When you’ve jetted off for a long weekend of tropical adventure and your flight home is canceled at the last minute, you make the most of it and wander back to the beach and plop yourself down in a lounge chair. Genc Brinja hopped a flight bound for Puerto Rico to reunite with some college friends and celebrate his birthday with his toes in the sand and his face in the sun. The long weekend was magical, filled with laughter, swimming, zip lining and more.

Like so many other folks, he was caught up in the thousands of flight cancellations that happened earlier this week. After scouring airline websites looking for a reasonable alternative to his original flight, he opted to stick with what had been offered without a surcharge and scheduled for Friday. A few more days in the tropics has done wonders for the mind, body and soul.

Kevin Oliver celebrated a milestone birthday on April 5. His youthful face and youthful spirit would lead you to believe that he, perhaps, was a recent college grad, but no: he just joined the half century club. Happy birthday, Kevin. I hope you felt a little extra love. I hope that extra love helped ease you into that new decade.

Wayne Iacono celebrated a milestone of another kind. He set out from Menemsha bound for Martha’s Vineyard Shipyard. His travels east on the Sound and into Vineyard Haven harbor went smoothly and brought him to the lift for F/V Freedom’s 40th haul out. While on the hard, Wayne will do some maintenance and prep her for another season of lobstering.

It’s out and available for you to dive into. Despite the challenges of having a one-year old in the house (happy belated, Winston Elliston) Julia Spiro managed to bring novel number two to us. Full, with its complex main character struggling with an eating disorder, is available at our local and remarkable bookstores. If you need it delivered, it is available online through places such as Amazon. Although it’s not a sequel to Someone Else’s Secret, there are a few familiar characters. Go Julia.

Welcome back to Howard Harrison and Liz Burns. April 1 brought their return from warm and sunny F-L-A to their Menemsha home. Howard has already taken to swapping stories on Squid Row over sunrise coffee from brewmaster Marshall Carroll.

Eighth grade students have been participating in a student exchange program with kids from Warrington, England for fast approaching 40 years. Mariah and Jessica Campbell had the pleasure of having Rachel Winterburn visit with her schoolmates back in October 2010. Then they had the opportunity to visit in June 2011. Both legs of the exchange were memorable, insightful and an opportunity to grow up just a little bit.

After 11 years of little communication, the three women reunited when Rachel visited the U.S. A trip to Martha’s Vineyard for a hug from old friends and an opportunity to catch up on life was simply too hard to pass up. What fun.

Earlier this week, during Station Menemsha’s quarterly uniform inspection, boatswain’s mate third class Justus Christopher received the Good Conduct Award. The award is issued in “recognition of adherence to (the USCG’s) core values of honor, respect and devotion to duty.”

After the inspection and brief ceremony, the crew got underway for a little pyrotechnics training for a couple of the newest Station Menemsha members, Scaggs and McIntosh.

It wasn’t just Coast Guard training that took place this week. The Chilmark fire department, along with West Tisbury fire, Aquinnah fire and Tri-Town Ambulance participated in a mutual aid drill at a house set to be demolished on South Road. Using their smoke machine to set the stage, simulations included a downed firefighter rescue by the Rapid Intervention Team (RIT). They also practiced transitional fire attack. Although the department practices regularly, chief Jeremy Bradshaw said the goal is to practice more frequently with neighboring towns with whom Chilmark has mutual aid agreements. This drill set the stage for that.