Of 52 Island beaches (by my count—e-mail yours and I’ll e-mail mine), only the Inkwell has been the subject and title of a movie, bad as it was, with not a frame shot on the Island. The 1994 feature film about a young man coming of age in 1976 included such visual malapropisms as sand dunes and palm trees on the beach, and a lobster (apparently on Xanax) caught by hand. One redeeming feature of The Inkwell was that it was recent visitor Jada Pinkett’s second film.

I can skip Monday and Tuesday’s weather and keep Wednesday’s. Nice cool breeze, warm enough to wear short sleeves and clear enough to see forever at the beach.

Happy birthday to all who celebrated their day this past week. Big balloons go out to Riley Craig and Shannon Morris, who celebrated their day July 21; Abigail Lively, July 23; Natalie Wallace, July 24; Jacob Cardoza, July 25, and to Auguste Pizzano, who celebrates his day today, July 27.

I wonder if there is another place like Chappy. Is there any place quite so remote and yet accessible? Popular and unpopular? Populous and under-populated? Maybe what separates us from most locations is our location — tantalizingly close to connected, yet untethered. True, we are anchored to our spot by the land below water, just as is the “Big Island” is, but there is an air of a slow drifting away that permeates our senses.

Lost Rockets. A classified advertisement in the Gazette recently described how a group of Cub Scouts had shot off 12-inch rockets and many of the small spacecraft went missing in windy conditions. The advertisement sought help in finding the missing recyclable rockets.

The advertisement may have fallen short of helping the youths get what they wanted (one rocket was recovered as a direct result of the ad), but it did raise the word that Cub Scouts can have a lot of fun on a windy afternoon in Chilmark.

The gibbous moon will rule the night sky through the weekend and into next week. The full moon is Wednesday, August 1.

Temperature: Precip.

Day Max. Min. Inches.

Fº Fº

July 20 76 64 .04

July 21 72 58 .04

July 22 77 52 .00

July 23 79 61 .00

July 24 80 69 .81

July 25 85 65 .21

July 26 80 66 .00

Water temperature in Edgartown harbor: 79º F.

When Vineyard physician Michael E. Jacobs teamed up with his friend, Dr. Eric A. Weiss, to write a book on marine medicine over five years ago, boating got safer for a lot of sailors. Boaters bought it and stowed it away with their box of bandages and antiseptic. It was a great addition to the required first aid kit.

The book enables all who sail or motor in boats to feel as though they have some expertise onboard to deal with medical situations.

Friday, July 20: Mild temperature but muggy. Large field in Chilmark is brown from lack of rain. Grass crunches underfoot. Poison ivy leaves glisten in the afternoon sunshine. Partly sunny skies. Temperature in the high 70s.

Saturday, July 21: Breezy. Partly sunny morning. Bend in the Road Beach is a popular spot in late morning. Swimmers in the water. Jumpers on the Big Bridge. There is the smell of suntan lotion on the beach. Oak Bluffs harbor is lit up at night by all kinds of lights: street lights, boat lights and flashlights.

The Martha’s Vineyard Touchdown Club’s popular tempura food booth — a primary fundraiser for the high school’s football and cheerleading programs — will need an unprecedented effort to be ready for this summer’s agricultural fair. The club faces a shortage in funding to rebuild the booth, which was severely damaged in a fire last September. The fair takes place a month from now.

Please Adopt Us

The featured cat this week from the Animal Shelter of Martha’s Vineyard is a beautiful older black cat named Thor who is on a special diet because he is overweight. Thor cannot be in the room with the other cats and is getting depressed. If someone adopts him, the shelter will waive the adoption fee; alternatively if there is someone who would like foster him in a loving home and watch his diet, the shelter would be most grateful.