GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
A calm day, then snow. We've got a ribbon of high pressure passing through today, which will bring us sunny skies to start. But there's a moisture-laden system headed our way from the Ohio Valley, and clouds will steadily build all day. Snow arrives mostly after midnight and it'll be heavy at times: The weather folks warn about tough driving during the overnight hours. Highs today getting close to 40, then settling down into the upper 20s overnight.This looks like a good one. Seven inches to a foot or a bit more around the Upper Valley and to the south. Here are the projected totals:
A fisher checks out the territory—in front of Erin Donahue's trail cam in E. Thetford. Ted Levin writes: "For fishers, March is the mating month ... it's also the birthing month. One to four kits are born in tree cavities high off the ground. Within days of birth, males come calling. Females often mate with more than one suitor (polyandry). Eggs become fertilized, divide and subdivide into a ball of cells (blastocyst), and then remain suspended in the uterus (delayed implantation) for almost a year. How else would a wide-ranging casanova find a wide-ranging fair maiden? She's stuck at home with the kits."Hoax school-shooting callers strike again at Lebanon, Hanover, around NH, and across the country. The call came in to Hanover's police communications center a bit before 10 yesterday morning, and to the Lebanon police around 10:10. By then, numerous other towns around NH were reporting the same thing—similar to calls that hit NH schools in December and VT police departments in January. The same happened yesterday in Nebraska, and a few days ago in Kansas and Minnesota. Police responded to investigate each call.“Maliciously smearing me with innuendo and worse." That's former Woodstock Foundation board vice chair Sal Iannuzzi responding to a letter by the current board chair and a legal counterclaim filed by board members to his and former board chair Ellen Pomeroy's suit alleging misconduct by management at the Woodstock Inn and Billings Farm, which the foundation oversees. The VT Standard's Mike Donoghue, who broke the original story, follows up on the letter, the counterclaim, and board members' charge that Iannuzzi had an "inappropriate relationship" with whistleblower Anna Berez. Randolph Union's Galloping Ghost mascot targeted by formal complaint. The complaint to VT's Agency of Education comes from the Rutland Area NAACP and the Native American nonprofit Gedakina, reports Darren Marcy in the Herald; under a law passed last year, the school district must now formally consider the complaint, which it will do Wednesday. The Galloping Ghost mascot—which initially bore a resemblance to a KKK rider on horseback—has been highly controversial for years and undergone several makeovers. A new set of riderless horse images are now under consideration, Marcy writes.SPONSORED: The Vermont Institute of Natural Science is hiring for multiple positions! Would you like to help protect Vermont's natural heritage and take part in the active care of our environment? Apply for a position at VINS! With various available positions in Accounting, Camp, Education, Rehabilitation, Research, and more, this is an opportunity for many motivated individuals to join our team. Sponsored by VINS at VINS Nature Center in Quechee, VT.Skiing and Snowshoeing Close to Home: Farnum Trails. After this snowfall, the Upper Valley Trails Alliance recommends this small trail network in Plainfield for winter snowshoeing or nordic skiing. The trails are ungroomed (if you'd prefer, there are nearby groomed trails, part of the Frenches Ledges system). The blue loop is a 1.2-mile hike through old lovely woods and wetlands without too much climbing. You can also extend your trek with the other internal loops and trails. The parking area is in Meriden, on your right along Columbus Jordan Road, half a mile from its junction with Colby Hill Road.What happens if a sheriff’s department goes belly-up? That's not just the question VTDigger's Ethan Weinstein asks about the Orange County sheriff's department as sheriff George Contois struggles with lack of staff, lack of revenues, and the financial mess he says he inherited. It's also the question Contois is asking (as he told WCAX's Adam Sullivan on Wednesday). Weinstein details the issues, including a long history of messy bookeeping the department's struggle to fulfill town patrol contracts, and tidbits like the fact that Contois was never given passwords to some of his department's computers.