What did the alien say to the cat? Take me to your litter. I know it’s silly, but that’s my early birthday present to Isaiah Morris. The youngest son of Pastor Rob and Christy Morris, my dear friend will celebrate his 16th birthday on Sunday. Isaiah loves jokes, so if you have a good one handy, make sure you share it if you see him.

Last week I reminded readers Bee staff photos can be purchased through SmugMug, which is where we have been building our digital photos archive since 2009. Every week we create an album, coinciding with each publication date, and fill it with the photos taken by our staff. The albums include those that made it into the print edition and online, and very often some photos we just didn’t have room for. While I remembered to mention these can be purchased as reprints and/or printed on everything from mugs, pillows and blankets to mouse pads, tote bags and more, I did forget one thing: if you’d like to order a digital copy of our photos, you can do that too! If you see a photo in one of our online albums — or even if you see it in print or on our website — a digital copy of that photo is available for $10/file. Call our main phone line (203-426-3141) and tell whoever answers that you’d like to buy a digital photo. They’ll take it from there.

If you’ve visited or even driven past Newtown Congregational Church in recent months you may notice its beautiful dove of peace weathervane has a new home. After a few topples from the steeple, the gilded weather vane by the late John Hallock has been mounted on a pole in front of the West Street house of faith, where church leaders hope it will remain for good. The pole is within a raised garden to the east of the building, near its front entrance. In the line of “many hands make light work,” I understand Tom Bender, Bob Keegan, Peter Reichmann, Keith Roberts, John Truitt, and Linda and Larry Whippie led the group of NCC members who took care of preparing and installing the new addition.

A reminder that a special event rescheduled from last month at Deep Brook Farm will now be taking place this weekend. Newtown Forest Association had hoped to host a walk around its newest acquisition in late December, but expected inclement weather changed those plans. Organizers are now hoping readers will join them on Saturday at 10 am at 32 Deep Brook Road, where a guided walk through the 60+ acres there will offer one of the first opportunities to explore the property since its purchase last summer. The preserve is home to farmland and upland forest, meadows, and wetlands, as well as stone barns with foundations that date to the mid 18th Century. The property is surrounded on two sides by dirt roads and, less than a mile from the Main Street flagpole, is going to be preserved in perpetuity. If you’d like to brave the elements and join the group, registration is requested via email to trent.mccann@newtownforestassociation.org.

Further ahead, the Rail Trail extension into Newtown looks like it could gain some traction this year. Greg Carnrick, a resident and local advocate who has long been among those collaborating to make this key piece of the trail extension a reality, shared very exciting news this week. CT DEEP has reportedly confirmed there are no restrictions preventing the long-wished-for extension into Newtown. The route already stretches 16 miles, from Monroe to Bridgeport. The extension into town will give more people access to a recreational resource already cherished by walkers, cyclists and other outdoor enthusiasts. The Newtown leg will run over property owned by Housatonic Railroad Company, including land that formerly housed the long-abandoned Batchelder property. The Batchelder land has long been a sticking point due to intense pollution at the former smelting plant. The go-ahead from the state’s environmental protection agency, notes Greg, “could be the spark needed to finally remediate and repurpose the site for good.” It is, as he also noted, a win for Newtown, the environment, and everyone who loves the outdoors.

We all know how difficult it can be to lose any family member, and Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo is mourning one of their own. Berry, a 14-year-old red panda, died last Wednesday following a veterinary procedure. I suppose the bright side is Berry had a good life while at the zoo, where she was a “beloved member of our zoo family and a fitting ambassador to her species, captivating the hearts of visitors, staff, and volunteers with her playful demeanor and striking natural beauty,” according to a note from the zoo. The honorary Mayor of the Zoo, Berry also lived beyond the typical life span of 8-10 years for red pandas in the wild (and even slightly longer for those in managed care).

If you haven’t noticed the listing with the ad on page A-2 of our print edition this week, Edmond Town Hall will be offering an extra matinee of this weekend’s featured film. With schools closed Monday due to Martin Luther King Jr Day, the theater at 45 Main Street has planned an early afternoon screening of Harold and The Purple Crayon. Check our calendar, in print and online, for details for that day (and Friday through Sunday’s regular screenings), and so many other things happening in town.

They say writing in cursive is the way to stymie the younger generations these days because they can’t read the mysterious language. The National Archives has long counted on volunteers to help them transcribe antique documents. Last weekend the Archives announced a collaborative effort with the National Park Service to transcribe Revolutionary War veteran pension files, or as they are officially called, Case Files of Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Applications Based on Revolutionary War Service, ca 1800-ca 1912. The focus on those files comes ahead of the 250th anniversary of this country’s independence. These are records, the agencies note, that share the stories of America’s first veterans. Being able to read cursive, or “longhand script,” is very helpful because so many of the historic documents were written using it.

The National Archives Citizen Archivist program is a fully voluntary and remote project. The project has records to translate from each of the original 13 colonies, as well as Vermont and a section called Native American Patriots. If you’re curious, visit archives.gov/citizen-archivist, then click on the Citizen Archivist Missions button. The next page has an entire section called Revolutionary War Pension Files Transcription and Tagging Missions. There are plenty of other projects to work on. The Revolutionary War pension files are just the latest, and tie in nicely to the approaching anniversary of The Declaration of Independence — which you can see, coincidentally, at The National Archives in Washington, D.C.

I’m in such a good mood this week I’m going to share one more joke for Isaiah: Why was the cat sitting on the computer? He wanted to keep an eye on the mouse.

Cats aren’t supposed to be able to read (otherwise I’d be first in line to help the folks at The National Archives) or write (or tell jokes), yet here I am once again with another column in the hopper. I hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s collection of news and notes from my point of view. Don’t forget to look for this miracle again next week, when you can … read me again.