“Tis not her coldness, father,

That chills my labouring breast;

It’s that confounded cucumber

I’ve ate and can’t digest.”

The summer is racing to an end. The Agricultural Fair is this weekend, the Chilmark Community Center programs end on Friday the 16th (although I will lead their last of the season bird walk on August 20), and people are beginning to return to their homes after their summer vacations. And along with all of this, the birding is changing. Large numbers of shorebirds are being found on the flats of the South Shore and along a few of the harbors and Great Ponds. Yellow warblers are disappearing, headed for their winter haunts in the south.

It’s Sunday morning in what promises to be a beautiful day. The sun is shining and, thankfully, there is low humidity. The Obamas have arrived 
. . . welcome back. I’m fascinated by all the hoopla about the inconvenience of travel. I’m happy to live in a place that attracts presidents. Riding along Middle or North Road for a week? People . . . please. Is this a problem?

Nothing so gentle as real strength, nothing so strong as true gentleness.

“That’s what we say about draft horses,” Bruce Marshard said, standing next to one of his Percheron horses, Sonny. His pasture mate and fellow Percheron Max was grazing nearby.

Fried food at Nancy’s to go, eaten at friend Valerie Jarrett’s house in Oak Bluffs. Dinner out alone with the first lady at the Beach Plum in Chilmark. A round of basketball in the middle. These were the benchmarks of President Obama’s vacation (day four) as he plied familiar haunts.

West Tisbury businesses, from a gas station to farm stand vendors, fear that the partial closure of South Road and prominent detour signs spurred by President Obama’s visit will hurt sales during one of the busiest weeks of the year.

President Obama arrived for a nine-day visit on Martha’s Vineyard last Saturday. The first family is staying at a private home off South Road in Chilmark. Because of security concerns, South Road is closed between Meeting House Road and Wooton Bassett Road until August 18.

This contemporary home off of Tea Lane features 10 lush acres of gardens, walking paths and fields that could be used as a horse or sheep pasture. While the grounds have a timeless quality to them, the house itself — built by Gino Mazzaferro and designed by Martha's Vineyard architect Peter Breese — is contemporary in style.

The top-seeded Martha’s Vineyard Sharks will go to the championship series of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League after a 7-3 victory against the Old Orchard Beach Raging Tide Monday night.

Despite rain showers, President Obama spent his second full day of vacation much like the first, with an afternoon on the golf course followed by an evening out with friends.

Spokesmen for the power company NStar told the Martha’s Vineyard Commission Thursday that they believe the commission has no jurisdiction over a project to install new, oversized utility poles around the Island. The poles have raised the hackles of Islanders and public officials who say they are ruinous to roadside aesthetics and out of character for the Vineyard.