GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Well hey! More clouds than sun, chance of showers—but still, some sun! If rain falls, it'll probably be this afternoon. But the headline is that after this morning's fog clears, there ought to be some sky out there, especially as the day goes on. Temps getting into the high 70s, and it will be a little less humid than it's been. On the other hand, with winds from the west there's a chance we'll see some wildfire smoke again. Down all the way into the low 60s tonight.It's summer!
With the cloud drama to prove it. Here's Tuesday evening in Strafford, from Annemieke McLane.
And this swallowtail on a lupine in Orford, by Julia Bonnett;
And this bee on a peony in S. Royalton, by Jenn Megyesi.
And oh yes, let's not forget this lightning bolt that just struck a pine tree on Brian Howard's property in Etna, which his security cam caught and he's uploaded to YouTube. Keep your sound low the first time. (Thanks, HHC!)
With 300 active members, 900 on its email list (plus more on Discord), and a full slate of meetups, workshops, hikes, and other events, UVYP has become a key point of contact for younger residents of the Upper Valley—especially newcomers. “People moving to the area, the first thing that happens to them is that they’re lost, because it’s a small town and they don’t get to meet enough people,” Vijay Prithiv tells Matt Golec for Matt's Daybreak story on the group. Plenty more on what it's all about at the link.
"We consider ourselves unexpected guests. Our rules are: Be polite, be patient and tip well." That's Claremont's Aaron Almanza, creator and organizer of Qbar Upper Valley, a "guerilla-style pop-up social club meant to bring together the Upper Valley's scattered LGBTQ community," as Colleen Goodhue describes it in Seven Days. Since its first event in May at WRJ's Filling Station, the group has organized impromptu gatherings at bars around the region. "There's very few places for us to gather and feel like we can be safe," Claremont's Whitney Skillen says. "But we're trying to change that."SPONSORED: Chapman's General has everything you need for your July Fourth celebration! Stock up with craft beer, fine wine, and tasty snacks at our Provisions section. Then join us out front on the Fourth itself for the Orford + Fairlee parade (starts at 11 in Orford, finishes in Fairlee), followed by a chicken bbq at noon and live music in the evening on the Fairlee Town Common. Sponsored by Chapman's General, serving the Upper Valley since 1875.Norwich hopes to explore affordable housing near transfer station. That's the recommendation of the town planning commission's Affordable Housing Subcommittee, reports Patrick Adrian in the Valley News. The commission on Tuesday asked the selectboard to support funding a study of 10 to 12 acres of unused town-owned land north of the transfer station on New Boston Road. “There are a lot of issues that need to be investigated,” says subcommittee chair Jeff Lubell, including regulattory issues involving water and wastewater and whether the soil is contaminated.You don't usually look to math for insight on standing up to bullies, but new research from Dartmouth does just that. In particular, writes Morgan Kelly for Dartmouth News, math prof Feng Fu and co-author Xingru Chen use game theory to show how "resistance to being steamrolled not only causes an extortionist to ultimately lose more than their opponent but can result in a more equal outcome." The two point argue that an "unbending" strategy on the part of a weaker party can even real-life outcomes. Says Chen, "Fairness and cooperation can be cultivated and enforced by unbending players.”SPONSORED: JAZZ AT THE JUNCTION at Northern Stage on July 12th! Grab a drink and enjoy an evening of jazz under the stars at Northern Stage, July 12 at 7 pm. We open with a performance by the Upper Valley Jazz All Stars, talented area high school musicians, led by Ian Gollub. Then we celebrate an album release by the electrifying En Diablada Quintet (Natalia Bernal, Jason Ennis, Michael Zsoldos, Itaiguara Brandao, and Mauricio Zotterelli). ONE NIGHT ONLY! Sponsored by Northern Stage.NH AG launches criminal investigation of Strafford County sheriff. The investigation, reports Karen Dandurant in Foster's Daily Democrat (paywall), is looking into allegations of theft, falsification of official matters, and abuse of office by Mark Brave, who was first elected in 2020. And while the AG's office gave no specifics, Brave—NH's first black sheriff—was more than happy to fill Dandurant in: the allegations in part involve trips he took to Florida with a woman employed by his department. He says they were "strictly business"; "This is a political attack by people who are supposed to be in my corner."It's going to be an interesting day in Concord. Both chambers finish their legislative sessions today, and several high-profile bills are up for votes, reports NHPR's Todd Bookman. One would bar people accused of murder from using the so-called “gay panic defense"; another is a package of changes to energy policy, including removing the requirement that small-scale energy generators like solar farms must be in the same municipality as their customers; and a third would launch NH on a path to rework how it regulates landfills.As NH state officials and conservative education advocates push "competency-based learning," educators ask, How? The approach, which requires students to "master" a concept before they can advance to the next level, demands "a focused, personalized form of teaching that caters to each child’s educational path," writes NH Bulletin's Ethan DeWitt. With administrative rules facing an update, backers see this as their chance. School officials and others have seen evidence that it can work—one Manchester school uses it—but argue the state's schools can't just turn on a dime to implement it.