It needn’t have been this way.         But when the overlords of Annapolis rendered the Eastport Bridge useless in 1998, the good people of Eastport were in a quandary. That was the occasion for the cannon shot heard ’round the upper reaches of Spa Creek. Revolution was at hand.

“Why am I always stuck in the mud?” asked five-year-old Xavier Dailey. Xavier was one of the youngest in the group of rummaging herptile hunters on the annual pilgrimage, this year to Kings Landing Park in Calvert County in search of amphibians and reptiles.

   1993    • New Bay Times born April 22 to Sandra Olivetti Martin, Bill Lambrecht and Alex Knoll and delivered every two weeks. • Bill Burton, just retired from the Evening Sun, hires on as outdoors columnist. New Bay Times stock soars.

Since birth, Eaton’s destiny has been to serve. The golden retriever-Labrador mix was bred to be a calm, focused and obedient companion to a human in need. Aspiring to join the 1,721 active Canine Companions for Independence teams, Eaton hopes to help a disabled owner live a fuller life.     For duty’s sake, Eaton gave up a typical puppy-hood.

When we last checked on The Volvo Ocean Race, the 15-ton, 70-foot-long boats were safely in Abu Dhabi — after hopping a stealth freighter to avoid pirates in the Indian Ocean. Leg 3 begins with the usual in-port race in Abu Dhabi, home of the boat in second-to-last place, and continues to Sanya, China, home of the boat in last place.

Everything old is new again. In a world that has come to appreciate recycling as a life essential, is it any wonder that the film industry has adopted the reduce, recycle, reuse philosophy?     Sometimes the story needs an update, a modern lens. Other times, a movie made so much money originally that there may be more cash to come. Then again, some studios would rather remake a foreign film than chance subtitles at the box office.

Woodchips and memories will soon be all that’s left of this year’s Christmas trees hauled curbside in Anne Arundel or to Calvert’s convenience centers for recycling. Not so for the 64 trees in Calvert Hospice’s 23rd annual Festival of Trees. Decorated and sponsored throughout Calvert, the trees annually add about $100,000 to Hospice coffers.

The frostbite swimming season began January 1 with barely an icicle.     At 43 degrees, Chesapeake waters were cold. That was the common report from plungers at North Beach’s New Year’s Day Polar Bear Swim.     “It was so cold I could only go up to my waist,” reported Lizzie Woolsey, newly of Huntingtown. “Brian stayed in 10 minutes,” she said of her soldier husband. Six-year-old Mayhem James waded in up to his knees.

The deaf cat, a skinny princess getting on, could not hear her own purrs, nor our learned conversations above her head, at a festive gathering in a lovely house on St. Leonard’s Creek beyond Jefferson Patterson Park.

In the language of old movies, falling calendar pages symbolized the passing of time. Years could go by in seconds, just as 2011 surely has done. Now December is about to top the pile of the last 11 months. So it’s time to choose a new calendar.     Most of us still do that, you know. Or have a calendar chosen for us, as calendars rank high in holiday gifts exchanged among acquaintances.