Daybreak Thursday 12/9/21

GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!

Some sun. And do enjoy the snow still on the ground, because after today things start warming up for an extended spell. For the moment, though, temps will stay in the high 20s or low 30s, with a mix of sun and clouds and modest winds from the northwest. Down into the low 20s tonight, and a warm front will bring us a chance of some snow overnight.Bubble-wrap ice. It makes such interesting shapes, doesn't it? Kathie Burrell took this in Canaan, NH on Monday. "Knowing we would have an increase in temperatures, I was afraid it would melt. But it's hanging in there so far," she writes.Citing spiraling hospitalizations, frustrated DHMC officials urge people to get vaccinated. "People who could have avoided hospitalization are occupying beds and taking resources that are needed by other critically ill patients," CEO Joanne Conroy said in an online press conference yesterday, "and all because they or somebody close to them refused to be vaccinated." The unusual press conference brought together the hospital system's medical brass to press the case that NH's comparatively low vaccination rate is hurting the state. Some 42 percent of ICU beds in NH are being used for Covid patients, and 85 percent of those patients are unvaccinated.Dartmouth researchers create "stretchy" crystals. “Picture a diamond that behaves like a rubber band,” chemistry prof Chenfeng Ke tells Dartmouth News's Harini Barath. In essence, Ke's research team has designed a new type of porous, carbon-based crystal that can expand to hold more than in its typical, hard state. The result points the way, Ke says, to creating nanofilters that may be able to absorb impurities from water.Understanding the winter-time electricity grid. ISO-New England, the region's grid manager, issued a forecast and held a press call earlier this week. Now, NHPR's Daniela Allee and Hoplamazian have a clear, helpful explanation of what it covered. The long and short: constrained supplies of natural gas, oil, and liquid natural gas could strain the system, especially if there's a serious cold snap. If this happens, ISO might have to take emergency steps, including a last resort of rolling blockouts. Regional energy efficiency efforts have helped cut demand—though NH's PUC is running counter to that trend.SPONSORED: Do you love animals? You can help them today! The Upper Valley Humane Society needs to raise $36,000 to refinish ugly, tired, damaged floors in the adoption center. This project will increase health and safety for animals while improving our appearance. For a limited time, a generous donor will MATCH YOUR GIFT OF STOCK SHARES. They will give $18,000 toward the adoption center floor if UVHS can raise an additional $18,000 by December 15th. Please help. More information available at the maroon link or here. (Click on "Give Stock.") Sponsored by the Upper Valley Humane Society.PUC's energy efficiency decision draws more fire. On Tuesday, Clean Energy New Hampshire filed a lawsuit asking that the Public Utilities Commission's Nov. 12 decision be suspended and that funding for energy efficiency efforts be restored to 2020 levels. It was joined by the Town of Hanover and several efficiency contractors. And now, reports Amanda Gokee in NH Bulletin, several lawyers are challenging a Monday ruling from the commission clarifying its earlier decision as "null and void," in the words of NH consumer advocate Don Kreis, because it lacked a proper quorum.NH health facilities say worker shortage driven by burnout, not vaccine mandates. Their argument, writes Annmarie Timmins in NH Bulletin: "Battling a deadly virus for 21 months has taken its toll..., especially given that less than 65 percent of the population has sought a vaccine." Timmins surveyed hospitals and care facilities, and found that compliance at places that mandated vaccines is extremely high: 100 percent at St. Joseph Hospital in Nashua and Genesis HealthCare's long-term care facilities around the state, 99 percent at DH's various hospitals, 99.7 percent at Concord Hospital. NHer becomes first woman, only fourth person ever to finish NH hiking triple crown. Denise Stassis, who lives over in the Thornton/Campton area, was 48 years old when she began hiking in 2013, reports Philip Werner in Section Hiker. Her feat is astounding: not just each of the 48 4,000-footers in every month of the year, but all 652 trails in the AMC's White Mountain Guide and climbing NH's 500 highest peaks—several hundred of which, Werner notes, have no trails, "which makes this a very challenging list, because you have to navigate off-trail to climb them." It took Stassis 7 years to finish those."It's just like how going to the general store to get your cup of coffee isn't the same as going to Starbucks." That's Dr. Donald Miller, who, along with a partner, runs a family practice clinic in Cambridge, VT. But, just like general stores, their brand of more personal, intimate, and independent medicine is disappearing around VT, writes Colin Flanders in Seven Days. A host of pressures are making hospitals and health centers more attractive to physicians, and doctors like Miller, who's getting close to retirement, worry that there's no one waiting in the wings.Beer-battered sea lamprey, anyone? It hasn't appeared on the menu at Burlington's Juniper Bar and Restaurant yet, but it's probably just a matter of time. Because Doug Paine, head chef there, is on the leading edge of "invasivorism," writes Matt Hongoltz-Hetling (yeah, the Grafton bear guy) in Popular Science. Garlic mustard in salad, Bishop's weed in soup, Japanese knotweed sorbet... they're part of "a boundary-pushing trend that combines ethical eating with invasive-species warfare" that has its roots in an idea dreamed up by UVM conservation biologist Joe Roman."Embrace the cold." We've all got our ways of dealing with winter, from getting onto snow or ice as much as possible to finding some warm nook to hole up in with a hot drink. In Seven Days, Jordan Barry, Carolyn Fox, and Melissa Pasanen interview a slew of Vermonters, from Waitsfield inkeeper Karen Rookwood to Nulhegan Band Chief Don Stevens, about their favorite things to do: hidden-gem destinations, good dining, favorite outdoor spots. Though the people are all from other parts of VT, Worthy Burger, Piecemeal Pies, and the Tuckerbox all come in for some love.But to really embrace the cold? A snowball fight. Which, it turns out, people have been doing for a very long time. The earliest depiction in Public Domain Review's large, striking collection of snowball-fight artworks dates to 1400—the Latin edition of an 11th century Arab medical treatise. Paintings from 1500s Europe, woodblock prints from 1800s Japan, some bruised Princetonians in a photo from 1893, Republican and Democratic US Capitol pages battling in 1923... "If there is a chance of snowfall in your part of the world," they write, "we wish you good aim and fast reflexes this holiday season."From 25,000 feet up, without a parachute, into a net you can't even see from up there. Let's stipulate three things: 1) This is a 2019 video; 2) about a 2016 event; 3) the guy's nuts. But hey, there's a reason almost 27 million people have checked it out: The Australian YouTuber behind the "Wonder World" channel pulls together behind-the scenes, training, and day-of footage to explain skydiver extraordinaire Luke Aikins' record-setting jump from 25,000 feet above Simi Valley, CA, with neither parachute nor wingsuit. Unreal.

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Laura Niquay grew up in Wemotaci, a village to the northwest of La Tuque, Québec, in a family of musicians. Though the music around the house was everyone from Hank Williams to the Egyptian-born, French singer-songwriter Georges Moustaki, Niquay has pursued her own singing , career largely in Atikamekw, her native language, partly as a bid to keep the language alive among younger members of the nation who've moved on to Canada's cities.

; among other things, if you listen to the chorus, you'll hear the words "“Nikinako ketcikinako,” which mean, wonderfully, "taking our shoes off and putting our shoes back on."

Okay, I know you were wondering: NH's 500th highest is Tinkerville Peak, in Tinkerville—though at 1,942 feet it's the same height as #499, Garnet Hill in Sugar Hill. See you tomorrow.

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

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