GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Partly to mostly sunny, somewhat cooler. Temps are going to remain on the cool side all week, but there's also high pressure settling in for the next few days. So it will be mostly sunny today, but the highs will be struggling to get into the mid-50s. Clear tonight, down to around or slightly below freezing. Moderate winds from the northwest today.Speaking of winds... This graphic of the winds across the US right now is quite lovely. It's an ongoing project of Hint.fm, a collaboration between data visualization scientists (and artists) Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg, who among other things help run Google's data visualization research group. The map uses surface wind data from the National Digital Forecast Database, which is updated hourly. Still, they note, "Please do not use the map or its data to fly a plane, sail a boat, or fight wildfires :-)"And speaking of data... Let's run the numbers...
NH announced 72 new positive test results yesterday, bringing its total reported cases to 2,588. Of those, 1,019 have recovered (up 2) and 86 have died (no change), yielding a total current caseload of 1,483. Grafton and Sullivan counties remain at 53 cases and 12 cases; Merrimack County is now at 200 (up 5).
VT reported 5 new cases yesterday, bringing its total to 902. Of those, 8 are hospitalized (down 2), with 52 deaths (no change). Windsor and Orange counties each added 1 case to their totals, bringing Windsor to 43 and Orange to 8.
Dartmouth plans for partial fall reopening. In a campus-wide email, president Phil Hanlon and provost Joe Helble said yesterday that while they expect a portion of the undergrad and graduate student populations to return, safety will require some students to remain off campus and learning at a distance. As the college plans, an academic working group will explore undergraduate curricular issues, the professional schools will do their own planning, and a health working group will look at how testing, monitoring, contact tracing, quarantining, and treatment will be handled once people return to campus. They plan to announce details by June 29."We do this work because we like to interact with the public." That's Rubi Simon, director of the Howe Library in Hanover. These days, when the public can only be remote—yet more than ever, people need information and entertainment—libraries around the region are finding creative ways to fulfill their roles as community hubs. In a Daybreak Interview, Simon talks about how the Howe has adjusted to serving its patrons when they're all online—or sitting outside in their cars, using its wifi.
“Look for us to maintain a healthy schedule straight up until the day we reopen--and then some.” That's Hood Museum director John Stomberg in Artful blogger Susan Apel's latest post, about how the Hood and Stomberg are adapting to the pandemic. The museum's got plenty of virtual programming, is hosting lunchtime gallery talks, and is even offering images for Zoom backgrounds. In Stomberg's own gallery talk last week, a viewer asked what the iconic images of the present pandemic might be. "Too early to know, Stomberg answered, but offered this as a possibility: the refrigerated trucks in New York City hospital parking lots, waiting for bodies to be loaded."D-H to resume non-emergency procedures. In a statement yesterday, the hospital announced that it's preparing for "time-sensitive, urgent elective surgeries and procedures and ambulatory visits" to start up again within the next two weeks. "Over the past month, we put a number of important measures in place to assure and monitor our critical equipment, supplies and medications, as well as to maintain patient and staff safety," chief clinical officer Ed Merrens says in the statement. "We’re confident that we’re ready to resume the appointments that we had temporarily postponed.”"Yesterday is gone and we are not going back....We must think our way out of this and find our new normal." That's Joshua White, chief medical officer at Gifford Health in Randolph, in an essay yesterday arguing that despite the need for caution in the face of the coronavirus, "living in a bunker" is not an option. "If you hide at home for fear of coronavirus and your emphysema decompensates, we have not beaten COVID," he writes. "If you turn to substance abuse due to the stress of this new world, we have not beaten COVID... Vermonters, go outside and care for yourselves and your neighbors. Be generous. Be considerate. Be respectful and wear your masks.""I don't think there's any decision I make when I'm not very nervous about it." Yesterday, Gov. Chris Sununu talked over reopening with NHPR's Rick Ganley, who asked pointedly about whether the state's really ready when caseloads keep rising. Sununu argues that the percentage of positive tests to all tests done is dropping, though NHPR's graphic makes clear that while true overall, it hasn't been consistent. Sununu also points out that half the state's cases are in long-term care facilities, which means "only about half of the cases are in what I'd call the general community with community transmission."Hey, they've noticed! NH "is facing two challenges as it eases restrictions meant to limit the spread of the coronavirus. The virus itself and, as Gov. Chris Sununu likes to say, 'our friends to the south in Massachusetts.'" That's Boston.com, writing about the constant drumbeat of concern from the guv about Bay Staters reinfecting NH. Last weekend, “We saw a lot of folks coming over the border,” Sununu explained to the website yesterday. “I mean, it was like bumper-to-bumper traffic and virtually all of them were Massachusetts license plates. We love our friends there in Massachusetts, but now is not the time to be ignoring their state-at-home order.”Never mind dairies: Brewers are dumping beer. The problem is that beer in kegs sold to restaurants back in March is going stale. IPAs in particular lose their freshness after about 60-90 days. "Since no brewer wants an inferior form of their product to be experienced by consumers, potentially harming their brand, they have little choice but to dump thousands of gallons of stale beer down the drain and replace the kegs at their own cost once restaurant business resumes," NH Business Review writes.
