Daybreak Friday 7/3/20

WELL HEY, FRIDAY!

That was nice yesterday, wasn't it?

Now there's this weak cold front traipsing through our weather area. It's moving slowly, and the day will be wetter the farther south you go. Around here, mostly cloudy and a chance of rain in the afternoon, temps stretching toward 80. Down into the high 50s tonight. 

A single, perfect, water lily.

Quechee photographer Lisa Lacasse was out early the other morning on Post Pond in Lyme. "The water was calm," she writes, "a loon was calling to its mate, songbirds were flitting about catching bugs and the the fog was creeping up the hillside reaching for the sun that was peeking out from behind the clouds. There were only a few water lilies blooming, but when I found this one, I knew it was special."

"What did poor Amasa do to come back as a turkey buzzard?"

 Tim van Leer and his daughter, Samantha, were driving past the Etna Cemetery on Wednesday when they noticed the buzzard sitting atop Amasa Gleason's obelisk of a tombstone, prompting Samantha to snap this pic and Tim to ask that question. Hard to say. Because he was born in Vermont? Or got an honorary degree from Norwich University in 1846? Oh, maybe this: According to one set of online records, he was in New Bedford, MA when he died in 1877. That's what you get for leaving the Upper Valley.

Last numbers for the week.

And if you want to keep track of what's going on in the whole region... VT's Department of Financial Regulation yesterday put out its weekly report on data for New England and the Northeast. Cases are now doubling at a rate of every 52 weeks in NY and MA, 36 weeks in VT, 20 in NH, and 8 in ME. Overall, the Northeast is in far better shape than other regions in the country. But while some counties between Maine and Virginia are moving in favorable directions, the final map at the link shows a good number are going the other way.Contested seats at next week's Hanover Town Meeting. Incumbent selectboard members Bill Geraghty and Peter Christie, the chair, face challenges from Dartmouth employees who are active in the "welcoming" movement and worked on the town's Fair and Impartial Policing ordinance. Both Kristina Wolff, who works at the Dartmouth Institute, and Dalia Rodriguez, who works in the college's Sustainability Office, are campaigning on equity and diversity issues. Town meeting, will be July 7 in the Dewey Field lot. It will also take up the town budget and short-term rentals. (VN) "Everybody has a lot that they want to share. We definitely got used to saying, ‘Make sure your mute button is on.’" Erika Wetzel is a kindergarten teacher at the Ottauquechee School, and she talks over this unusual spring with Junction Mag's Isaac Lorton. As the months wore by, she and her co-teacher shifted how they taught, loosened up on daily lesson plans, looked for more things to do offline. They also grappled with how confusing it all was for little kids. "At the end of the school year I was thinking, how is it already June? It passed in a flash, but also so much happened that it felt so full."There were 520 lightning strikes on the VINS property in June. This is pretty cool. They've got their own weather station, with the data nicely displayed by Weather Underground. June temps ranged from a low of 33.3 degrees F to a high of 95.3. Highest wind speed was 17 mph, and in all, 4.3 inches of rain fell. Link takes you to current conditions at the top, June data filtered below. The lightning strikes are in a separate report, you'll just have to trust me.History through a lens. In particular, the lens of Jon Gilbert Fox, the veteran photographer for Vermont Life, NYT, Yankee, and other publications. Fox is the guest artist for the Chandler's 10th annual Vermont Pride Theater Festival, and in celebration, a collection of his photos—Jesse Jackson. Allen Ginsberg, Tony Bennett, Donald Hall, and dozens of others including activists and gay icons—will go up online July 9 and at the Chandler two days later. He'll be interviewed (online) by arts writer David Corriveau on the 9th, registration opens today. Susan Apel has the deets.In the midst of retail pain, a new store opens in Woodstock. It's Woody's Mercantile, the "mountain lifestyle store" that owner Suzi Curtis had originally planned for the old Dartmouth Bookstore space in Hanover, then pulled out after construction delays. Now it's in the space once filled by the Whippletree Yarn Shop on Central Street. The Woodstockvt.com blog talks to Curtis about what she's up to.We the People struggles. The scrappy theater troupe that's made a home for itself in WRJ's Briggs Opera House was about to mount its production of Man of La Mancha when the pandemic shut everything down. Including Brown Paper Tickets, the Seattle-based ticket-seller for scrappy little arts