Another lovely fall day, but a bit on the chilly side.  Last night our thermometer dropped to 19 degrees - that's pretty darned cold.  I had a note from Henretta Splain today saying there was a skimming of ice on the cove at her place (Clubhouse Circle). Henretta is our data input specialist for the Ice Out Contest and she said she's expecting to be very busy soon.  We have perhaps 500 tickets that have come in over the summer, and just this past week I've had requests from outlets in the Burlington area to supply them with tickets.  It's a bit early, but people are already asking for them, and we are very happy to supply them.

We have some news - the log cabin at the head of Sandy Beach Road has been sold.  The cabin has had renters there for about a year after the owner moved to Colorado.  We don't know who has purchased it, but we know the owner, John Jenkins, must be very happy.  

We were also contacted this week by Robert and Andrea MacLeod, of Barre (Andrea is Joey Calcagni's sister) telling us they have just purchased the Smith cottage - across from the pavilion on North Shore Road, and next door to Joey and Joni.  How neat is that!?  There's a "family compound" forming there with Andrea, Joey and Matthew all in a row on that road.  Andrea said they are anxious to become members of JPA, and we're very happy to have them.  We'll have everything lined up so they'll be official this spring.  I love it when people contact me to let me know they have purchased property here and want to be members. 

People along West Shore Road are happy that the Town of Cabot worked the road this week.  There were some serious pot holes forming, and it's good to get them leveled off before the ground freezes.  The town has a new road machine - it looks pretty spiffy, and whoever was operating it seemed to be turning up an unusually large amount of material, but we haven't been over it yet so I don't know if it is crowned more than normal.  With the rain coming soon, we'll find out if the water finds the ditches ok or runs down the tire tracks.  It looks great from what we can see from our mailbox. 

And speaking of roads - if you don't have your winter tires on yet, better get going.  There's lots of information out there this year about all-weather tires not really being adequate for Vermont winter driving, and we will agree to that wholeheartedly.  We ran all-weather tires for years until last year, and what a difference!  No wonder we had trouble making it up our steep driveway so often!   With the winter tires, it's a breeze.  We used to always have winter tires when we were commuting to Montpelier every day, but for whatever reason, once we retired, we depended on all-weather tires.  Now we're told winter tires are made completely differently than they were a few years ago - different tread, different type of material - and are much better than the old ones were and a world apart from all-weather ones.  We're sold.