HELLO, FRIDAY!
Still breezy out there, and definitely colder. We'll see sun today, though clouds will build in (and then out) for at least part of it. Temps dropped overnight into the low 20s, and they won't climb very much. Winds pretty steady from the southwest, with gusts as high as 30 mph. Still, things are quieting down, though there's a slight chance of snow showers all day today, the effect of a slow-moving low pressure system way to the north. Down into the teens tonight.Thank you SO much for your emails and support yesterday. It was a bracing, whirlwind day — and a reminder of what a cool, thoughtful, and generous place we live in (or, for some of you, come from). You make this so much fun to do.One reason is that you send in pics like this. This is out a window at Rob Grimaldi's house in Wilder — no mountains, no stunning vistas, yet the early sunlight and the fog-enshrouded trees and the whisper of open space beyond are so evocative of this place. And also like this. A beguiling, up-to-something young fox that visits Patricia Campbell's yard in Woodstock from time to time.In case you're headed to Boston or Manchester today, a car crashed into the Hooksett tollbooth around 1:45 this morning. One person died, and the car was on fire when responders arrived. As of 4 am, the southbound cash lanes were still closed, though state police expect them to reopen around 6.Former Dartmouth College Republican leaders apologize to campus. You may remember that the two, Alexander Rauda and Daniel Bring, resigned during the imbroglio over US Senate candidate "Corky" Messner's cancelled visit. They regret poor communications, but also say this: "Under our leadership, the College Republicans’ public presence became purely oppositional, combatting the 'radical left' and devoted to 'owning the libs.' When your only stance is to oppose that of others, you feel you have no meaningful choices but to escalate the rhetoric of political — and interpersonal — conflict."On the docket in Lyme: discontinuing a section of River Road. The town's building a bypass around the failed, long-closed section, and the SB has recommended giving the rights to the road to abutting landowners. Opponents want more discussion of whether it could be a town-maintained trail and bikeway. The VN continues its look at upcoming town meetings.“We’ve had periods of much greater political division than we have today.” In case you missed it last night, that was former National Security Adviser Susan Rice during her conversation with Daniel Benjamin in Spaulding. They talked Benghazi, coronavirus, political tensions, Rice's childhood... The VN has a writeup.Oh yeah, the old ladder gag! The local theater group We the People will be mounting Man of La Mancha in three weeks, and director Perry Allison teases it on Facebook with a short video of rehearsals. Clearly audiences are in for some slapstick. First we'll knock each other into the boards a bit, then go shoot hoops. This is some serious real estate eye candy that Boston mag is featuring: a place for sale in Woodstock with both an indoor (synthetic) skating rink and a full-size basketball court. Also, walls of Lake Champlain bedrock and white pine, a bunch of acres, and a pond. Yours for a cool $9.75 mil.Upper Valley's housing shortage affecting its most vulnerable populations. NHPR's Daniela Allee reports that WISE and the Haven are sheltering people for longer than they used to because housing is so hard to find. “I have conversations every day in my office that are really just a lose-lose. So many people have to stay with perpetrators and abusers. There's a lot of doubling up and couch surfing,” says WISE's Bethany Hartt.That housing shortage? It's not just the Upper Valley. VT and NH have the lowest residential vacancy rates in the country, according to Attom Data Solutions, a real estate data broker that's amassed an immense database of property tax, deed, mortgage, foreclosure, and other information. The vacancy rate in both states is just 0.4 percent. Highest in the country are TN and KS, at 2.6 percent.NH utilities fall short on efficiency. The state's consumer advocate Donald Kreis, is up with a commentary in NH Business Review pointing out that for residential customers, greater efficiency is "the cheapest and cleanest energy resource." And the utilities are paid, by ratepayers, to find and promote energy savings. But the state's efforts are faltering, and the utilities, Kreis writes, "are chronically unwilling to expend an ounce of their political capital on defending the energy-efficiency programs they are paid handsomely...to deliver."Vermont's smaller hospitals continue to struggle. Six of the state's 14 hospitals lost money in fiscal year 2019, a staff presentation to the Green Mountain Care Board showed on Wednesday; five of them, including Gifford and Springfield, have reported losses over each of the past three years. "Vermont’s aging demographics, declining population, workforce challenges and low reimbursement rates from Medicaid and Medicare played into the hospitals’ economic challenges," writes Katie Jickling.New England Culinary Institute continues to struggle, too. It's basically shutting down NECI on Main, its farm-to-table dinner spot in Montpelier; instead, its La Brioche café is in the space. More striking: The school had 800 students 20 years ago; it's now got 50, Seven Days reports."This is a town that is struggling in so many ways. And it’s something that I see very clearly, because I am right on the forefront of it." That's Alan Blackwell, who runs the dive bar Arkham in downtown Brattleboro. Which is not just a dive bar. "This is also an LGBTQ bar. This is also a black bar, and a white bar and a brown bar. And this is someplace where everyone can just be themselves.” VPR's Howard Weiss-Tisman has an intriguing profile of Blackwell — 6'7", African-American, determined to create a place where anyone can sit and talk to anyone else, regardless of beliefs and background.
No spin, just news that connects you. If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:
THERE'S JUST NO WAY YOU CAN STAY HOME TONIGHT...
It is, clearly, still the word: The North Country Community Theater teens take on the iconic, hot-rodding, gum-snapping musical. The movie, an eight-year run on Broadway, more school and revival productions than one can count... there's a reason the soundtrack — think Greased Lightnin', Freddy My Love, Born to Hand-Jive — lives in our heads, but it's never as alive as under stage lights. 7:30 tonight, two shows tomorrow, and 3 pm on Sunday.
Matthews grew up gay in North Carolina, the daughter of a preacher, and that experience undergirds her no-holds-barred, unblinking songwriting. “I didn’t anticipate becoming a social-justice songwriter,” she told the
VN
's David Corriveau. “But social-justice songs are the ones people want to hear right now. People seem to have a need to know that other people out there are worried about what’s happening.” 7:30 at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the Upper Valley.
That's the American quartet of mandolinist Jamie Masefield, bassist Tyler Bolles, guitarist Doug Perkins, and fiddler Patrick Ross, each a fine performer in his own right. They'll be doing both original music and Appalachian standards. Live & Upstairs at 7:30 pm.
From 1968 until 2009, WBCN ruled the rock airwaves in Boston. It introduced the Cars, Tom Petty, U2, Radiohead, and Aerosmith, and for its last decades was a ratings powerhouse. But Bill Lichtenstein's documentary is interested in its early years, forged in and by the counterculture, when it was subversive and activist and didn't shy from a fight. Lichtenstein and executive producer Robert Sennott, who worked at the station in college, will be at the screening. 7:30 at town hall.
Right, so... the mycelium. You're bracing yourself for a droning, head-on-the-desk grade school experience. Nuh-uh. "One of the year’s most mind-blowing, soul-cleansing and yes, immensely entertaining triumphs," Matt Fagerholm writes on
RogerEbert.com
. It's not just that the huge network of cells breaks down matter, it's that it transforms matter. Penicillin, Psilocybin, mushrooms that boost the immune system... The film's about hope in the face of decay. 7:30 pm in Spaulding.
And then there's tomorrow, our whole extra day this year. You could spend it at the
to benefit VerShare's children's activity fund; or
surrounded by the more permanent kind; or tomorrow night at Still North Books, where
will be talking about characters who face tough choices and try to find their place in the world; or at the Chandler, where Québecois folk supergroup (there's gotta be such a thing)
. And, as always, you can check out Corriveau's
.
Have a lovely weekend! See you Monday.
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