GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Some sun to start, cold again. After the front that came through late yesterday, cold air's filtering in from the west, with highs today reaching the mid or upper 20s. There's a chance of snow showers late if you're up in the northern end of the region; otherwise, we're looking at mostly blue skies in the morning, then clouds building in over the afternoon, with some gusty mid-day winds from the west. Down into the mid teens overnight.Speaking of wind and cold... On New Year's Eve day, videographer Peter Bloch was out at Little Lake Sunapee with his drone, filming the lake's striking ice patterns from above, when his aerial view caught an ice-kiter practically flying across the lake's surface. We'll just let Peter describe it: "This sport features athleticism, speed and drama, yet I also get a sense of tranquility and grace when observing this spectacular activity." It's kinda made for video. Here's the video he was out there to make.Lake Morey skating trail hinges on meeting today. That meeting is between Fairlee officials and a "loss control" agent from the town's insurance company to go over ice safety and other considerations as the town preps to take over hosting the trail. The Lake Morey Inn presided over the internationally popular skating trail for years, but, says Fairlee Administrator Ryan Lockwood in an email, the inn's insurance company "will no longer cover them operating and maintaining the trail." The town he writes, plans to lease equipment from the inn and hire someone to maintain the trail—if it gets the go-ahead. Stay tuned.Visitors flock to Leb's Storrs Hill for first weekend of free skiing. It wasn't just the sheer numbers—58 passes handed out Friday night, nearly triple that number on Saturday—but where people came from: MA, ME, RI, as well as locals, writes Lukas Dunford in the Valley News. Ever since the Lebanon Outing Club, which runs the community hill, announced that thanks to a gift from the Byrne Foundation skiing would be free this season, word has gone far and wide via maintream and social media. “It’s a nice hill to learn on,” one RI visitor told Dunford, “and it’s actually a lot bigger than I thought.”Lalo's Taqueria closes. Last Wednesday afternoon, Eddie and Ariana Moran announced via Facebook that they were "heartbroken to announce" they were closing the popular spot, which has filled a corner of the Lebanon Mall since it replaced the Lebanon Diner in 2020. They cited rising prices—though Ariana added separately, "sadly that is only one of a few issues that needed to be changed." On Saturday, they took to FB again to say they would be turning to catering and smaller events. In a FB message, they write, "Not sure how we will move forward but definitely want to keep providing our food."AVA on the hunt for new director. Shari Boraz, who held the post starting in 2021, has retired to work on her own art, reports Marion Umpleby in the VN. Over the course of her tenure, Umpleby writes, Boraz—the nonprofit's fourth director—worked hard on rebuilding staff and audiences after the pandemic and spearheaded infrastructure improvements to its buildings. Since December, former Claremont Opera House and Hatbox Theater director Andrew Pinard has been serving as interim director, with no plans to apply for the permanent slot. The board is looking at applications now, Umpleby reports.25,000 meals in one day. That's how many meals Lions Club members from around VT—coordinated by SoRo's Carol Greene—packed on Saturday. 10,000 of those will go to the Vermont Foodbank, reports NBC5's Jackson Stoever, while the rest will go to local food pantries. The Lions are aiming for 30,000 meals in a single day next year.SPONSORED: Cara Romero Opening Reception this Friday, 1/17, 5:00–6:00 pm. Celebrate the multiplicity, beauty, and resilience of Native American and Indigenous experiences with remarks by the artist and Dartmouth President Sian Beilock, gallery activities for all ages, exhibition swag, raffles, refreshments, and live music. Always free and open to all! Sponsored by the Hood Museum of Art.About barred owls... Ted Levin was out and about early yesterday morning on Hurricane Hill in WRJ and happened on a crow chasing a barred owl out of its neck of the woods. Which leads him, in his latest newsletter post, to muse on barred owls' westward expansion: from the eastern half of the continent to the West Coast and, now, to southern Alaska and the Yukon. How? Windbreaks planted by farmers and ranchers across the Plains states. Now, to protect northern spotted owls, there are federal plans to shoot thousands of barreds a year, even though "they are no more invasive than we are," Ted writes.Hear a crunch underfoot when you're walking in the woods? This time of year, it's often needle ice, and in her latest Naturally Curious post, Mary Holland notes that under certain conditions, water that's soaked into the soil will get sucked upward by capillary action. "Certain soil contains particular kinds of pebbles that contain pores just wide enough to allow capillary action to occur," she explains. "Water in the ground is drawn upward through the pores until it hits the air. Then it freezes." New water freezes anew, "push[ing] the newly formed needle of ice outward."SPONSORED: You’ve got the music in you! And Upper Valley Music Center in Lebanon is ready to help you develop and share it! Learn a new instrument, join an ensemble, pick up an old instrument, or sing in a group — there are lessons, classes, ensembles, and workshops for all ages and all abilities. 