For the second morning, I had to scrape ice off the car. Some leaves of the nasturtiums have wilted. The sumacs are bright red and the hornets have finally quit buzzing around their nest. It’s my favorite and most busy time of the year.

With the annual meeting of the Historical Society only a week or so away, reports have to be written and I’m preparing to cook some chicken dish for our potluck. On the heels of that meeting, is a cemetery tour which requires some research. The Planning Board has about eight public hearings at its meeting, which is the same night as the annual meeting of the Historical Society, so I’ll be picking up the video of that meeting which will, no doubt, be lengthy.

One of my part-time jobs is transcribing the minutes of those meetings. There is also an Appeals Board meeting this week. Jammed into the calendar is the Veterans Center Open House on Veterans Day. Roosevelt Trail Nursery and Boy Scouts and other volunteers have been working on the landscaping of the park and I must drive up and see how things are progressing.

With all of the above going on, there’s little time to worry about oil prices because it’s a given that no matter how much it is, we have to have it. Haven’t heard a thing about fuel assistance or when/where one can make an application. And of course, there’s no time to think about early Christmas shopping, but thankfully we have a neat little store in town where there are lots of things for only a dollar.

One thing I want to remind readers about is the holiday fair at New Marblehead Manor on the Sandbar Road. I saw one of the senior citizen residents at the grocery store and she told me their annual fair is on Oct. 28 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. This is a great place to go if you want homemade or handmade items at extremely reasonable prices. Keep an eye on this newspaper for other holiday fairs where you can shop locally and support local organizations, too.

At the grocery store the other day, I was surprised not to see a long line of folks waiting to get flu shots, but when I spoke to the nurse, she said this was the first break of the day and that many folks had already been in. Windham is having a flu clinic Nov. 16 from 3 to 5 p.m. at the town hall gym. There doesn’t seem to be a shortage of vaccine this year. So far, anyway.

The talk about the possibility of a flu epidemic (or pandemic) is of special interest to me, since my maternal grandmother died of the flu in 1918 when she was just 32 years old. She left three children. One of my aunts told me that the children had been staying with their grandmother when their mother got sick and they never returned home because it was quarantined. In those days with that particular flu strain, it wasn’t the old or children who were at risk. Most of those who died were healthy, and in the prime of their life. I wonder if the history of that world-wide occurrence is taught in the schools today.

The “to do” list isn’t getting any shorter. See you next week.

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