Just a gentle reminder, folks: we have officially reached the cut off for all Christmas decorations. Do it now, and avoid the shame of being one of those houses where the crocuses have to nudge aside a deflated, inflatable Santa. Oh, I can get a real bee in my bonnet about this! There are some people in Mahoosuc Mills who never seem to take their decorations down. (White Hebert? I’m talking to you!) I’m sure this happens where you live, too. Folks who figure they went to all that trouble to put ‘em up, why take ‘em down, just to do it all over again next year? Thing is, as the years go by, the …

Mahoosuc Mills is gearin’ up for our Down Home Holiday Festival. Used to be called the Down Home Christmas Festival, but we are now “politically correct.” The St. Hyacinth’s Christmas Bazaar is part of the Festival. I suppose we should change it to Holiday Bazaar, but hey, we’re Catholics! Who are we kidding? The Festival is a lot of fun. All the stores are open and the town is decorated real cute. The Kiwanis sell trees in the vacant lot where Pomerleau’s store used to be. There’s a horse drawn sled for the kids out in Bucky DuMont’s field. And on Enchanted Mountain, the bunny slope with a rope tow at the edge of town, …