2025 Spring Registration is open now (burgundy link or here) and classes start in January and February. Sponsored by Upper Valley Music Center.Unhappiness studies. Dartmouth economist David Blanchflower has made a name for himself by studying how people experience happiness and well-being during their lives. Famously, he and his colleagues found a U curve: people tend to be at their unhappiest in middle age, but happy when young and old. But now, reports Hannah Silverstein in Dartmouth News, the curve's left arm—young people—isn't pointing upward anymore. It began to shift around 2013, Blanchflower says, tracing a "collapse in the well-being of young people, and especially young women." He suspects smartphones and social media.Or maybe not enough dancing? It's not like there's no Upper Valley nightlife, but as Steve Taylor writes in the VN, these days there's not much "in the way of live music for dancing amid convivial beverage consumption and casual connections." That's very different from the days when clubs like West Leb's Electra and a series of bars, hotels, and even the Legion and VFW kept things hopping. Taylor looks into what happened: insurance companies raising rates if there was entertainment, the rising drinking age (and changing cultural norms), and, says musician Al Alessi, “People got up and danced in those days."“I’ve taken to calling myself ‘the Democratic leader of the Executive Council.' It’s a very small caucus: one.” Lebanon's Karen Liot Hill is joking—but also quite serious, after becoming one of two new members of the five-member—four of them Republicans—Executive Council. She talks to the Globe's Steven Porter in the Morning Report newsletter (no paywall) about the work, much of which is not partisan, she says: “We are there to be a check and balance on the governor, and so that means even Republican executive councilors are there to be a check and balance.” First real meeting's tomorrow."Who takes care of all the tiny cemeteries in Vermont, and how did they begin in the spots they are in?" That's what E. Thetford's Kathleen Cuneen wanted to know. So she asked VT Public's Brave Little State, and Sabine Poux set out to find the answer. After checking in with Cuneen about a tiny Thetford cemetery—the town maintains it—Poux heads to Putney, where some of her ancestors are buried, and to Charlie Marchant, "a Lorax" for old cemeteries. "In general, the people you're working for don't call you... So it's quiet work," he says. Meet the people who care about, and for, small cemeteries."I had reached [Vermont's] oldest, most defining feature: Bernie Sanders the Green Mountains." David Nolan jokes. Sanders wasn't there outside Bennington on his daylong, 48-mile run the breadth of Vermont (he chose a shorter route, along Route 9), but the mountains certainly were. In Sunday's Boston Globe Magazine (slightly clunky non-paywalled version) he traces his run, not only the sweat-stained, coffee- and Snickers-fueled details, but the history—Genl. John Stark and the Battle of Bennington, the Allen brothers and the Catamount Tavern, flooding in Wilmington—and the growing outdoor traffic.Bird bites lizard. Winners of the 2024 SINWP Bird Photographer of the Year are out. Hira Punjabi took top prize for his image of a monitor lizard being chomped by a parakeet whose eggs it was trying to steal in India’s Keoladeo National Park. Take a few extra minutes to scroll through the “commended” winners, too—they didn’t make the top three, but they’re every bit as captivating and astonishing. One example: Maggie Bullock’s freeze frame of a great grey owl scoring a dead mouse on a snowy landscape. The competition drew lots of entries, so there’s lots of stupendous nature photography.On this day, it was Kitesurfer 1, Ocean 0. On Friday, kitesurfer Bruno Lobo, a member of the Brazilian Olympic kite sailing team (and an orthopedist), was off the coast of São Luis testing new camera equipment when he heard a cry for help and saw a swimmer in trouble. “I quickly approached her with the kite," he wrote Sunday on Instagram. "I tried to calm her down and asked her to climb on my back, she was quite tired and without strength, I used the equipment to bring her safely to the sand." And, of course, the camera caught it all.
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Grammy Award-winning violinist Jennifer Koh, a Hop visiting artist who's in town for a concert tomorrow evening, will talk with neurologist Dr. Brian C. Fidali and music therapist Allison Pollard about how both playing and listening to music affect the brain—and in particular, the brains of patients with brain injuries or epilepsy. Noon today in DHMC's Auditorium G. There's also a livestream option, for which you'll have to register.
Sponsored by the Hop and Upper Valley Music Center, she'll work with middle school and high school students as they present works in progress to talk over "technical and musical aspects of each individual piece." Afterward, Koh will "
sit down with UVMC faculty to discuss her approach to new music and to working with contemporary composers," UVMC writes. 7 pm at the First Congregational Church of Lebanon, no charge.
The Tuesday poem.
The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window wasSpawning snow and pink roses against itSoundlessly collateral and incompatible:World is suddener than we fancy it.World is crazier and more of it than we think,Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portionA tangerine and spit the pips and feelThe drunkenness of things being various.And the fire flames with a bubbling sound for worldIs more spiteful and gay than one supposes—On the tongue on the eyes on the ears in the palms of one's hands—There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses.—
"Snow" by the Irish poet
, from his 1967
Collected Works.
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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