After a shaky start against Sandwich last week, the boys’ varsity basketball team picked up a decisive 69-41 victory over visiting Dennis-Yarmouth Tuesday evening in their home opener.

It is a jump-and-shout scavenger hunt. Turn left and find a canvas dog tote, turn right and snap up the wooden Bavarian candle chime, search the bin on the bottom shelf and discover an ice cream scoop with a pink pig-shaped handle.

A grant received by the committee to save the Gay Head Light will allow three-dimensional scanning to create an accurate model, as preparations continue for relocating the old lighthouse.

Michael G. West wrote a talking blues song and it goes a little something like this. “I was born in 1947 / North of hell and south of heaven / About that time the sun went down / On San Francisco, my hometown . . . .”

The West Tisbury Congregational Church moves over to the Agricultural Hall once again for a 5 p.m. Christmas Eve service.

Well, all is nearly ready in most homes for Christmas. Prudy Whiting has a small tree in front of her house and her brother Allen and his wife Lynn have a lighted wreath outside their place.

Malcolm Hall of Oklahoma City and his wife Judy and their family wish all their Vineyard friends a very happy holiday season. Malcolm will be starting his okra seeds once he cleans up after a houseful of family and guests. Their daughter Emily and her husband Whitney will be flying out to join them for the holidays.

The Aquinnah Christmas party will be held at the Aquinnah town hall on Monday, Dec. 23 from 5 to 7 p.m. All Aquinnah residents are encouraged to attend whether you have little children or not.

After all that celebrating, start off the new year with a walk at the Felix Neck Wildlife Sanctuary in Edgartown.

It is the end of the year and the end of an era in many ways. I’m only shopping on-Island for gifts. This is a grand opportunity to see my friends and business owners that I am too involved to see in season.

Next week will mark the 399th Christmas since 1614 when Sir Ferdinando Gorges returned Epanow, the kidnapped son of the Nunnepog Sachem tribe, to his home in Ogkeshkuppe, now known as the town of Oak Bluffs.