GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Weak waves of low pressure. That, apparently, is what's moving through the region over the next couple of days, with their effects felt mostly in the north today and mostly to the south tomorrow. Us? Partly to mostly cloudy today, calm winds from the northwest, with a slight chance of snow after noon. Skies will clear a bit overnight before clouding over again, but not before the temps drop into the teens. Grafton meetinghouse, Grantham open space tract win six-figure grants. Yesterday, NH's Land and Community Heritage Investment Program announced $3.5 million in preservation grants around the state. Mascoma Valley Preservation, which has made restoring the Grafton Center Meetinghouse a cause célèbre, landed $150,000, which will help it install a new roof and repair the interior. The Ausbon Sargent Land Preservation Trust got $215,000 to help it buy the 386-acre Sawyer Brook Headwaters land in Grantham and conserve it for outdoor recreation. (VN)Not much time for Upper Valley towns to act on refugees. Last week, Gov. Chris Sununu affirmed that towns and cities in NH can resettle refugees if they wish, after a Trump administration order requiring states and communities explicitly to state if they want to. A variety of NH towns and cities have taken in refugees throughout this decade, but none in the Upper Valley, the VN notes. "We hope that will change," it editorializes: It's the right thing to do and refugees can help the region's labor shortage, declining school enrollments and graying population. The deadline for an official affirmation is Dec. 20.So you know that Trader Joe's run you made the last time you were in Burlington or Nashua? The chain has just recalled sushi, poke bowls, cheese dip and other house-brand products made by one of its suppliers because they may be contaminated with Listeria. Stores in VT, NH, and MA are among those affected. List of products at the link.NH's population just went up by one. Tulsi Gabbard has rented a house in Goffstown as she campaigns in the NH primary. Just in time for the season's first storm, which she shrugged off by tweeting out a pic of an indoor yoga session. "I grew up in Hawaii, where Christmas was 80 degrees and a day at the beach, and so being here in the winter, it's just -- the first snow of the year is always fun," she tells WMUR.NH lawmakers appear to be losing interest in pot legalization. That's NHPR's conclusion after a Senate committee this week voted to send full legalization — the state had already decriminalized possession of small amounts — to "interim study," which will effectively kill it. Same with a bill allowing physicians to prescribe medical marijuana for "any condition." The House had already passed the legalization bill.VT enjoys banner loon year. Fish and Wildlife reported yesterday that 2019 saw 101 nesting pairs, the most since it began tracking the loon population in 1978. Even better, says the VT Center for Ecostudies' Eric Hanson, there were 115 chicks, of which 87 (75 percent) survived through August — bettering the five-year survival average of 73 percent.UVM's Fanny Allen Hospital forced to close operating rooms due to mysterious odor. Last week, for the second time this year (the first was in October), the hospital in Colchester was beset by an odor that sickened people, sending them to urgent care. Now UVM Medical Center officials say they'll keep the surgical facilities closed for the rest of this month while they investigate.VT's eldercare workforce struggles with low pay, high turnover. And that, reports a joint investigation by Seven Days and VPR, puts residents of eldercare facilities at risk. They found dozens of instances in which "residents at state-regulated homes have been harmed or mistreated by staff who were poorly trained, overwhelmed or made terrible decisions." Staffers have diverted drugs, stolen money, and assaulted them. "The workforce shortage we are facing across long-term care in Vermont is rapidly approaching crisis levels," says Ruby Baker, who runs the advocacy group Community of Vermont Elders.
Regulatory shift endangers VT chicken farms that run composting operations. There are a number of farms around the state that collect food scraps, blend them into a compost mix to feed hens, and then process the leftovers as compost to sell. This makes the economics work for small egg operations. Now, however, they're going to have to get solid waste permits from the Dept of Environmental Conservation, and farmers worry it'll put them out of business. It's a tangled bureaucratic tale."If you put me at a buffet, I'm going to pay attention to the little man made out of a radish." That's VT's new poet laureate, Mary Ruefle, talking to Seven Days' Chelsea Edgar. In a lively, convivial interview, they talk about attention to detail, why writing poetry is like peeing, solitude, email, and one of Ruefle's goals as poet laureate: "I want to make Xerox copies of poems that I love and put them in envelopes and randomly mail them to a thousand Vermonters."Ski mountains for geeks. Don't know how I missed this, but the NYT travel section last week went all data heavy on how to choose the likeliest downhill spots to have snow at different times of the season. Sure, average annual snowfall matters, but so do the direction that ski slopes face, elevation, and latitude. In the east, you'll be glad to know, "three ski resorts stand out for their natural snowfall, all of them in Vermont": Jay, Stowe, and Smugglers' Notch. Early in the season, around the holidays, Killington and Sugarbush are good bets because of their snow-making capabilities.
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Within the already insanely talented North American circus world, this Québecois troupe is known for pushing the boundaries of what's humanly possible. Their new show, "Blizzard," takes winter as its theme and treats it with all the somberness you'd expect from a bunch of Canadians. Which is to say, none at all: It's a light-hearted, exuberant show. Expect to see jaw-dropping artistic and technical brilliance. 7:30 at the Moore Theater tonight and tomorrow, runs Saturday and Sunday as well.
Alan Ayckbourn's 1979 farce is set in a reputedly haunted former-brothel-turned-house, with the action taking place on three separate floors that, onstage, are actually all one level. Which means the audience is in on what's invisible to the characters. The
NYT
's Walter Goodman once wrote that Ayckbourn's characters "are not so much people as collections of eccentricities," and here their relationships (and the house) fall apart and scoundrels and the upright all get what's coming to them. 7:30 pm, runs through 12/22.
Lebanon High School's Wet Paint Players present the full-on musical version of Natalie Babbitt's much-loved novel. In the late 1800s, an 11-year-old girl meets a family in the woods of New Hampshire that seems entirely normal, if unusually close-knit — which might be explained by the fact that they happen to live forever. Philosophical musings, dilemmas, and a villain in a yellow suit. What could be bad? Tonight, tomorrow and Saturday at 7 pm.
It's Comedy Club night, and area comics will take the stage to duke it out. Doors open at 7.
A celebratory evening of community theater, dance, music, and film to benefit Upper Valley Habitat for Humanity, with performances by Dancers' Corner, the Valley Chords, Raq-On Dance, Valley Improv, and two short films by Vermont filmmakers George Woodard and Horseless Headsman. Starts at 7.
Now,
— from last year, though, because why spoil what's in store for us here?
See you tomorrow.
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