“What’s keeping you small?” That's what US Rep. Becca Balint asked more than 50 VT high school students attending the Governor’s Institute on Global Issues & Youth Action. Over 10 days, writes Kevin O'Connor in VTDigger, the students met with politicians, refugees, and others. The gathering—and seven other nonpartisan Governor’s Institutes that include art, environmental science, and entrepreneurship—aimed to show young people the myriad ways they can have an impact. “It’s definitely cool to see someone in more of a human way than you get to normally,” says Springfield High's Maggie Meserve.VT Public's Conor Cyrus explains decision to resign. In a video statement posted yesterday on Instagram, Cyrus discussed his boyfriend's death two weeks ago from complications of cystic fibrosis. Cyrus "acknowledged that he hasn’t been on air as much as usual in recent weeks and that he has been 'in a little bit of a fog' while he tries to figure out what’s next," reports VTDigger's Patrick Crowley. In the video, Cyrus said, "This isn't something I was really ready to talk about fully, and I was really hoping that my departure from Vermont Public would have been quieter or would have been a joint effort with a joint statement together, but—cat’s out of the bag."Pizza ovens, contra dances, trash day at the dump—how Vermonters get together and "forge community." In Seven Days, Rachel Hellman builds off Hardwick's Civic Standard—an effort to create high-spirited gatherings for townspeople looking for a chance to connect—to look at similar gatherings around the state. There's the community oven up in Johnson—inspired by the one in Norwich—and its summertime Monday pizza nights, which can draw upward of 75 people; the Saturday-night contra dance in Berlin; the regular locals' night at the bar in Harry's Hardware in Cabot (New England's "first and only bar in a hardware store"); and more. Hellman profiles them all."Even though he got a bit of a steak dinner, I don't think he looks at Pawtucket and thinks, 'This is where a bear belongs.'" That's Morgan Lucot, a state wildlife biologist in RI, commenting on a black bear that on Sunday afternoon wandered into a backyard barbecue, knocked over the grill, grabbed a steak, then climbed a tree for a nap. Usually, writes Jack Perry in The Providence Journal, wildlife officials just wait for the bear to wander off; that wasn't an option in such a crowded neighborhood. So they tranquilized the young male and took him elsewhere. And warned: There'll be more.“He stood extremely close to the work, radiating a twitchy, electrified energy.” Unlike most art thieves, who love money, Stéphane Breitwieser loves art. So much so, that for nearly a decade and across 200 heists—during the day, in museums, surrounded by visitors and guards—he amassed a collection worth an estimated $2 billion. In GQ, Geoffrey Gagnon speaks with Michael Finkel about his new book, The Art Thief, and what it’s like to accompany a man who is “preternaturally skilled at thieving and short on morals” into a museum. Just don’t call him a thief. “Breitwieser,” writes Gagnon, “prefers to be thought of as an art collector with an unorthodox acquisition style.”The Thursday Vordle. With a word from yesterday's Daybreak.
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At 4 pm today, the Howe Library in Hanover hosts an opening reception for artist and economist Marjorie Rose's exhibit, "The Dog Days of Summer", her dog-forward show of acrylics and multimedia works that includes “tongue in cheek” versions of 19th and 20th-century masters. There'll be music by Leah Kohn and Niv Ashkenazi, whose Oak Hill Music Festival is gearing up for its second season in the Upper Valley starting July 12.
At 5:30, Sustainable Woodstock hosts soil expert Cat Buxton at the Billings Farm Community Garden for a talk and demonstration of "no-till gardening" and its techniques for gardening with as little soil disturbance as possible.
At 6 this evening (gates open at 5:30), BarnArts Feast and Field at Fable Farm in Barnard hosts Cachitas Now! The seven-piece band from Buenos Aires is on its debut tour of the US, thanks to a public diplomacy program run by the US State Department. The identity-inclusive band blends tango, folk motifs, and electronics "with the joy of a crowded dance floor."
And at 7, Sunapee's Summer Music Associates brings in the Fred Moyer Jazz Trio, with special guest Nicole Densmore on flute, to the First Baptist Church in New London. The trio is known for its note-for-note transcriptions of great jazz trio performances from the past; tonight, they're adding chamber music to the program, with Densmore joining in for Schubert's Sonata in A minor, arranged for flute and piano.
At 8 pm, Sawtooth Kitchen presents a singer-songwriter showcase with a trio of up-and-coming musicians: Ian Galipeau, Dylan Patrick Ward, and Aidan Lewis, all playing sets of original tunes.
Finally, check out JAM's highlights for the week, including: footage of this year's Quechee Balloon Festival; a celebration of the Rice's Mills village, school, and community center in Thetford, with five long-time residents sharing reminiscences and music by folk duo Bruce and Jenny Keller and guitarist Ted Warner; a tour of three resident-owned manufactured-home communities, in Lebanon, Canaan, and Claremont; and Lyme author D.K. Kennedy's reading and talk about her debut novel Jane's Cure, at Still North Books & Bar.
And to get us up and going this morning...
Let's face it, it's been a kind of dreary week, but now we get a couple of days with some sunshine.
(based in LA, named for a small river outside San Antonio), with "High Hopes."
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.
The Enthusiasms Archives. A list of book recommendations by Daybreak's rotating crew of local booksellers, writers, and librarians who think you should read. this. book. now!
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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