Special Delivery

As off-Island subscribers to this newspaper know only too well, the U.S. Postal Service has been in decline for many years. With subscribers in 47 states and several foreign countries, we often hear horror stories of papers not arriving for days or weeks after they are mailed.

Big Houses, Small Island

They are the guzzlers of the built environment, and like sport utility vehicles, McMansions have become an object of derision in many circles in an age of heightened consciousness about wasteful consumption of finite resources. Much as big cars guzzle gas, oversized houses gulp electricity from an overloaded grid, block scenic vistas and occupy valuable coastal wetlands, sometimes to ruinous effect.

Wreaths Across America

Island veterans and school children from the Tisbury Elementary School will gather for a simple service of remembrance. The program is part of Wreaths Across America and it will be led by Jo Ann Murphy, the county veterans agent and a Viet Nam era veteran. The short but thoughtful program at Oak Grove Cemetery in Tisbury starts at 10:30 a.m., Friday, Dec. 9.

Tomorrow night’s full moon, the Holly Moon, rises in the east at about sunset and commands attention all night long. The moon is in the zodiacal constellation Taurus. Early Sunday morning, the moon sets in the west at about the time that the sun rises in the east.

From Gazette editions of December 1986:

The Vineyard may only wonder — perhaps despair is a better word — at the insanity of yet another collision over the future of Georges Bank.

New Dollar Tree Sprouts

At West Tisbury Library

The West Tisbury Library Foundation, Inc. hopes to grow its fund-raising efforts, thanks to a new dollar tree program announced this week.

For each $1 donation the West Tisbury Free Public Library receives, the foundation will add a leaf inscribed with the donor’s name to a paper tree on the library’s wall. An anonymous donor has offered to match every $1 donation up to $1,000.

Already facing a critical shortage in staff, the Aquinnah fire department now finds itself about to be leaderless after the town fire chief said this week that he would resign by the end of the year.

In an e-mail to selectman and board chairman Jim Newman, acting fire chief Jim Vercruysse said the demands of the job are putting too much strain on his family life.

The fate of two French bulldogs named Toy Boy and Leona have prompted a criminal charge against the dogs’ former caregiver.

By SARA BROWN

The fate of two French bulldogs named Toy Boy and Leona have prompted a criminal charge against the dogs’ former caregiver.

Kelly Slavin, 37, of Fairhaven, was arraigned Dec. 2 on a perjury charge in Edgartown district court stemming from her assertion that she had the dogs and was ready to turn them over to the owner, Charlene Garcia of West Tisbury.

Instead, according to allegations, the dogs had been surrendered to an animal control officer more than a year ago and placed in adoptive homes.

It’s a Wonderful Life

It’s a Wonderful Life, the radio play written by Philip Grecian based on the film by Frank Capra, is being performed on Dec. 17 at 8 p.m. and Dec. 18 at 1 p.m. by the Vineyard Playhouse at the regional high school’s performing arts center.

This live stage “radio show” is recommended for ages eight and older.

The final Massachusetts Estuaries Project report on the health of Lagoon Pond was unveiled this week in Oak Bluffs, and the blunt diagnosis was summed up in two words: “significantly impaired.”

Dr. Brian Howes, technical director for the project, a joint venture of the state Department of Environmental Protection and the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, said that almost all of the 89 estuaries in southeastern Massachusetts are impaired. Lagoon Pond is no exception.