GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Mostly cloudy, warmer. That airflow from the south is still moderating temps, and we're likely to get into the mid-30s today under mostly gray skies. There's a weak low pressure system coming through tonight that brings a slight chance of snow overnight, with nighttime temps pausing in the mid-20s on their way down to the minuses tomorrow night. But more on that tomorrow.What we do for art. Or, at least, what Lisa Lacasse does. Yesterday morning found her outside in Quechee's 2-degree weather blowing soap bubbles through a large straw, then crawling around trying to photograph them on the snow as they froze—at least, the ones that didn't break on contact. But then she noticed one on her deck railing, glowing. "The sun peeking out a bit through the clouds," she writes, "gives it that inner light and warmth."Is there a financially viable model for small-scale development that can help revitalize villages? That's what Fairlee's Jonah Richard—whose blog you read here sometimes—is trying to do, writes Nick Clark in Sidenote. Richard's been writing about the travails of getting his apartment projects in Fairlee and Bradford off the ground, as well as the Chapman's Place commercial building in Fairlee. "We need more small-scale developers and the first step in making that happen is by laying everything on the table and opening up the books," he says. Clark profiles Richard and his efforts.Speaking of Fairlee, new zoning rules aim at denser village, preserving natural spaces. Right now, Claire Potter writes in the Valley News, the town allows one-acre lots anywhere within its boundaries. The proposed new regs, which the selectboard expects to put in place later this month (with an eventual town vote on whether to make them permanent), would create a 10-acre minimum in a new "rural resource area," aimed at keeping forestland from being chopped up; promote cluster development on larger parcels so that more land remains undeveloped; and allow for three-story apartments in the village."Dartmouth has more white people than I’ve ever seen in my life. Sometimes I just walk around campus marveling at how many there are." That's a line from Dartmouth grad Echo Brown's new young adult novel, The Chosen One, about a young Black woman named Echo Brown who grew up poor in Cleveland and is the first in her family to go to college. The book "is basically a memoir infused with magical realism," she tells WBUR's Jane Clayson on Here and Now. Brown details her experiences—"the feeling of being out of place, of being in this new world, of being isolated and alone," as she puts it—and talks about learning to navigate that new world.SPONSORED: Paid Job Coach opportunity. A young man with Down syndrome is seeking employment support and transportation for several part-time positions throughout the Upper Valley on Monday through Friday (approximately 9am-3pm). The ideal candidate will work with a skilled support team to implement employment-related goals and training strategies, while modeling professionalism and a positive, compassionate attitude. Pay starts at $18.00 per hour, plus benefits to include paid time off. Reliable vehicle and valid driver’s license required."Below [minus] fifty-five degrees a gob of spit freezes solid in midair. Spit had been freezing in midair for two weeks." That's from a short story by the Russian writer Varlam Shalamov, who spent 15 years laboring in Stalin's gulag in far northeastern Siberia. "I like reading about cold weather more than I do living in it," Peter Orner writes in this week's Enthusiasms, and no writer captures it better, he thinks, than Shalamov—a "criminally unknown (in this country) giant of Russian literature." More of Orner and Shalamov at the link.Strike three at the NH Executive Council yesterday. The GOP majority again voted 4-1 to reject contracts that together fund 80 percent of the reproductive health care in the state's family planning program. Only one councilor explained his vote, saying he doesn't believe abortion services can be separated from other care, despite state officials' assurances to the contrary, NH Bulletin's Annmarie Timmins writes. Councilor Ted Gatsas asked Gov. Chris Sununu if he intends to bring the contracts up again. “I might put it on the agenda every meeting. Who knows?” Sununu responded.Just because the "Laurie List" is public doesn't mean people are happy. In fact, Todd Bookman reports for NHPR, the effort to increase police transparency by making public the names of officers with "credibility" issues still frustrates both police and advocates. The latter argue that the process by which an officer's name gets on the list remains too opaque. Meanwhile, chiefs say the brief descriptions from the state of why an officer landed on the list often raise more questions than answers. “There is a whole wide range of what 'truthfulness' is, and how bad the incident was," says one.VT catches up on its Covid numbers. After software glitches kept thousands of test results