HELLO AGAIN, UPPER VALLEY!
This will be one of those days you wish your friends from away could see. Unless you don't want them moving here, in which case just wait a few weeks. Dry, cooler air is settling into the region and once any fog lifts, we're going to get a lot of sun, temps reaching the low 70s, and a taste of that clear fall light that makes you want to drop whatever you're doing and go bathe in it. Of course, with all this come colder nighttime temps, down into the 40s tonight. Norwich finance investigation makes progress. Ahead of a special selectboard meeting Tuesday night, Police Chief Jen Frank told the VN's Patrick O'Grady that she's working with FBI offices in Rutland and Albany and several banks, and that "multiple individuals" were involved in questionable activity in the town's general fund. Former finance director Roberta Robinson has returned to help out temporarily. O'Grady notes that town manager Herb Durfee would not comment on the status of Donna Flies, her replacement. Remember the news that Leb's going to be using goats to keep poison ivy at bay? Well, they're here, and they're kind of already celebrities, judging from regional TV coverage. Here's WCAX. They're at Riverside Park right now, headed next to Basin Field by the junior high school. Go visit. But given what they've been eating and tromping around in, don't touch them. If you're seriously into baking, Hurricane Dorian's your friend. I know, sounds odd. But every year, King Arthur Flour's Harvest Conference sells out. It's for pos and semi-pros who want to delve deep into the mysteries of chocolate puff pastry, wood-fired flatbreads, challah braiding, and the like. A handful of spots have suddenly opened because people from down South can't make it. Details at the link, email [email protected]. And while we're on KAF... Yesterday's item about Martin Phillip was wrong in one respect: The lead bakers these days are Carrie Brisson on the bread side and Andrea Quillen on the pastry side.Center for Cartoon Studies aims to teach a wide audience how democracy works. The school has just put out This Is What Democracy Looks Like: A Graphic Guide to Governance, a 32-page graphic civics lesson. It's drawn mostly by 2018 graduate Dan Nott, with help from others, including CCS founder James Sturm. “For our government to function properly, people have to be involved in the process,” Sturm tells the VN's Alex Hanson. The book is “a call to people to get engaged in the process.” (VN)“I always say that we’re going to have a brilliant and resilient foliage season because inevitably we do.” That's Karen Bennett, a UNH forestry specialist telling Boston.com that, basically, foliage season in NH is going to rock! But if this state-by-state New England roundup is right, it's shaping up to be great all over. A lot of healthy green foliage out there, we're headed toward cold nights and warmer days... Keep your fingers crossed.NH power brokers "paralyzed by size of Democratic field." That's the headline on a Politico story noting that the vast majority of Democratic elected officials are still on the sidelines in the presidential primary. By this point in 2016, many of them were fully on board with Hillary Clinton. "It speaks to the sentiment among political insiders that New Hampshire can’t afford to get it wrong this time," the site says. Though it's worth pointing out that several local pols, including Leb city councillor Sue Prentiss and state Rep. Susan Almy, have just endorsed Pete Buttigieg. VPR's taking up the craft cider revival today. If you happen to be free around noon or 7, you can catch Vermont Edition with Steve Wood, who owns Leb's Poverty Lane Orchards and Farnum Hill ciders and pretty much got the alcoholic cider resurgence going in this country. The show will also feature Jason Wilson and his new book, The Cider Revival: Dispatches From The Orchard.VT Episcopal diocese' ad for a bishop with "holy scrappiness" drew Shannon MacVean-Brown to the job. She'll be consecrated on Sept. 28, becoming the first black woman to lead the state's roughly 6,000 Episcopalians. "This church thing is not about coming and singing pretty songs on Sunday and saying our perfect prayers," she tells Seven Days' Derek Brouwer. "It's about: How are we changing the world? How are we living into this countercultural activity we've been called to?"Here's Vermont's "lake score card." It maps the cleanliness and health of 823 lakes and ponds, including all those over 20 acres in size. One note: You'll need Google Earth Pro, but the friendly folks at the VT Agency of Natural Resources give you a link at the link. Another note: The agency's definition of good water quality might not be yours or mine. As a commenter noted on VPR's website yesterday, "If we use, as we should, the benchmark of 'can I safely drink the water unfiltered?' then the water quality of most of our ponds and lakes is appalling.... Great, the water is not on fire. Hardly anything to be proud of."Black garlic appears to be becoming a thing. It's not a variety. It's a lifestyle. Or, well, actually, it's regular garlic that's been fermented for 288 hours and eventually comes to take on "sort of a molasses-y, truffle-y, smoky flavor.” That's Howard Prussack, whose High Meadows Farm in Westminster West, VT, is increasingly being given over to turning out the delicacy. Brattleboro's Commons has everything you might want to know about how it's done.Phil Scott teams up with fellow dairy state guv Tony Evers to promote lactose tolerance. The VT governor originally dreamed up the idea with former WI Gov. Scott Walker. "I’m disappointed that our fantastic name of ‘Scott and Scott’s Dairy Spots’ won’t be used, but ‘Scott and Evers’ Dairy Endeavors’ is almost as good,” he says. Okay. No. Don't take this seriously. It's satire from The Winooski again. But honest, don't you wish?Junkie whack-a-mole. Sometimes a piece of writing comes along that grabs you by the chin. Elizabeth Rosen, a paramedic in an unnamed city, picks up after the opioid/fentanyl/heroin scourge every day. "It’s a strange feeling, knowing that there’s an oops button on an overdose. We don’t always get there in time," she writes. "But a lot of the time, you die most of the way, and then we pop you full of magic eraser juice, and you come stumbling back from the edge." Unflappable, sad, deeply empathetic, eye-opening, worth your time. If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:
SO... GOT PLANS?
So you
could
remember that the weeks are fleeting and the Lebanon Farmers Market is on tonight. Enough prepared foods — jerk chicken, pad thai, kettle corn, fudge, and so much more — to keep you happily fed all evening. Music by J Michael Kelley. And oh right: produce. Runs 4-7.
Or you could remember that the weeks are fleeting and Feast & Field is on tonight, featuring Triton.
That's one of Jeremiah McLane's, like, 8 bands. He's on accordion, Timothy Cummings on various pipes and whistles, and Alex Kehler on various strings. French bourrées, Breton hanter dros, Scottish reels, original tunes drawn from all those influences. Kehler's from the Eastern Townships and not only brings his Quebecois roots, but plays Swedish nyckelharpa and låtmandola (a nordic mandola) with Scandinavian verve. 5:30.
It's unplugged game night at the Latham Library in Thetford: Apples to Apples, Pictionary, Scrabble, Monopoly (but really, if you've got Monopoly Deal go for it), Uno... As long as it doesn't have a plug, bring it. If you'd like some pizza while you're there, let them know at: [email protected]. Runs 5-7 pm.
Light like the moment after the baton tap & before the
first symphonic note.
Light of the possible, light of the improbable.
— Gerry Lafemina, from "Daybreak"
See you tomorrow.
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