GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Just a heads up: There will be no Daybreak Monday or Tuesday. But it's just a short break. Back in your inbox Wednesday morning. Sunny and cold today. There's a polar high moving east, and today we'll get the brunt of it: any clouds this morning giving way to clear skies, but temps only getting into the mid-teens along with some decent northwest winds. Down into the negative double digits tonight. Pepper changes vote, Norwich Selectboard will discuss new contract with town manager. Norwich blogger Chris Katucki reports that after long discussion at Monday's special SB meeting, board chair John Pepper — who in January had voted against entering into contract discussions with embattled town manager Herb Durfee — said he's now willing to do so. That made the board's vote 3-2 in favor, though Katucki writes, "It is not clear that a new contract is a done deal."VFW, AG recognize Heavisides. Yesterday, Doug Heavisides, sometime blogger and principal of the Hartford Area Career and Technology Center in WRJ, showed VT Atty Genl TJ Donovan around HACTC. But he neglected to tell his colleagues why: He's the AG's Vermonter of the Month. Heavisides downplays public recognition, so we'll just mention quietly that he was also just named one of the Vermont VFW's teachers of the year (at the link). His response: "I am really not much to brag about without the people around me. They rock. We have such an awesome school at the HACTC because of the other 31 folks I work with."Dartmouth ranks 55th in financial aid generosity study. The rankings of four-year private nonprofit colleges come from the Chronicle of Higher Education using US Dept of Education data. "Dartmouth offers an average net price of $13,837 for students from families with incomes of $0 to $30,000," The Dartmouth reports. By comparison, Harvard, which at fifth was the highest ranking Ivy on the list (Duke was first), had an average net price of $2,382. Dartmouth was the only Ivy to place out of the top 50."Human communications usually fail except by accident." That's the first of what's known as Wiio's Laws, sent in by EDM Landman as an addition to yesterday's compendium of useful laws to know about. #3? "There is always someone who knows better than you what you meant with your message." More at the link. "Skis straight down an incline in a tuck, hit jump fast, fly, try to land on two feet, avoid yard sale." Carla Frontfive is visiting — and writing about — all the ski areas in NH, big and small, and she was in Leb recently to try out ski jumping for the first time at Storrs Hill. Lots of pics and great enthusiasm for the sleeves-rolled-up community ski hill. "I want to move to Lebanon," she writes. "I want to be a volunteer snowmaker/groomer/lift operator too!"Ascutney again. Remember that drone pic a few days ago? He's back, with an even better shot from 375 feet up, this time with the early-morning sun bathing the mountain. Springfield Hospital plans to cut ties to local health clinics. The nine clinics, in Springfield, Londonderry, Ludlow, Chester, Rockingham and Charlestown, are part of a network affiliated with the hospital, which filed for bankruptcy last year. Now that Springfield is trying to become part of a three-hospital system with Mt. Ascutney and Valley Regional, probably under DHMC's auspices, it's looking to slough off the clinics as an independent company, VPR reports. NH Dems announce delegates to national convention. With the primary votes counted, the party allocated six congressional-district-level candidates each to Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg, and four to Amy Klobuchar. Included among the 2nd District delegates: Hanover's Krishna Desai for Sanders and Canaan's Johnnie Christensen for Buttigieg. The convention is July 13-16 in Milwaukee.Mt. Washington Avalanche Center warning of "considerable" danger on the mountain. The center's director, Frank Carus, tells NHPR that excess precipitation and warm temperatures are creating slabs of unstable snow. So far this year, a handful of people have reported triggering avalanches in high-risk areas. If you're headed that way, you can find the day-by-day advisories here.DHHS employee files whistleblower suit alleging NH fails to protect children from abuse and neglect. Anna Carrigan has been speaking publicly since last year about problems she sees at the Dept of Children, Youth and Families. “There is a legal mandate that requires the state to respond and assess cases within 60 days,” says her lawyer. “The state is not doing