Sununu announces extra money for cities and towns. Using federal pandemic relief aid, $40 million will go to cover municipalities' pandemic-related expenses, including telework arrangements, welfare expenses, and childcare costs for first responders. At his press conference yesterday, Sununu said the money cannot be used to fill revenue shortfalls. In addition, he announced that full-time safety workers will be eligible for a temporary $300/week pay raise.NH residential real estate sales are booming. "March was our single best month for new orders,” Matthew Neuman, who owns a property title company, tells the Monitor's David Brooks. “And April – we’re not even done with the month and it’s our second biggest month ever.” Expensive homes aren't doing so well, tells Brooks, but houses under $300,000 are getting multiple offers. Also not doing so well: multi-family and commercial sales. Investors don't want to own apartments if people can't pay rent, and in an uncertain economy worry about owning commercial real estate.Meanwhile, across the river, Gov. Phil Scott lifts some restrictions on elective procedures. Health care providers must practice social distancing, but can now begin nonessential visits, diagnostic imaging, and outpatient surgeries or procedures that don't require overnight stays."We think we have enough staff to trace about 500 new cases per week." Vermont state epidemiologist Patsy Kelso talked yesterday with VPR's Jane Lindholm about the state's new testing and contact-tracing plans. Even though the state has the capacity to track that many new cases each week, Kelso says, "I certainly don’t hope we get to point where we have 500 new cases a week." She also says the state is hoping to roll out a nasal swab test later this week, rather than the more invasive nasal pharyngeal test it's been using.All VT state colleges will reopen in fall. In a statement yesterday, Interim Chancellor Sophie Zdatny said the college system is encouraging new students to enroll, and current students to return, despite the uncertainty that has roiled the colleges in recent weeks. “I want to thank everyone who has advocated so fiercely for our VSCS,” she wrote. “We must harness that energy for good as we consider strategies to address our ongoing financial challenges and position ourselves for success in the long-run.”Coronavirus-era mapping is "new and fascinating but still fits into the tradition of disease and epidemic mapping that started in the 19th century." That's John Hessler, who specializes in modern cartography and GIS for the Library of Congress, and is compiling a collection of pandemic maps. He talks to CityLab's Laura Bliss about the challenges and some of the cutting-edge maps he really likes. Oh, and yes, that wind map up top? This is where I learned about it. (Thanks, DM!)Seriously. Do not try this at home. Unless you happen to be an Olympic pole-vaulter with your own runway and pit in your backyard. Three vaulters—former Olympic champion Renaud Lavillenie, world champion Sam Kendricks, and world record holder Armand "Mondo" Duplantis—vied virtually on Sunday to see who could clear 5 meters the most times in a half hour, since there'll be no Olympics to stoke their competitive juices. That's a bit over 16 feet, which is a piece of cake for vaulters of that caliber. But still, Lavillenie tells the BBC, "I got the same feeling as if I was going for the World Championship." Story and footage at the link.
