GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
You guessed it: Chance of showers all day. Also, the heat's back. And so's the normal summer weather pattern. We're looking at temps getting into the upper 80s (with humidity making it feel like the 90s), with a slight chance of showers the rest of this morning, rising to a chance—along with possible thunderstorms—this afternoon. There's low pressure headed this way from the Great Lakes over the next few days, and it'll bring air streaming in from the south, laden with humidity. Lows tonight in the upper 60s.A fine spot for a young eagle to hang out. Well, not that young—Robin Malkasian guesses the bird's 3-4 years old. "Is he just passing by?" Robin writes from W. Windsor. "Is he going to settle in around our ponds for what he probably considers fast food?" Whichever, that's one serious-looking bird.The Lyme-E. Thetford bridge, a year in photos. As Li Shen writes in Sidenote, both sides of the river have adapted to the bridge's long closure, even if they don't like it. Meanwhile, work continues, and the bridge is due to reopen in October. NHDOT has been sending out monthly updates, along with photos, and Li pulls them together with a running narrative from last July to this one: new trusses, new beams, new decking and abutments. Soon, new piers.Proposed Enfield microbrewery takes a step forward. The town's planning board, reports Liz Sauchelli in the Valley News, has approved a proposal for Hoptimystic Brewing of Sunapee Harbor to set up shop in a former laundromat building on Main Street. In addition to brewing beer onsite and having tastings, Hoptimystic owners Dan and Kelly Thomas plan to offer prepared food; Dan Thomas told the board they hope to open next May—in time to take advantage of bike traffic on the Northern Rail Trail, by which it will sit.The weaver's gaze. Earlier this month, two Navajo master weavers, Lynda Teller Pete and Barbara Teller Ornelas, visited Dartmouth to give a set of workshops. Raised in the Two Grey Hills community of the Navajo nation (in northwestern New Mexico), they come from a long line of weavers; their work is on display in galleries and museums around the world (including the Hood). While they were here, master filmmaker Signe Taylor captured their time with students—here in a poetic one-minute video, set to music by Navajo pianist Connor Chee.SPONSORED: From wheelchair to podium. Remember when Hanover High stand-out sprinter, Ella Maclean, was hit by falling boulders in a freak hiking accident back in 2020? Well, today she’s back to piling up individual medals and leading her college team to new heights. Read about her incredible run via the link above. Sponsored by Cioffredi & Associates Physical Therapy.Hartland's Olivia Zerphy brings her physical theater troupe to the Upper Valley. The Hanover High grad, who now lives in Paris, is one of four members of the Voloz Collective, which has no particular home base; its members, from three countries, met at a theater school in Paris. The troupe's "physical theater" specialty, Zerphy tells Susan Apel in Artful, is to tell stories "through visual aspects that take precedence over the textual” using mostly movement and mime; actors “communicate with their bodies.” They'll be in Woodstock Aug. 3, Stockbridge Aug. 9, and at Nexus in Lebanon on Aug. 11.Former Hartford schools superintendent headed to Windsor. Tom DeBalsi, who left the Hartford district at the end of June after leading it since 2011, will become Windsor Southeast's associate director of student support services, reports the VN's Christina Dolan. DeBalsi had worked in special ed before taking on the Hartford post, which he left with a year remaining on his contract. His new contract is for a single year. “Tom brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in special education to our team," Windsor Southeast Supt. Christine Bourne tells Dolan.SPONSORED: Imagine Zero Music Festival: Tomorrow's the last day for early bird pricing! The second annual Imagine Zero Music Festival is on Saturday, Sept. 7 from 11am-9pm at Fable Farm in Barnard, VT. This family-friendly, community-driven festival aims at zero waste and zero carbon emissions, and this year features Lakou Mizik, The Wolff Sisters, Billy Wylder, Chad Hollister, Ben Kogan Band, Seth Glier, Saints and Liars, Beecharmer and kids band Path of Totality. Get your tickets here or at the burgundy link now! Prices rise on Thursday. Sponsored by the Imagine Zero Music Festival.Woodstock voters to decide on short-term rental ordinances today. The issue is up in both the town and the village, after opponents of identical regulations passed in May