GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Here's hoping today's forecast is righter than yesterday's was. That (mostly) turned out to be a day, huh? Meanwhile, whatever rain we had last night will finish up this morning and then we get high pressure building in for the weekend and a mix of clouds and sun today... but also colder, with temps only reaching 40 or a bit higher. Winds from the west, down into the low 20s tonight.More views... But not everyday ones, by any means.
Rick Karash sends along a sun pillar (created by tiny ice crystals) just before sunrise the other day over Eastman Lake in Grantham;
Josh Lewis was up on top of Smarts on Sunday and shot the view through the ice-filligreed windows of the fire tower;
And Sally Stoddard Collier caught the dramatic gray clouds and distant blue sky perfectly mirrored in Dublin Lake, over in Dublin, NH.
Meanwhile, above Hanover... Robert Gill, a photographer who works in Dartmouth's communications office, has put together a drone's-eye-view portfolio of the campus and the river—"There’s no light quite like the light of mid-November," Dartmouth News writes."Do you know what it's like to be extinct?" It's Week 51 in Lost Woods, and Auk and Eddie get all existential while Henry, much to his surprise, gets lost. As he does every Friday, Lebanon author and illustrator DB Johnson chronicles the doings in his favorite patch of trees. Scroll right to move on to the next panel or left to catch up on previous weeks.SPONSORED: Enfield Shaker Museum is thrilled to announce that our 2021 Fall Auction is live online! Join the fun and bid on an exciting array of items, including gift certificates, socially distanced experiences, and handmade crafts from local artisans—as well as donate to this year’s Cause Within a Cause: Visitor Infrastructure! Auction proceeds support the Museum's general operations, education, and preservation efforts, as well as the enjoyment and safety of our visitors. Sponsored by the Enfield Shaker Museum.Details emerge in Weathersfield death. Daniel Murray, 29, of Springfield, "was experiencing a mental health crisis" when he went to his mother and stepfather's home in Weathersfield Wednesday, according to VT State Police. There, as his stepfather tried to help, Murray broke a glass-front cabinet and used some of the glass to cut him, then killed himself. “It’s clear based on the investigation that this was an issue of a man experiencing a severe mental-health crisis," VSP spokesman Adam Silverman tells the Valley News's John Lippman. In crisis? Call 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or text 741741.
Energy efficiency cuts will hit the Upper Valley. Local companies had already been delaying weatherization projects before the NH PUC opted a week ago to ax energy efficiency funding, writes Claire Potter in the VN. Now, they're looking at laying off workers. Projects at risk include weatherization of affordable housing in Claremont, efforts by nonprofits, municipalities, and businesses to pare back energy consumption, and local programs to help homeowners—especially the elderly—save on heating. "It has a huge impact on the poorest people in our state,” says Plainfield's Evan Oxenham."The fact that she’s among Vermont’s best kept literary secrets seems appropriate for a poet as singular as Stone." For a while now, fiction writer and essayist Peter Orner has been dipping into a worn copy of a collection by poet Ruth Stone, and he's just discovered The Essential Ruth Stone, published last year. In this week's Enthusiasms, he writes, "I think Stone was incapable of writing a line that wasn’t fully alive—and she’s funny. More great poets should be funny." Note (below) that Nora Jacobson's new film about Stone screens tomorrow at the Briggs. “I am simultaneously compelled to keep up (maintain) my blackness and to hold up (check) my blackness.” That’s Norwich sculpture artist William Ransom describing the tension at play in his work and in how others perceive it—and him. Seven Days’ Pamela Polston spotlights Ransom’s new exhibit, a small but “visually and conceptually potent” collection, at BMAC in Brattleboro. In one sculpture, strips of wood held in place by clamp convey the fraught fragility of our national union. Others speak to the tragedies of George Floyd, Philando Castile, and Daunte Wright. Through March 5.Hiking Close to Home: The Joe Ranger Road access to the Appalachian Trail. The Upper Valley Trails Alliance says the hiking is great both directions, but the southbound route provides two beautiful views over less than a mile. While the hike is considered moderate, you’ll get a good workout on the steeper portions. As with all AT section hiking, it's easy to manage