that and that is illegal.” Carrigan also alleges that her supervisors retaliated against her for speaking out on the issue. Want to break a track record? Milk 30 cows before dawn growing up. Okay, maybe it's not quite that straightforward. But the AP caught up with Elle Purrier, the Vermonter and UNH grad who just broke the women's indoor mile American record, and her childhood on her family's dairy farm definitely played a role, she says. “Just growing up in that community and in that setting — people work really hard. My family worked really hard. It taught me a lot of life lessons."VT Senate votes to override Scott minimum-wage veto; action moves to House. It wasn't close in the Senate yesterday: 24-6. But the minimum wage bill passed the House with 93 votes, and that body will need 100 to override. In the wake of its one-vote failure last week to override Scott's family leave veto, reports Seven Days' Colin Flanders, "Democrats who initially opposed the minimum wage bill must now decide whether to allow Scott to again strike down a top party priority. Last week's debacle appears to be weighing heavily on some of their minds."Okay, Washington State, sure. But maple syrup from New Jersey? CBS in Philadelphia has a report on an effort in Stockton, NJ (northwest of Trenton) to see whether red maples can be used for syrup production. "We’re really trying to convince the community around Stockton…that this is a commodity they can exploit without harming the forest," says Stockton U environmental science prof Aaron Stoler. One advantage: looks from the video like you can be out tapping trees in your shirtsleeves. With traffic going by behind you.
No spin, just news that connects you. If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:
WHAT'S A LITTLE ARCTIC BLAST WHEN THERE'S SO MUCH TO DO TONIGHT?
It's a chance to encounter the museum's art in new ways. "Grab a friend, a date, or your partner for this special edition as we zoom in on poetry, play, and romance," they write. Starts at 6. Free, but register at the link.
The National Theater's version of Noël Coward's 1943 comedy stars
Fleabag
's Andrew Scott in a production that, with one key gender switch from the original, becomes an entirely new look at fame, loneliness, and a charming egomaniac at the center of his little bohemian world. 7:30 at the Loew.
Mary Zimmerman's play, based on Ovid, starts with the creation of the world, runs through King Midas, Orpheus and Eurydice, Narcissus, and a series of other myths. "These stories have earned their keep," Zimmerman said a few years ago. "They are not a conspiracy of English professors." 5 pm, and again tomorrow and Sunday.
Rebecca Bailey takes on the centerpiece role of Arkadina, the mistress of the provincial estate on which Checkov's play is set and "an appealing package of potency and toxicity," as the critic John Lahr once put it. Around her an ensemble of sharply drawn characters — including Jim Schley as the family doctor, Dorn, and Katie Cawley as the aspiring young actress Nina — explore love, cruelty, and regret. 7:30 at the Grange Theater in S. Pomfret, runs through Feb. 23.
Written by local playwright Kristin Rose, the play involves Claire, a spa owner who wants to travel but can't afford it. So she does what anyone would: tries her hand in the magic service industry as The Witch of Love. 7 tonight, runs this weekend and next.
Honky tonk, rockabilly, whatever... you'll be up and moving. They've got fans all over, though they rarely leave Vermont. "They make music whose natural habitat is the barroom and the dance floor, and they do it with heart, soul, aplomb, and chops," a critic once wrote. 7:30 pm.
This week with guitarist (and Native American Studies major at Dartmouth) Wanic at 7:30; acoustic folk/roots band Decatur Creek at 8:15; and guitarist Tom Pirozzoli at 9. In the Lebanon Congregational Church.
Then, of course, there's
plenty
on tap this weekend. Including the Montshire's legendary
on Saturday; the
comedy show Saturday night at Bridgewater's Woolen Mill Comedy Club; the
actual
appearance of
NYT
bestselling author (and local)
at Babes Bar in Bethel on Sunday with her cardboard cutout of Rachel Maddow and her new biography of the same (the real Maddow, not the cutout); the Trails Alliance's Lake Morey
on Sunday; and Parish Players' reading of Circus Smirkus founder Rob Mermin's new play about helping a friend die under Vermont's
Act 39,
no link, at the Eclipse Grange in Thetford Sunday at 2:30.
Whew. Stay warm! See you next Wednesday.
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