On the Hahn Cove hillside the new Beattie cottage is seeing lots of activity this summer even though it’s not quite finished. Rob and Cammie had barely said goodbye to CJ and Charlie last week when the the Walsh crew arrived a couple days later, followed closely by eight Beattie/Yantes' on Sunday. Cammie says “Meanwhile, the siding crew joins our wonderful construction crew who are now part of the family.”

Downpours on Saturday morning cancelled the tennis exhibition but didn’t dampen the enthusiasm for pancakes. On arrival at 9:30 a.m., the Community House was buzzing and volunteers were still whisking platters of pancakes out of the kitchen. Many hands volunteered and I’m embarrassed to say I’ve lost the list. Photos and kudos will be posted online.

Sunday evening’s demonstration by the Boothbay and Boothbay Harbor fire departments was a winner! Firefighters Mark Sullivan, Assistant Chief Joe Hall, Lieutenant Gareth Hodgdon, Andrea Hodgdon and Junior Firefighter Nick Giles put on a quite a show, not without its humorous moments (a demo fire extinguisher turned out to be empty). Gareth won the speed competition in donning the complete fire fighting suit and gear in under two minutes. Afterwards anyone who could easily climb into the front seats of the engine was able to honk the horn and turn on the siren.

Ice cream with brownies and cookies followed inside. The event raised just shy of $500 between donations and silent auction items. Their equipment is very expensive and the firefighters devote a lot of their time to fundraising to keep taxes as low as possible. We all went home to check our fire extinguishers, make sure we have the blue house number visible, and will be clearing low-hanging branches just in case a big truck has to come to our cottage. Thanks to Dave, Mary and Jeff Kowalski for making this a success.

It was great to see over a dozen JPVISers at the Land Trust annual fundraiser on the Pink Lady last Friday night. David Stanford, Bill Stroppel, Emily Whiting, Jessica Dumphy, Xavier Duralde among others managed to climb the stairs to the upper deck on the rocking boat while holding onto a drink. A new Olympic event maybe? Lots of fun for a good cause.

More comprehensive tennis tournament news will be coming from Dave. With the rainouts play has moved about. This Thursday night the mixed doubles will be held in conjunction with a baked bean “suppah”. In some ways, that sounds more to be avoided than tequila night.

We need someone to write the column due Monday August 26th. Your correspondent will be in Santa Fe for a few days to dry out, meteorologically speaking. One of the perks of the correspondent is that you can write about your family (did you know Maria and Tommy made an impromptu visit to Nana’s after their dad Carl Dooley ran the Beach to Beacon 10K race in 36:23 last weekend? Reminds me of the many times I wrote about Bev McCoid running that same race. She was fast, too.) Sign up for your chance to write about your family with annedooley@mindspring.com