It's that time of the year when the folks who tend to Ice-Out are busiest.  Fred and I went down to the flag site this morning to do an interview with the Lyndon State College team, News 7.  It was very cold and pretty windy, but we got the job done.  The two young men who did the interview were filling in for Jessica Gullbrand who had set up the interview with us.  It seems Jessica suffered a fall on one of the rock climbing features at the college gym and had a concussion and several broken ribs.  She e-mailed me this morning.  Poor girl - she must be in a lot of pain.  The young man who filled in for her was Ted Gilman;  cameraman was Alex Pinkham.  Ted hadn't expected to be outside in the weather today, so he was woefully underdressed.  Alex at least had a fleece jacket on, but he was cold, too.  Fred and I were chilled through by the time we were finished, and we had heavy clothing on, but Ted and Alex were working without gloves.  I'm sure it took them a while before they "thawed out."  I forgot to ask when it will air - probably tonight on their 5:30 newscast.

In the top picture, Ted is telling me his family used to own "The Hideout," off of North Shore Rd.   Then in the middle picture, he was getting background material before the interview, and you can see the flag setup out on the pond - absolutely no sign of melting out there!  The bottom picture is during the interview, with Alex manning the camera.  What doesn't show is the cold breeze and flecks of snow that were in the air. 


There is no sign of spring here today - except the road has deteriorated a bit, especially the Danville end going onto Route 2 where there is impossible washboard and now a sizeable hole over the culvert on the pond side.  I noticed today there's a piece of metal resting in the hole - perhaps a piece of car left behind!  I left a message with the Danville Road crew, and I imagine they'll get to it as soon as they can.  I know they've been busy keeping the roads sanded and salted during this crazy stretch of weather, so probably hadn't thought much about that short stretch down to the Cabot line.  There are some spots along West Shore Road that are showing signs of beginning to break up, especially by Drown's and Decker's.  It's perfectly passable, though, and except for the snowflakes drifting down intermittently today, we might think mud season is has started.

The temperature is 36, and there's a light north wind from time to time.  According to the forecast, there probably will be more snow coming our way later this week.  Right now we're getting a snow shower - a few minutes ago the sun was peeking through the clouds, but that didn't last long.  



There was a lot of activity at Three Ponds today, and I think Ted stopped in to see if he could do an interview with them.  The plan is to open within days now, I believe.  We'll keep track of that and let everyone know.