orgs, which never paid We the People for the 650 tickets it had already sold. In a press release Wednesday, producer Perry Allison says that We the People is trying to dig out of its financial hole. Members are "considering virtual concerts and forming a 501C3. They will also launch a GoFundMe campaign to ensure that the company has a future."VT's new food scrap law? A boon for bears. Apparently. "We have been receiving lots of reports of bears on decks, tearing down bird feeders, wrecking beehives, killing chickens, and getting into trash, compost and garbage containers,” says state bear biologist Forrest Hammond. Fish & Wildlife has just come out with advice for backyard composters. Among other things: three parts of brown material for one part of green material, and no meat or bones. If you're desperate, try electric fencing, they say. Meanwhile, Jackson NH confronts a rash of large, messy car burglars.Several cars, the Conway Daily Sun reports, have been looted by bears looking to scarf up leftover Cheerios and Three Musketeers bars. “The bears have been kicking things up a notch,” says the town's police chief. “I don’t believe they are an organized gang, but we have (multiple) vehicles in the community being targeted by food burglars." They're casing cars with unlocked doors. "We know of one bear that’s smart enough to open both car doors,” he says. NH pollworkers want mask guidance for fall elections. Local officials are finding the question cuts both ways—volunteers who refuse to work if they have to wear masks, and volunteers who are leery of working if there's no mask mandate for voters. "I had quite a few election workers who said, I'm willing to process absentee ballots, but I don't want to deal with people in person because I feel as though I'm being assaulted by people without masks,” one state rep from Nashua says. State officials say they're finalizing guidance.VT vote-by-mail becomes law. Gov. Phil Scott said yesterday he'll allow the recent bill expanding mail-in voting for the November election to become law without his signature. He noted it appears to have a technical problem that creates ambiguity in how the Secretary of State deals with ballot returns, the AP reports, and that the legislature should fix it when it returns in August. Meanwhile, Scott also signed a raft of bills containing hundreds of millions of dollars in pandemic relief.Jerry Greenfield donates to Zuckerman, Bradley Whitford to Holcombe. Okay, maybe that's not the most relevant part of the latest campaign finance reports from VT's gubernatorial and lieutenant governor campaigns. On that front, Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman collected about $130K in donations over the last three months, compared to former education secretary Rebecca Holcombe's $101K—though Holcombe has far outraised Zuckerman over the course of the campaign, and has more in the bank. Asst Atty Genl Molly Gray leads Democrats in the lt gov race. Garlic beer? Apparently it tasted as bad as it sounds, because Magic Hat had to take it all back. Seven Days' Dan Bolles takes a long look at the craft beer company that helped transform Vermont's brewing scene...and is now departing for Rochester, NY. In their early years, "[t]hey embraced experimenting and an acceptance of failure, because they were so groundbreaking and experimental that every one can't be a home run," a Yankee Brew News columnist tells Bolles. That all came to an end in 2010, Bolles writes, when founder Alan Newman sold it to a NYC investment firm. Trees, uh, find a way. There's something immensely reassuring about these photos, which have been around online for a few years but somehow, right now, strike a chord. They grow in the oddest, most tree-defying places—crevasses, rocks, a speed-limit sign, up cliff faces, in sidewalks, on other trees, out the windows of abandoned buildings..."determination" and "grit" don't even come close to doing them justice. (Thanks, LB and DM!)"When you have a herder who thinks he's a setter." That's the brilliant comment on this 16-second video that'll have you rethinking everything you thought you knew about dogs' place in the world.

News that connects you. If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:

#UVTogether

And then, as if I need to tell you, the film version of 

Hamilton

starts up on Disney Plus today. Just to get you in the mood,

by Lin-Manuel Miranda and members of the original production, along with Jimmy Fallon & The Roots.

Have a great, restful, safe 4th! See you Monday.

Written and published by Rob Gurwitt         Banner by Tom Haushalter    Poetry editor: Michael Lipson  About Rob                                                    About Tom                             About Michael

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