the time and length by getting picked up at the next road (Cloudland) or by simply turning around when you’re ready. You’ll find the trailhead by expanding the map at the “directions” tab and looking for Joe Ranger Road in Pomfret. Been paying attention this week? The guys who run The News Quiz have some questions for you. Like, can UV residents get Trader Joe's goods delivered to their doors? And where in NH did President Joe Biden make a stop this week? And just what is it that Hanover's put up for auction? You'll find those and others at the maroon link. Meanwhile, feel free to try your hand at the Dartmouth-specific quiz pulled together by The Dartmouth."Our job is to represent the law. We call balls and strikes." Ahni Malachi runs NH's Commission for Human Rights, which investigates allegations of discrimination—in housing, the workplace, and now, thanks to NH's new "divisive concepts" law, the classroom. Now that the state has provided parents and students a form to lodge complaints, the little-known organization suddenly finds itself in the spotlight, since it's the body that will investigate teachers, reports Ethan DeWitt in NH Bulletin—though its first step will be to interview complainants to determine if there's been a potential violation.“We’re in a very concerning moment." That's Jeff Tieman, president and CEO of the VT hospital association, talking to VTDigger's Liora Engel-Smith about the fact that the state's ICU's are operating at 85-90 percent capacity just ahead of the holidays. The rise stems in part from conditions that worsened due to lack of care earlier in the pandemic, and because Covid-19 ICU admissions have risen 30 percent since October began. Now, Engel-Smith writes, "a relatively small Covid-19 surge could put significant pressure on the system." And that's even before peak flu season and ski/snowmobile injuries."They're driving east rather than flying west." Actually, they're driving west and north, but you get the drift: That's a Stowe real estate broker in the Financial Times talking about wealthy New Yorkers and Bostonians who pre-Covid "thought little of catching a flight to Colorado resorts" but now are just buying second homes in VT and NH. Prices in Bretton Woods are at an all-time high. And Stowe? The realtor describes a condo listed last weekend for $700K that got 21 offers “and will sell for well into the $800,000s." (Note: If you hit a paywall, Google "Who needs the Rockies? Local slopes fuel a New England homebuying boom" and get there that way.)VT relaxes airborne PCB standards for schools. It originally imposed a screening level of 15 nanograms per cubic meter back in 2013, writes Alison Novak in Seven Days, even though it turns out that it's common to find low PCB levels in indoor air "even when there isn't a nearby source of PCBs." On Tuesday, the state reset its "action level" to 30 nanograms per cubic meter for Pre-K, 60 for K-6, and 100 for 7-12—possibly too late for Burlington High School, which decided to move after testing last year showed levels above the state's threshold. The federal standard is 500-600 for high schools.You don't suppose Champ...? Nah. Couldn't be. Could it? Two years ago, the Pomeroy Foundation, which supports "the celebration and preservation of community history" around the country, installed a roadside "Legends and Lore" sign about the legendary lake monster on Cumberland Head, in Plattsburgh. Sometime in the overnight hours Tuesday, though, it disappeared and only the metal base remains, reports Sun Community News. Town officials are asking anyone with information to get in touch with the police. Wouldn't you love to see what that correspondence looks like?Is Instagram pushing earth’s most beautiful places toward ruin? When photographer Pat Morrow began his career, he didn’t imagine that his solitary adventures through far-flung lands would morph into the camera-wielding pastime of millions. Writing on ExplorersWeb, Morrow says, “I assumed that spreading the love about these largely unknown gems would help protect them.” Now he worries about the unchecked growth of global tourism and social media’s overexposure of fragile natural habitats. His plea: Be more mindful in places where “our seemingly innocuous weekend warrior posts can act like an arsonist’s accelerant.”
The numbers...Daybreak reports Covid numbers on Tuesdays and Fridays.
Dartmouth's dashboard reports 12 active undergrad cases (up 11 since Monday), with 1 case among grad and professional students (up 1) and 13 (up 5) among faculty/staff.The dashboard also reports 23 combined new cases among students over the past seven days, as well as 18 among faculty/staff. 11 students are in isolation, along with 18 faculty/staff.