“The crooks know there’s no police protection now. They get it." That's Randolph business owner and former selectboard member Perry Armstrong talking to the VN's John Lippman about a town meeting proposal for Randolph to reconstitute its own police department—a move Armstrong and other backers say is necessary after the sheriff's department announced it didn't have the personnel to fulfill its patrol contract in town and the state police said they couldn't help. The debate in town, Lippman writes, isn't so much whether to rebuild a PD, but how big it should be.In Royalton, selectboard asks voters to turn down town manager plan it placed on the ballot itself. There are plenty of intriguing questions for next week's town meetings in the Upper Valley's VT towns; the VN's Alex Hanson checks in with what has to be one of the most unusual. Royalton's selectboard wants to propose adding a town manager and put funding in the budget—but didn't really talk about why or what the job would entail, let alone convey that to residents. Called on the issue, they've backtracked. “That’s why we’d urge you to vote no, because we don’t know where we’re going with this,” says one.After deliberating for over a year, NH Supreme Court deadlocks on whether guv's office has to turn over emails. The case centers around Gov. Chris Sununu's veto of a 2019 bill to create an independent redistricting commission; legislators thought he would approve it, but he abruptly reversed course—leading the progressive Kent Street Coalition to seek emails between his staff and the National Republican Redistricting Trust, a group led by former WI Gov. Scott Walker. A lower court had ruled the emails were not subject to the state's right-to-know law; the Court's deadlock means that ruling stands.In NH, the country's second most-forested state (after ME), a debate over foresters. Or, to be more precise, a debate between foresters and the governor. Among the 34 state licenses (and eight licensing boards) that Gov. Chris Sununu wants to eliminate is the forester's license. In NH Bulletin, Hadley Barndollar talks to foresters—who, unsurprisingly, take a dim view of the move ("Why would you entrust the management of that resource to unlicensed professionals?" asks one)—and to state staff, who cite the availability of national-level certification and lack of complaints to the state board.Been paying attention to Daybreak? Because Daybreak's Upper Valley News Quiz has some questions for you. Like, what was that truck hit by the southbound Vermonter hauling? And where was that fire on the Dartmouth campus? And what did the great-grandfather of LISTEN's new executive director do? You'll find those and other burning questions at the burgundy link.But wait! How closely were you following VT and NH?
Because Seven Days wants to know if you know what's been going on around the state this week—like, there's a bill in the legislature that would fine GPS companies for doing what?
And NHPR's got a whole set of questionsabout doings in the Granite State—like, how many occupational licenses is the Sununu administration aiming to eliminate?
“A Canadian cultural practice that more Vermonters would probably take up if we could just get our hands on it.” Yep, curling. In Seven Days, Erik Eskilsen writes about the growth of the sport, and explains the ice, the yelling, and the brooms. He even tried his hand at it (and his feet: “On my second throw, I lost my balance after releasing the stone and toppled over”) at the Border Curling Club in Québec, just across the border. Want to give it a try? Vermont has four clubs, including Upper Valley Curling.Twelve miles of xc ski bliss. One of the most beautiful skis in the state of Vermont is the old Craftsbury Marathon route from Highland Lodge in Greensboro to the Craftsbury Outdoor Center, through miles of fields and woods, down the hill that looms over Circus Smirkus headquarters, through Craftsbury, and on to the center. In the NYT (gift link), David Goodman blows the cover on this gem, describing the ski itself and why the outdoor center "has quietly become one of the country’s premier cross-country skiing centers, an innovator on sustainability and a pipeline for Olympic aspirants."And while we're on the subject: There's a reason no one makes tandem skis. Bikes, sure. Kayaks, fine. Skis? Well. It turns out that there's a fantastic story behind the first two guys to compete in northwestern Wisconsin's famed American Birkebeiner wearing a single pair of cross-country skis. It has to do with a champion racer who lost some years to addiction, his friend who got him back into racing with a move that inadvertently got them both disqualified from the Birkie, and a brainstorm to put them back into this year's race. MN's KARE 11 has the story. And if you want more detail, the two are up with the first installment of their own, first-person plural version. (Thanks, PG!)Still terrified by the Twilight Zone episode “The Invaders?” Then you’ll spare a thought for Frank Nischk. In Ecuador, the entomologist found himself the lone guard at a field station when millions of army ants invaded. His weapon: a broom. “A stream of hard, small bodies welled up through the cracks in the floorboards like water in a flood,” he writes on Atlas Obscura. When your heartrate returns to normal, keep reading. The ants, it seems, are critical to the survival of a host of other creatures. More than 500 species, from beetles to birds, tag along with the marchers, feeding off their leftovers and each other.The Friday Vordle. If you're new to Vordle, you should know that fresh ones appear on weekends using words from the Friday Daybreak, and you can get a reminder email each weekend morning. If you'd like that, sign up here.
