Hi ho, Eohippus! One of many sights seen by the Wiscasset High School students in Forensics, Chemistry and Astronomy earlier in December, and a hurrah for the stamina of their biology teacher, Chris Riser, last seen shepherding them all through Boston's Museum of Science, the Peabody Ethnology Museum, the Museum of Comparative Zoology, the Genzyme Corporation and several other sites. Along their way they watched forensic science at work, the evolution of horses, the crystalline structures of minerals, and the world famous Harvard Glass Flowers. (Thanks to Ms. Sarah Sutter of WHS, from whose write-up I have unblushingly lifted all this!)

Kudos for Edgecomb students at Lincoln Academy: High Honors for Alexander Graves, freshman, Michael Carter, junior, and Robert Langton, senior; Honors for Mariah Bintliff, sophomore. Well done, all! Meanwhile, the Wiscasset Middle School Mathematics team, with five (count them, five!) Edgecomb members, have been competing in the Central Maine Math League's tournaments. Ryan Hanley, James Brown, Hunter Reid, Nat Blackford and Ricky Cost are holding our town's standard high!

Gail Boudin, Edgecomb's Busiest Lady, announces her Web site! We are all invited to visit www.turn ingleaves.org for brief guided soothing meditations, one aimed particularly at office space relaxation. She also has similar material on two CDs, available now at The Green Gourmet in Wiscasset!

The Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens has a whole slue of intriguing things to do: On Saturday, January 5, from 1 to 2:30 p.m., families can learn about Wind and Weather, their effects on nature and on humans. From January 5 through March 27, ski instructor Dianne Ward will teach Nordic (a.k.a. cross-country) skiing over the Gardens' several trails, from 1 to 3 p.m., adults only, any ability level. Weather depending, sessions will be on the first and third Saturdays of each month, and every Tuesday and Thursday. Please provide your own equipment (CMBG has rentals) and be sure to dress in layers! Call CMBG at 633-4333 for fees, information, and to sign up. Ask about other adventures they will be making possible!

The Town offices are still closed until January 3, 2008. The selectmen will hold their first 2008 meeting on Monday, January 7 at 6 p.m. However, of immense interest to Edgecomb residents, the Planning Board meeting scheduled for Dec. 20 which was cancelled due to snow, has been rescheduled to the working meeting of Monday, January 7, 6:30 p.m. One item on the agenda is the assisted living complex in the works for Davis Island.

I received no answers to my Christmas quiz! Could it be that Santa Claus provided too many distractions? I will have to speak sternly to the old geezer.

However, it will shortly be 2008. Year of Elections! Year of Olympics! Year of Fort Edgecomb's Bicentennial! So, time to shape up, troops! Let me repeat a quiz question that may have been missed in the holiday uproar: What was the local significance of the date Dec. 22, 1807?

Smirking smugly behind the answer book at 234 River Road, 633-2978, jocam@midcoast.com.

This column appears in the Boothbay Register, The Lincoln County News, the Wiscasset News-paper, and at www.Edgecomb.org.