Martha Hennessy to step down from NH Senate once term ends. Seeing her youngest daughter hospitalized with Covid-19, the Hanover Democrat tells the VN's Tim Camerato, brought home the impact of politics on her family. "All my kids’ families, they could all use some help from grandparents,” she says. “I would like to be able to have the flexibility to, at the drop of the hat, fly out to help them and to see them and spend more time with them.” Hennessy's district covers Lyme, Hanover, Lebanon, Enfield, Canaan, Plainfield, Cornish, Claremont, and Charlestown.In the mood for flowers? Norwich's Richard Neugass has made a project of photographing them very up close and personal, and sent Demo Sofronas a bunch for his "About Norwich" newsletter. They're eye-popping and beautiful.Or you could just head for the woods. Insects are back, including the tri-colored bumblebee. Red efts are brightening up the terrain. You'll find sessile bellwort and wild ginger and the arrestingly named early small-flower saxifrage. All this and more at Northern Woodlands' "This Week in the Woods." Hanover now has "an arch of open space properties" from the border with Leb to the river. That's thanks to a recent deal to preserve the 250-acre Mink Brook Forest along Greensboro Road. “We’ve been working on this project for a generation,” Adair Mulligan, executive director of the Hanover Conservancy, tells the Union Leader's Damien Fisher. It's part of an effort by the conservancy, the town, and the Trust for Public Land, which is trying to raise $2.5 million to buy the land and turn it over to the town.VT Jazz Center lands $40K grant to digitize historic recordings. The project will make it possible for old, fragile recordings of influential jazz guitarist Attila Zoller, who came to the US from Hungary in 1959, to live on. He had a country retreat in VT, but worked throughout Europe and in NYC, performing with people like Jimmy Heath, Lee Konitz, and Cecil McBee. The jazz center has his sound archives, but they're unavailable because they're too fragile to be played. (Thanks, JG!)"All ducks, go to bed!" That's Peacham farmer Morgan Gold, who's trained his ducks to head for the duck house when he calls them in. As his video makes clear, this is not an easy thing to accomplish. "Don't be afraid to take risks, and don't be afraid to fail," he says. "Because it's in that failure that you get better." A good life lesson, sure, but really it's the very fine lots-of-ducks-running-around footage you want to check out.
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#UVTogether
Staying Connected
Well, it is, of course, the 5th of May, and an all-star crew of musicians are going to be gathering at 5 pm our time for Eva Longoria's virtual Cinco de Mayo celebration. We're talking both Estefans (Gloria and Emilio), Luis Fonsi, Ana Brenda Contreras and others. The festival will be streamed on pretty much every platform known to humanity (FB, Live, YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, iHeartLatino's websites...). It's free, but they're taking donations for the farmworkers’ Covid-19 pandemic relief fund.
Then at 8:30 tonight, you could tune in for Phish's "Dinner and a Movie," which tonight features the band’s 2017 show in Quintana Roo, Mexico. It's free, but if you want to donate, your funds will go to Partners in Health.
Meanwhile, the Flynn in Burlington is hosting a new-music livestream of Daniel Bernard Roumain—you may remember him from The Just and the Blind at the Hop back before everything went south—and the chamber musicians of TURN Music, performing Roumain's pieces fast BLACK dance machine and Voodoo Violin Concerto No. 1.
And just a reminder (because you'll want some time to read the play) that the next Northern Stage "Play Date" is on Friday. This week they're doing August Wilson's King Hedley II, the ninth in his ten-play Pittsburgh Cycle, set in 1985and excavating travails of an ex-con trying to sell stolen refrigerators to make enough to open a video store. “Life’s got its own rhythm," a character says. "It don’t always go along with your rhythm." It'll be hosted by Charlie Hudson III, who played Martin Luther King, Jr. in Northern Stage’s 2016 production of The Mountaintop.
Helping Out
Last week's doc put together by an anonymous reader of Upper Valley organizations working to help the region through the pandemic has been growing. In particular, he's built up the list of mutual aid organizations, and added organizations dealing with financial aid. It's become a handy guide to who's doing what out there.
And a group of VT musicians has put together a compilation album, with proceeds going to the Vermont Foodbank. It's got jazz guitarist Paul Asbell, a new piece by Bow Thayer, Spencer Lewis, and a host of others.
Reading Deeper
Recent tests by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have found that about 60 percent of the imported masks they tested allowed in more tiny particles than U.S. standards normally permit. In other words, the Wall Street Journal (via MSN) reports, "millions of substandard masks have been imported from China and other countries as the need for protective gear for workers confronting the pandemic has skyrocketed."
For weeks, we've been reading about the "wild West" of antibody testing, which took shape after the FDA allowed manufacturers to submit their own information about the accuracy of their tests with no standards guiding what would be acceptable. Now the FDA has had enough, and is requiring them to meet "minimum quality standards" and submit a request for emergency use authorization, which sets some standards for authorization, though they're lower standards than usual.
Starting here, what do you want to remember?How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?What scent of old wood hovers, what softenedsound from outside fills the air?
Will you ever bring a better gift for the worldthan the breathing respect that you carrywherever you go right now? Are you waitingfor time to show you some better moments?
-- Excerpted from William Stafford's "You Reading This, Be Ready," which he wrote two days before his death in 1993, at age 79.
(Thanks DM and SD!)
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