created a flurry of suggestions that it was probably "The Trouble With Harry," that was shot in Craftsbury. Another response was that it might have been a short film he apparently did called, "Vermont the beautiful" - see the comment from Rob a couple of posts ago.

The other thing that has created some interest is the photo of the old cottage that came from Danny Colford's collection by way of Andy Rudin. Craig (and I'm not sure who this is) wrote that it looks like it was on Flint's Point, which is the name of the point of land now reached by Cove Road. I think that is probably right, but perhaps in time we'll hear something from Danny and the mystery will be solved.

In the meantime, we've had a little of every possible kind of weather today. It hasn't been awfully cold - low 30's most of the day so far - and while we were getting light rain last night, this morning it turned to snow and for a while we had a real blizzard going on with lots of wind and blowing snow, even though the snow is very wet. Now the temperature seems to be dropping but the precipitation has stopped. I measured .85 in. this morning, and we've had more during the day.

Our wind gauge is definitely set up in the wrong spot. This morning when I went to retrieve my water gauge I could hear the wing roaring overhead and the trees across the road from us were swaying in a strong north wind - and our wind gauge was lazily turning from north to west to east to south and back, trying to find a steady breeze and the little cups were barely turning. At one point we registered 5 m.p.h., but I could see snow blowing down West Shore Road faster than the traffic goes past. We'll see to moving it, but perhaps not until spring.

I heard from one of my "sources" that Walter Ruf (Sandy Beach Road) has a birthday coming up on Christmas Eve. This is a big one! My source also told me Walter and Mimi will have a family reunion with two sisters, one from Germany and one from New Jersey, to celebrate the event with them in Florida. Very nice. Perhaps Walter will send me some pictures to post here. Happy Merry Christmas Birthday, Walter!!

Bill Rossi let us know this morning the goose that had hung out at their boat house during the sloppy weather yesterday was gone when daylight broke this morning. Diane thought he might be waiting for a strong north wind, and I'd say he wasn't disappointed. Bill didn't tell us what wind speed his anemometer registered, but I'm betting it was right up there. The wind must have been whipping down the pond today. It looks as if the ice has melted or broken up, too, so we're back to open water in most of the pond. Freeze-over number two may be this weekend.

Right now the wind has calmed down and the thermometer is registering 32.2 and the wind speed is changing between 5.0 and 2.0, out of the northwest. At least it seems to be holding pretty steady from that direction, not waffling like it was this morning. Even registering a lower wind speed, at one point over night the wind chill low reached around 8 degrees. I'm glad I wasn't that goose waiting to take off last night!