NH reported 774 new cases Tuesday, 928 Wednesday, and 986 yesterday, bringing its total to 149,827. There were 26 deaths over that time, bringing the total to 1,656; the state reports 7,632 active cases (+1337 since Monday and a new record, well above the previous mark of 6,994 set last December) and 327 (+67) hospitalizations. It tallies 460 (+104) active cases in Grafton County, 381 (+30) in Sullivan, and 858 (+177) in Merrimack. In town-by-town numbers, the state says Claremont has 170 (+13 since Monday); Newport 68 (+7); Lebanon 46 (+23); Haverhill 41 (+12); Charlestown 40 (-5); Hanover 28 (+1); Warren 24 (+8); Sunapee 23 (+6); Enfield 21 (+1); New London 21 (+9); Cornish 13 (no change); Croydon 12 (+2); Rumney 10 (+2); Newbury 10 (+1); Grantham 8 (no change); Canaan 6 (-1); Plainfield 6 (+ 1); Lyme 6 (+at least 2); and Piermont, Orford, Wentworth, Dorchester, Grafton, Springfield, Wilmot, and Unity 1-4 each.
VT reported 185 new cases Tuesday, 259 Wednesday, and 517 yesterday (its second-highest single-day count for the pandemic). The state's total now stands at 45,985. There were 6 deaths over that time, bringing the total to 400. As of yesterday, 62 people with confirmed cases were hospitalized (+10 since Monday). Windsor County has seen 64 new cases reported over the last three days, for a total of 3,212 for the pandemic, with 351 new cases over the past two weeks; Orange County gained 31 cases, with 176 over the past two weeks for a total of 1,618 for the pandemic.
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This evening at 7, the Norwich Bookstore hosts an online reading and conversation with two novelists. Franz Nicolay will be talking about and reading from his new book, Someone Should Pay for Your Pain, about a cult musician on the downslope of his career; Adam Wilson's Sensation Machines is about a husband and wife on the downslope of their marriage in the midst of economic and political upheaval in a near-future US.
And at 7:30 pm, Artistree brings in the Vermont Symphony Orchestra's Jukebox Quartet to the Grange Theater in S. Pomfret. They'll be joined by singer, composer, and TED-talker Moira Smiley on a program that mixes the old and new, from Armenian folk songs to Bartók to Chickasaw composer Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate. Masks and vax proof required.
Also at 7:30, the Anonymous Coffeehouse reconvenes at the First Congregational Church of Lebanon. First up: country/folk singer-songwriter Ava Burnham. She'll be followed at 8:15 by the folk/rock/country/Americana band Rose Hip Jam, and at 9 pm by 2 X 2, two couples who met through music 20 years ago and draw from the folk tradition for their songs. Note: Starting at 6 pm and running until 9 in a room off the sanctuary, there will also be a silent auction of works by 30 local artists to benefit Afghan refugees resettling in the region.
And also at 7:30, if you feel like heading down the highway a bit, Putney's Next Stage hosts trombonist Joe Fiedler, the music director for Sesame Street, with his sextet doing arrangements from Fuzzy and Blue, Fiedler's second album of jazz riffs on Sesame Street tunes.
Tomorrow at 4 pm in the Briggs, White River Indie Films screens Nora Jacobson's new film, Ruth Stone's Vast Library of the Female Mind, about the much-lauded (at least within poetry circles) Vermont poet. The film took 12 years to make and combines footage of Stone at different times of her life, reciting poetry and talking about how she writes, as well as conversations with both poets and family. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Jacobson and her team and a reception. Masks and proof of vax or negative test required.
And at 5 pm and then at 8 pm, the Lebanon Opera House is throwing a silent disco in the Lebanon Rail Trail tunnel—you get headphones, DJ Sean and the LIVEMIXKINGS crew provide the tunes. The 5 pm event is for families, with kid-friendly music; at 8, it's the funk. As LOH explains, "DJ Sean and guests will broadcast their custom mixes via a radio transmitter; you control the volume level and select your preferred music feed. Those without the headphones hear no music, giving the effect of a group of people dancing to, well, nothing."
And Sunday at 5 pm, Warren Miller's back at LOH (well, his films, anyway) with Winter Starts Now: featuring, among others, the minds behind Winterstick Snowboards at Sugarloaf; Phil and Amy Taisey, who craft Amalgam Skis out of their garage; and Vermont native Jim Ryan bombing around Sun Valley.
I mean, how could we not?
around the time his
first
album of songs,
Open Sesame,
came out.
See you Monday.
Daybreak Where You Are: The Album. Photos of daybreak around the Upper Valley, Vermont, New Hampshire, and the US, sent in by readers.
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