AH IT'S YOU, FRIDAY...
So how'd you make out yesterday? We've still got this high pressure sitting over us, which is lovely because it means full-on sun again today. And hey, good news! The temps are rising a little bit each day, so we might actually get into the high teens or even to 20 today. Though the winds will be pretty steady, so stay bundled. Low tonight dropping toward 0.Two maples across from Hopkins Center have 10 days to live. Dartmouth, which owns the Hanover Green, says that one of the trees has lost much of its canopy while the other has extensive internal rot. An outside contractor will bring in a crane on Dec. 30 to take them down. Both trees were planted in the early 1960s. "If these trees were in a forest, they would live a lot longer, but because of the compaction of foot traffic, snowplowing, and vehicles, they really have declined," says college arborist Brian Beaty.Thetford shakes up library board. Amid the uproar over a vote last summer by the Latham Library board to replace longtime librarian Peter Blodgett, the board learned it lacked legal authority to act, since its bylaws require the election of members who aren't appointed by the neighboring Congregational church. Now, three incumbents have lost their seats and six newcomers will sit on the board. Voters, says the VN's David Corriveau, "appeared to lean toward candidates who supported Blodgett."There's a GoFundMe campaign for Bradford's Crystal and Tom Blakeney. Their home was destroyed by a fire on Wednesday, and the family — the two parents, three kids (8, 6, and 4 months), and four dogs (Crystal works at Bradford Veterinary Clinic) — need food, clothing, and money. One of Crystal's co-workers launched the fundraising effort, details at the link. According to the VN, the fire isn't suspicious, and seems to have started near their woodstove.“The shape, a curve opened to its reflection, has a gesture that is quite common..." Those would be Herb Ferris' twin white cedar "arms" for "Passage," the entrance to VINS's new Canopy Walk. That — plus sculptor Joseph Fichler's stunning wild horses in Woodstock, Kate Emlen's meditative landscapes in S. Royalton, Evelyn Swett's compost photos at AVA, and more — feature in Susan Apel's rundown of the recent visual art season in online mag The Woven Tale Press.What the 19 Days looked like. Demo Sofronas has been out and around Norwich the last few weeks, snagging photos everywhere he turns: the Norwich Inn, the PD, the FD, Norwich Knits, the pancake breakfast, Carpenter & Main, Dan & Whit's, Tracy Hall, the banks....“You could make a case that La Garagista is the single most original, creative wine operation in the United States." That's none other than the NYT's highly influential wine critic, Eric Asimov, in Rowan Jacobsen's very deep (he got his feet dirty) Boston mag dive into the natural wine movement centered in Vermont but expanding quickly throughout New England. La Garagista is Deirdre Heekin's Barnard winery, and Jacobsen covers Heekin, Krista Scruggs, Fable Farm and others. He sums them up in his title: "New England winemakers don't care how they do it in California."Herald, Times Argus get a new publisher. Mike Pappas, who's been the top editor at the Rutland Herald and Barre-Montpelier Times Argus, is taking the reins from Rob Mitchell, whose family owned the papers for eight decades. The papers are now owned by the Sample News Group, which also owns Claremont's Eagle Times. "We are convinced that communities want local journalism, and we’re blessed to have two newspapers that are integral to the communities that we serve,” Pappas says.VT, NH ace Fed study of access to credit. The NY Fed is out with a new report on access to credit in communities across the country. The higher the score, the more people living there have no access to credit. This matters, write Axios' Felix Salmon and Danielle Alberti, because "communities with good access to credit can grow faster and prove more resilient to shocks than their less creditworthy counterparts." Only two states have no counties with worrisome scores: VT and NH."The Emotional Toll of Climate Change on Science Professionals." That's the title of a new paper authored by an intriguing group of Earth science professionals, including Susanne Moser, a human geographer at Antioch University New England in Keene. She talks to NHPR's Peter Biello about how the people on the front lines of analyzing the planet's changing data are dealing — or not — with their feelings about what's happening around us.NH economy doing just fine, thank you. NH Business Review's Bob Sanders runs down what's happening: a slight drop in manufacturing, but otherwise the economy remains strong. Despite the trade war, exports rose, thanks largely to (did you know about this?) the state's aerospace industry. Healthcare and construction are booming, too. The problem everywhere: finding workers. Last year, half the coal burned in New England was at Bow's Merrimack Station plant. But that was just a fraction of what the coal plant used to burn. Now that it's in the crosshairs of climate activists, NHPR's Annie Ropeik is up with a detailed explainer on the plant and its changing role in the regional power grid. The short version: The plant's one of just three left in the region, and runs much less frequently than it used to.Half of Vermont's 20 largest eldercare facilities are owned by out-of-state corporations. And that, says the latest installment in the joint Seven Days/VPR investigation, is a problem. "Managers face immense pressure to fill facilities and control costs," Derek Brouwer writes. "When problems at large investment properties arise, they have affected dozens, even hundreds, of seniors.""It's a hard life for a tree in northern Vermont." Well, yes. That's the Nature Conservancy's Jim Shallow, talking about an intriguing problem. The Conservancy had wanted to give big California companies a chance to offset their greenhouse gas emissions by paying to protect the millions of trees on its 5,500-acre Burnt Mountain property. But it turns out the trees are smaller than expected, and aren't storing enough carbon to cover the project's costs. Which means Vermont has been unable to tap into the billions generated by California's cap-and-trade program.Pssst, wanna see an analemma? Let's just pause a moment to note that the winter solstice arrives tomorrow night at 11:19. Which makes this exactly the right time to check out this very nice (and can you imagine the hours he put in?) photographic plot of the sun's travels over the course of a year by Italian sky photographer Giuseppe Donatiello. (Thanks for the pointer, ML!)
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SO FRIDAY, WHAT'CHA GOT?
They did it back in the summer and then again at Halloween. That's enough to say it's now a tradition, right? So the Upper Valley’s Hip Hop and R&B station will be back with DJ's and a light show. Runs 9-midnight.
Three different chorales have been rehearsing since November, and tonight they come together with a full-throated audience for audience sing-alongs as well as instrumental and choral performances. Starts at 7 pm.
The Lyme-based community chorus, which has been going strong for over a quarter century now, will do its annual holiday concert. As they describe it, "It’s a relatively short and incredibly sweet concert, filled with beautiful music from across seasonal traditions and including audience singing that fills the space with the shared spirit of the evening." 7:30 pm, and if you miss it they'll be at the Lyme Congregational Church tomorrow.
Wich, who graduated from Hanover High last year and has been down in Nashville studying for a music business degree and playing gigs on the side, is pushing ahead as a singer-songwriter. Yeager, of course, is an Upper Valley veteran, host for five years of the open mic at Skunk Hollow, and a presence at venues where they take music seriously. Starts at 7.
But wait! There's a bunch more!
Jazz at Café Renée in WRJ and singer-songwriters everywhere you look tonight; Christmas Revels in its new location at LOH starting tomorrow; Handel's
Messiah
at the First Congregational Church in Leb tomorrow afternoon; Brocklebank Brewing's holiday party in Tunbridge Saturday with the Shugarmakers; pianists Daniel Weiser and Philip Liston-Kraft doing four-hand arrangements of the "Nutcracker Suite" and "Rhapsody in Blue" at three performances tomorrow and Sunday... Check it all out:
The Valley News Calendar (no subscription reqd)
David Corriveau's look-ahead writeup in the VN (yeah, sorry, you may hit their paywall)
And the indispensable Junction Magazine calendar!
Now that we're about to round the solstitial corner, here's Wendell Berry to say not so fast:
To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.
Hanukkah Sameach Sunday. See you Monday.
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