Daybreak Monday 12/21/20

WELCOME TO THE WEEK, UPPER VALLEY!

Quick heads up: Daybreak will publish today through Thursday, then take the rest of the year off. (Sounds so... decadent.)A quiet day today. We're in for a skyful of clouds, with not much if any break in the gray. Temps just nicking freezing early in the afternoon, then dropping back into the mid-20s for tonight. Calm winds.But at least we had this. Two sunny days, deep snow, winter looking the way it should. Karen Harris was up at Green's in Dorchester on Saturday as the afternoon sun hit the headwaters of the Mascoma River. Farmer's Table Café reopens in Grantham with new owner. “Most people would say this guy has lost his rocker. But I see an opportunity," Randy White tells the Valley News's John Lippman. The restaurant, at Exit 13 off I-89, has been "an oasis in Grantham given the void of decent sit-down restaurants in the vicinity," Lippman writes. It closed in March. White, who used to be an IT specialist at DHMC, has re-hired much of the old staff, re-opened with slimmed-down seating, and re-made the website to allow for online ordering.W. Fairlee's Tara Geraghty-Moats wins first-ever women's nordic combined world cup. Finishing sixth in the ski jump portion on Friday in Austria, she began the 5K xc ski race 30 seconds behind Norwegian Westvold Hansen, then beat her by 1.5 seconds. The event has been limited to men since it began at the Winter Olympics in 1924; Geraghty-Moats has helped lead the fight for women's inclusion, though the Olympics will not happen until 2026 at the earliest, when she's 32. "[I may] not necessarily be at my prime," she told NBC Sports last week. "And I think I will enjoy it just as much.”SPONSORED: This small business will steal your heart. Find unique gifts by local artists at Long River Gallery – pottery, glass, jewelry, fine art, puzzles and books. Need something small but distinctive? How about a wood-handled ice cream scoop, buffalo plaid pottery, or whimsical felted creatures? Holiday hours ~ Monday – Wednesday 11-5 and Christmas Eve 10-3 at 49 S. Main Street in White River Junction. Visit the gallery, shop online, or email [email protected] for a personal shopping service. Sponsored by Long River Gallery.As homeless population rises, Hartford grapples with huts. Three of them have gone up "tucked away at the base of a hill behind Worcester Avenue, down a long path through the woods," writes the VN's Anna Merriman. Selectboard member Simon Dennis, who's been working with homeless people and advocates, supplied the materials in an effort to help people get through the winter. “These are emergency times. We are in the middle of a pandemic,” he says. But the huts have also aroused opposition, and at a meeting last week, the selectboard formed a group aimed at finding an alternative.Reported cases of rape, burglary, liquor law violations all down at Dartmouth last year. Under the federal Clery Act, colleges each year report on crimes on and around campus for the year before. Dartmouth issued its Clery Report for 2019 on Friday, along with updated numbers for 2018 and 2017. There were 33 cases of rape in  2019, compared to 39 in 2018 and 23 in 2017. Burglary dropped slightly, from 19 to 15 cases, arrests for liquor law violations dropped from 37 to 16 and disciplinary referrals from 275 to 249. Instances of domestic and dating violence rose from 8 to 14. Stats start on p. 65.Cornish-Windsor Covered Bridge slated for repairs soon. NHDOT plans to replace worn deck planks starting Jan. 4. The bridge will be closed to all traffic for a week from 7 am to 3 pm, then for four more weeks will be reduced to one-lane traffic until work is done each day. There's the hoopla, and then there's the reality. After last Tuesday's televised first-Covid-vaccination events, the hard work of vaccinating many, many more people began—at small hospitals and rural clinics around VT and NH. VTDigger's Katie Jickling and Mike Dougherty went to Gifford Medical Center in Randolph to watch the first 20 healthcare workers get their shots—basically, a test run for the masses who will follow. Their report on what it was like went up yesterday on the "Deeper Dig" podcast."Three-Toed Sloths?" Sports headline writers shudder. Hanover High's council, the student-run organization that oversees affairs at the school not governed by the school board, administrative policy, or state law, is considering abandoning the longtime Marauder mascot, the VN's Pete Nakos reports. The association of "marauding" with raping and pillaging, the male pirate, and students who don't want to see a change have all "made for a full slate of discussions this academic year," Nakos writes. No alternatives yet, but in 1986 the council voted for Three-Toed Sloths, then reversed itself a week later. Remember that C-130 fuselage? Of course you do: It passed through NH (including Lebanon) last month on the back of a flatbed, drawing lots of interest. The Monitor's David Brooks is nothing if not tenacious, and he tracked down what was going on: It had been used at Pease to test something called the Joint Biological Agent Decontamination System, which rids airplanes of "biological agents," according to the Marine Corps. Then it was sent to NC to be destroyed. And why was the truck using smaller roads? The fuselage was too dang big to fit under interstate bridges.Orange East schools will be remote after Christmas break, amid "patchwork" of reopenings around VT. The schools in Bradford, Thetford, Corinth, Newbury, and Wells River did not go remote after Thanksgiving, but supt. Emilie Knisley decided to keep the buildings closed for a week in the new year after a survey showed at least 37 percent of families would need to quarantine, reports VTDigger's Lola Duffort. Elsewhere in the state, some schools are opting for in-person learning from the get-go—which may create a child-care crunch for some staff if the districts where they live remain remote.As report concludes solar saves money, VT cuts incentives for homeowners. You may remember that study from Synapse Energy a couple of weeks ago: It says that over six years, solar energy saved Vermonters $79 million. But the Public Utilities Commission and GMP have rejected its findings, reports VTDigger's Amanda Gokee, citing alleged problems with the study. While Synapse and VT solar companies say the state's wrong, the PUC has cut net metering rates to the point where the companies contend the state is discouraging new solar development. Gokee digs into the argument.So, if you move from Colorado to Vermont, are you still a flatlander? The answer appears to be yes. For the latest installment of VPR's "Brave Little State," Nina Keck looks into the origins of the terms  "woodchuck" and "flatlander." "Woodchuck's" a tough task—even Tom Slayton, the longtime editor of Vermont Life, couldn't arrive at a "conclusive answer" when he researched it. Keck notes it became popular among VT natives in the '60s and '70s, as flatlanders were moving there. The origin of "flatlander" is pretty obvious, but as Keck notes, "In typical New England fashion, the word flatlander, as far as putdowns go, feels pretty tame."Sure, lots of white-tailed deer. But also Cooper's hawks, gray fox, bobcats, coyotes, flying squirrels, turkeys, fisher, black bear... VINS has several game cameras set up near ground level along its trails, and day and night local wildlife parade—and eat, and fly, and hunt, and butt antlers—in front of them. Emily Johnson has put together a highlights reel from last fall to this.

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If monks had known about stairwells... Kings Return is a Dallas-based vocal quartet that does jazz, R&B, and classical, among other things. Back in July, lacking a handy cathedral, they repaired to a stairwell to perform Norwegian composer Ola Gjeilo's Gregorian-ized version of "Ubi Caritas," an 8th-century antiphon sung on Holy Thursday. I know, wrong season, but there's never a wrong season for transcendent music.See you tomorrow. 

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