William R. Anderson, a Marine Corps veteran who was actively involved in his Laureldale, Pa., community, died at his home there on Oct. 26. The former East Hampton resident was 76 years old and had kidney failure.

Far be it for a newspaper to encourage its readers often to turn on the television, but this is an extraordinary time in the history of the United States.

For the most part, the now-mandated low-nitrogen septic systems being installed on eastern Long Island work as promised. The big if is whether they will deliver on the environmental improvements.

In March, the swallows come back to the cliffs of Capistrano, and in November the scallops come back to the dredges in the Peconic Bays and the suppers of the salivating. Until they don’t.

An attentive group seemed surprisingly not bored on Tuesday when my daughter and I spoke about The East Hampton Star, and our magazine, East, at a gathering of a group called “Women in Conversation” at Peconic Landing, the retirement community in Greenport.

On my list of favorite things, right up there with shoulder rubs, Netflix comedy specials, and strawberries in June, is Christmas.

There’s one big reason for not hosting Thanksgiving — the turkey.

Reports of the scallops’ demise are premature, at least that was true in certain East Hampton Town harbors and select locations in Southampton Town.

We went recently to Sagamore Hill, Theodore Roosevelt’s home in Oyster Bay, and afterward I said I could imagine his wife, Edith, saying, “Not one more polar bear rug, water buffalo head, or hippopotamus foot inkwell, Teddy, not one more.”