from being reported to the health department since last weekend, the state yesterday updated its dashboard, VTDigger's Erin Petenko reports. It hit a new record of 2,975 cases last Friday, then saw numbers drop through yesterday. The seven-day case average now stands at 1,740 cases per day, which is actually lower than the state record of 1,852 cases per day reached on Sunday. Hospitalizations, too, have dropped from their high of 101 on Monday.Rutland Raiders barely got to be Ravens before they were back to being Raiders. I know, it's confusing. Back in 2020, the school board voted to retire the high school's old Raiders moniker and arrowhead logo after students, staff, and alums criticized their reference to Native American stereotypes. Late Tuesday night the board reversed itself, 6-5—after voters put three new members on the board last year who favor the Raiders mascot. "I just really want to say, from the student body...I think it's time for this to be over," said the board's student rep in opposing the re-vote, writes Seven Days' Alison Novak."Do not call the Health Department for assistance." So read a tweet sent out yesterday by the VT Dept. of Health after—this will stun you—the website for Vermonters to order free rapid tests had trouble dealing with heavy demand. But it obviously got unstuck: By 2:45 yesterday afternoon, all 350K tests were claimed. The state expects another 150,000 tests sometime, which it will distribute either online-only or partially in-person, reports Seven Days' Colin Flanders.UVM Med Center shifts to emergency staffing procedures. The move takes effect today as the hospital deals with severe staffing shortages. “The number of UVM Medical Center staff out of work due to COVID has doubled in the last week, and current projections indicate that these numbers will continue to grow,” the hospital's chief nursing officer wrote staff on Tuesday. Some managers will shift to tending patients, writes VTDigger's Liora Engel-Smith, nurses will be assigned to areas of highest need, and the hospital will turn to FEMA staff for help.A deadly virus could threaten porcupine populations in Maine. Unusual flu-like symptoms—runny nose, trouble breathing—found in five porcupines at Acadia last fall have experts worried about a virus that ended up killing two of the infected animals. Sam Schipani reports for the Bangor Daily News that researchers are now working with the state wildlife department to gain a better understanding of the virus, discovered to be a mutation of an adenovirus discovered a few years ago in Canada. Still unknown are how far it has spread and what other species are most at risk of infection.Six New England ski resorts land among Ski mag's 16 "Best." You can take or leave lists like this, but still, here's how readers rate them... Maine's Sugarloaf comes in at #16, NH's Cannon Mountain at 14 ("a wealth of excellent terrain packed into a medium-sized mountain"); Jay Peak at 10 ("some of the best tree runs anywhere in America"); Mad River Glen at 8 ("hard to have a bad day on such a wonderful mountain"); Killington at 6 ("a mountain west vibe"); and independently owned Smuggler's Notch ("everything that is great about skiing") in 2nd place. Tops? Idaho's Sun Valley.Have you ever wondered: Why do we have butts? Maybe it’s not the first thing on your mind when you wake up in the morning, but know that scientists are still trying to figure out how and when animals developed that, um, key digestive component. It’s one of several enduring puzzles that Vox’s Brian Resnick has rounded up, such as: Could a person live to 150? And whatever happened to the planet Venus, which once was as pleasant as Earth? (Now it’s 900 degrees in the shade.) You can also follow Vox's podcast "Unexplainable" for a deeper dive into these and other universal mysteries.
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This evening at 6, there's an online memorial and reading to honor longtime Dartmouth English and creative writing prof Gary Lenhart, who lived in Norwich and died last March. Over 27 years, he taught writing—poetry in particular—to countless undergrads and adults in the MALS program, after years as a poet and poetry-reading organizer in NYC. Via Zoom.
This evening at 7:30, the Hop launches The Force of Things, an immersive, experiential "opera for objects" by composer/architect sibling duo Ash and Adam Fure. They "gesture towards the gravity of ecological collapse in this immersive, mind-widening experience," the Hop writes. "Audience members enter into a field of sculpted matter ringed by speakers sounding waveforms too low for human ears." Performances through Sunday in the Moore Theater, but you'll need to call 603.646.2422 to check for tix, since shows may be sold out.
Time to wake up!
with baroque composer François Couperin's
Le Tic-Toc-Choc, ou Les Maillotins.
See you tomorrow.
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.
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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