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Given tonight's incoming weather, it's worth checking to make sure events you're interested in are still on.
Today at 4, Woodstock's Norman Williams Public Library hosts a reception for and talk by Randolph painter Pati Braun Grandy, whose new exhibition, "SeaSpring: An Exploration Underwater and In the Garden," runs through the end of April.
It's First Friday, of course, and there's plenty going on in downtown WRJ. JAM is hosting an opening for artist Laura Di Piazza's new show, "Redlining Our Souls," which focuses on discriminatory housing policies; over at the TipTop, Speakeasy Studios is hosting cartoonist and printmaker Natalie Norris, with an acoustic jam after-party; the Main Street Museum hosts its regular Friday night piano night, with snacks on the deck and cabaret music wafting through the air; and all around town, restaurants, galleries and shops will be welcoming passers-by.
At 7, Hop Film hosts this year's Oscar-nominated short documentaries, including The Elephant Whisperers, the Indian film about a couple that takes care of orphaned baby elephants; The Martha Mitchell Effect, about the outspoken Nixon-era cabinet wife; and Stranger At the Gate, about a former Marine who'd decided to bomb the local Islamic Center in Muncie—until its members' kindness turned his life around.
Starting this evening at 7:30 and running through Sunday, the North Country Community Theatre teen show sets up at the Lebanon Opera House with Anything Goes—yep, the Cole Porter musical set aboard the ocean liner S. S. American, with nightclub singer/evangelist Reno Sweeney on her way to England, young Billy Crocker stowed away in hopes of wooing wealthy debutante Hope Harcourt—and Hope herself engaged to the wealthy Lord Evelyn Oakleigh. Complications ensue, with a lot of very fine musical accompaniment.
This evening at 9, the stage at Hanover's Sawtooth Kitchen welcomes Ethiopian singer/dancer Kiflu Kidane and his Vermont-based Ethiopian funk/Afropop ensemble, New Nile Orchestra.
Tomorrow (Saturday) evening at 7:30 (and again Sunday at 3 pm), WRJ's Main Street Museum hosts the two-person play, Trumbo: Red, White & Blacklisted. It was written by the son of Oscar-winning screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, who was blacklisted by Hollywood after refusing to testify before the House Un-American Affairs Committee in 1947. The play, based on Dalton's letters, opened Off-Broadway with Nathan Lane in the title role. This version stars the Western Terrestrials' Nick Charyk and veteran Vermont theater personality Donny Osman.
At 2 pm on Sunday, Opera North presents its final Always On Sunday livestream, with ON's artistic director, Louis Burkot, talking with soprano Nina Evelyn Anderson and pianist Noriko Yasuda.
And finally, from 5 to 8 on Sunday, the Tuckerbox in WRJ is hosting a fundraiser for victims of the earthquake in Turkey, with traditional Turkish wines, appetizers, a Döner kebab cooking demonstration and tasting, and music by the musical duo Za'atar —Craig Macrae and Valerie Ritter, both local music teachers and past members of the Boston Arabic Ensemble—and Baglama player Tuna Akmehmet, a Dartmouth freshman from Ankara. Getting in requires minimum $75 donation: at the link or you can just show up and contribute.
And to take us into the weekend...
The Teskey Brothers spent nine years playing the bars of Melbourne, Australia, and didn't come to wider attention on their home continent until 2017. Now, it's fair to say, they've got fans on more than a few continents for their sound, which a reviewer once described as occupying "a space bordered on one side by old-fashioned Muscle Shoals southern soul ballads and on the other by the late-60s blues revival."
Have a fine weekend, and enjoy the snow! See you Monday for CoffeeBreak.
The Hiking Close to Home Archives. A list of hikes around the Upper Valley, some easy, some more difficult, compiled by the Upper Valley Trails Alliance. It grows every week.
The Enthusiasms Archives. A list of book recommendations by Daybreak's rotating crew of local booksellers, writers, and librarians who think you should read. this. book. now!
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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