WELL HEY, FRIDAY!
So, you remember that word "polar" the weather folks have been tossing about the last few days? It's here. Nothing like what we'll see once it's actual winter, but still: If temps make it above freezing today it won't be by much. Partly sunny, winds from the northwest with gusts close to 20 mph. Low tonight getting down into the teens.Norwich will recoup money lost in scam. At the selectboard meeting Wednesday night, Town Manager Herb Durfee announced that its insurer, the Vermont League of Cities and Towns, will cover $168,955 of the nearly $250K the town was bilked. Comerica Bank will return nearly $80K it had flagged in a suspicious account. Altogether, that leaves Norwich out $1,000, the cost of its insurance deductible. VLCT is also recommending Norwich revamp its financial policies and employee training procedures. (VN)If you want to catch Eddie Murphy's new hit on the big screen, Hanover's not a bad place to be. Dolemite is My Name, which is being hailed as Murphy's return to form, went almost straight to Netflix, but next weekend it'll be one of the features at Dartmouth's Film & Media Alumni Fest. The event will include screenings of three films, each one presented by an alum who worked on it, including Winter's Bone producer Alix Madrigan, who will show her new film 1982. The VN's Sarah Earle has the rundown.NH sets out to add 20 new charter schools. You may remember that in August the state landed $46 million from the feds to build new charters. A legislative committee is meeting today to decide whether to approve spending the first $10 million of those funds, and NHPR takes a deep look at where charters are now, the challenges in building them, and concern that the new schools will suck resources from struggling public schools."Hey, you're going the wrong way!" That's what Paul DegliAngeli hears a lot as he skins up ski area slopes around New Hampshire. "Uphilling" is gaining traction at resorts and attracting backcountry skiers who want to try out equipment or just get in a good, quick workout. And as Marty Basch points out in this NH Mag piece, "going uphill is only part of the endeavor. Going downhill is the just reward for slowly getting yourself to the top."Progress on Vermont's Lamoille Valley Rail Trail has "come to a virtual standstill." That's lawyer Hans Huessy in Stowe Today, lamenting the stasis that's beset the 95-mile project from Swanton to St. J. It could, he argues, attract tourists from all over the world, just as Québec's 110-mile Petit Train du Nord does. But while VT politicians pay it lip service, the state's contributed a mere drop in the bucket. "Completing the rail trail would project Vermont into the forefront of northeastern bike destinations," he contends.Just an extra reminder if you're headed into the Vermont woods this weekend: Wear orange. It's Youth Deer Hunt weekend.The Halloween storm was the first real test of home batteries as power backup — and 1100 homes showed they work. As you may know, GMP has a pilot program to install Tesla Powerwalls that it controls in private homes. It's been able to use them to manage consumption during peak demand times. But the batteries had never been tested in a widespread outage... until last week. "I hope we get to a point where [having] storage in a home is no different from a computer in a home," says GMP's chief innovation officer.Meanwhile, though, the storm was also a disaster. At least, that's the declaration Gov. Phil Scott is hoping to get from the feds. The state's calculation of damage to infrastructure now stands at $5 million, and Erica Bornemann, the director of Vermont Emergency Management, expects the final tally to rise to between $6 million and $10 million.VT towns weigh whether to join opioid lawsuit. And not just in Vermont. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio is overseeing the landmark consolidated national suit against opioid manufacturers, and Judge Dan Polster has ruled that nearly every municipality in the country — that's about 34,000 jurisdictions — will be automatically included in any settlement unless they opt out. After initially opposing that move, Vermont AG TJ Donovan is now recommending that towns join in. Standoff Enters 2nd Day as Two Barre Drivers Continue to Wave Each Other Through a Stop Sign. The Winooski again. Just to launch you into the weekend.Painting the sky. That was a lot of birds in yesterday's link to migrating blackbirds... but then I stumbled on this exquisite video of starlings, which gather in immense flocks as they head south. Those flocks attract predators, especially peregrine falcons, and the shifting patterns as the starlings evade their foes are mesmerizing. This was filmed in California, but as the filmmaker points out, "I have seen this in many other places. Check out agricultural areas...in the fall and winter. [And] keep going back."If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:
SO YOU STRUCK OUT ON PETER & PAUL TIX. WHAT NOW?
You can go eat up and catch some very fine local music. At 7:30 it's the Bradford Bog People, who do Appalachian harmonies and stylings and the occasional clogging; at 8:15 it's Grace Crummer, an up-and-coming jazz vocalist, and the rest of her quintet; and at 9 pm singer-songwriter Ted McManus flies solo piano. At the Lebanon Congregational Church.
You probably know the drill by now: Go play!
Food tonight by the Skinny Pancake, drinks from the Norwich Inn, music from the d.j. collective Booth. And they'll be doing Take Apart in the Science Discovery Lab, meaning you get to dive into the innards of toasters, cameras, hair dryers and more without anyone nagging you to put it back together. Starts at 7, though doors open at 6:30.
Morticia, Gomez, Uncle Fester, Pugsley, Wednesday, Lurch... You can see how there'd be a lot to play around with on a high school stage. Especially when Wednesday's normal boyfriend and his parents are coming over for dinner and director Lanni Luce West (who also did last week's
Newsies
) has given ensemble members enhanced ancestral roles. Tonight at tomorrow at 7, Sunday at 2.
Jon Robin Baitz's witty, nuanced family drama snagged a Pulitzer nomination after its 2011 debut in NYC. When members of the Wyeth family get together for Christmas at the parental home in Palm Springs, daughter Brooke brings along the manuscript of her memoir, which unearths events her parents would much prefer remained buried. At Barnard town hall at 7:30 tonight and tomorrow, Sunday at 2, same next weekend.
Stay warm! See you Monday.
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