Alba Rossi, 103!

Today Alba Rossi celebrated her 103rd birthday! Here she is today, looking not a day over 70! She is at a celebratory luncheon with friends at her residence at Lincoln House in Barre.  In the second picture, she is with her BFF Nelda Rossi (Larry Rossi's mom). I looked back at another picture taken when Alba  celebrated her 100th birthday and she hasn't aged  one bit! Way to go, Alba!

Alba and her late husband, Ted Rossi, were long-time Joe's Ponders. Their camp was where Bill and Diane Rossi's is now, on West Shore Road. If you'd like to send her a belated birthday wish, her address is Lincoln House, Rm. 11, 120 Hill St., Barre VT 05641. I'm sure she'd love to hear from Joe's Pond friends.


Our weather turned out to be much less threatening than the forecasters had predicted, but according the the news tonight, other areas of the state got damaging wind and rain. Also there were power outages, of course, and flooding. We were just plain lucky. I measured .70 in. of rain in my gauge this morning and as far as I know, we didn't have really unusual wind. The temperature is 38.3F as I write this, so it wouldn't be a surprise if we find the ground covered with snow in the morning. But then we're supposed to warm up, so we won't be bothered with it for long.

We've been hearing gun shots in the early mornings on weekends - duck hunting season opened on October 10 and runs through December 8. Canada Geese can be hunted from October 10 - November 8. Although  hunting is legal on Joe's Pond, we worry a bit because there are so many cottages and people living on the pond. It's really dangerous - what goes up must come down, so even if a hunter is firing at birds flying overhead, the shot has to fall someplace, and if they shoot at a duck flying low over the water, cottages could be in a direct line of fire. Hopefully not too many hunters decide to hunt here. There are other lakes and ponds that have fewer cottages and better hunting, I expect.

Lots of people have left the pond for the winter and several more are scheduled to leave next week. It gets very quiet here this time of year. There isn't much going on until the pond has frozen over and we have ice fishermen and snomobilers here to entertain us. In the meantime, the leaves have taken a beating, especially during yesterday and today with the wind and rain. The trees will be bare soon. Fred and I usually have a second season to look forward to, when the tamaracks turn, but this year that won't happen, at least here at our house. We are having our row of tamaracks next to the road removed. They have grown way too tall and  cut us off from being able to see across the pond to Route 15. It is amazing how quickly they grew up. We originally planted them to buffer us from the dusty road in the summer - and they did that for a long time. Then I realized I wanted to be able to see cars on the road below the house, so Fred limbed them about five or six feet up from the ground.  That was ok for a while, but now it's time for them to go. We connected with a neighbor who wants them for firewood.

We expect another cool day tomorrow, but a really nice weekend. We all need to get outside and enjoy every last minute - we'll be covered in snow soon!