by the selectboard and the village trustees petitioned to put them to a public vote. The ordinances capped the numbers of short-term rentals and imposed differing permit fees for owner-occupied and non-owner-occupied rentals. Opponents argue the fees are too high—and that short-term rentals aren't the cause of Woodstock's long-term housing shortage. As WCAX's Laura Ullman reports, a "no" vote upholds the ordinance.Norwich man who assaulted Dartmouth student gets suspended sentence. You may remember the September, 2022 incident in which a man later identified as John Mlcoch approached four grad students—three from India, one from Pakistan—in Hanover, threw racial epithets and then a beer can at them, and then pushed one to the ground as the student filmed him. Last week, the VN reports, he pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of simple assault and was given a six-month suspended sentence. At the time of the assault, The Dartmouth reported he'd been arrested in previous similar incidents. He "is well known to us in the area,” said Hanover Police Lt. Michael Schibuola at the time.Pity the poor moth: Orb-weaving spiders and their "process." The spiders, which wrap silk around prey that's gotten caught, have figured out that moths can "spare a few scales", as Mary Holland writes on her Naturally Curious blog, and escape more easily than other insects. So the spiders bite them before wrapping. Same with less troublesome insects. But feisty prey like bees and wasps get wrapped first, carried to the center of the web, and then... oh, never mind. It's breakfast time.On Winnipesaukee, a new family takes in a bullied loon chick. Okay, that's actually just speculation. What is known, writes Daniel Sarch in the Laconia Daily Sun, is that a pair of loons in 20 Mile Bay had two chicks and now has just one, while another pair about a mile away had two chicks and now has three. "So as far as we can tell, the second chick from that first pair broke off and made its way down to the other pair, and they started caring for it," says the Loon Preservation Committee's Caroline Hughes. Older chicks, she tells Sarch, often pick on younger ones, which may be why that one took off. So far, it's getting along with its new sibs and the parents are feeding all three.NH secession movement gets moment in the spotlight. That's because Carla Gericke, a Free State stalwart who moved to Manchester from South Africa by way of New York and is promoting a move for NH to become an independent nation, was on "Dr. Phil Primetime" last night. In a statement, writes the Globe's Steven Porter (newsletter, no paywall), she called the chance "to discuss an amicable national divorce" a gift. Two years ago, the state House rejected a secession amendment 323-13; this year, it put off considering an amendment to secede if the national debt reaches $40 trillion.Need help sorting out who's who in VT's primary elections? VTDigger is up with a new voters' guide to the Aug. 13 election that not only covers basics like how to vote and where to find your polling place, but digs into the statewide and legislative contests. You'll find state House and Senate candidates by county, along with basic information about them and, if they filled in a candidate questionnaire, a biography and their stances on a range of issues facing the state, from school funding and housing to gun regs and the economy.A list you don't want to be on: VT, NH among states with most federal disaster declarations. That's based on a new report from the nonprofit Rebuild By Design, reports VTDigger's Juan Vega de Soto, that charts the number of disaster declarations for climate-related events from 2011-2023. CA tops the list with 34; VT ranks 7th, along with SD and KY, with 20, while NH is 9th, at 18. Washington County, VT, ranked second in the country along with a set of KY counties, with 14 disaster declarations. Orange County was among a group of counties with 12 declarations; Grafton Co. had 11. Here's the report.Ant v. bee, Round 1. Let’s put it this way: You wouldn’t want to be the ant. Researchers had heard that Japanese honey bees deal with intruders by slapping them, and now they have it on tape. Using a high-speed camera and slowing the footage way down, scientists caught a bee revving up its wings, angling into position, and … biff goes the bee, wheee goes the ant. The bees have other tricks up their sleeves, writes Holly Large in IFLScience: They can roast hornets alive by surrounding them and vibrating the temp up to 117 degrees. Given the alternative, a slap doesn’t seem so bad.
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We may be the middle of nowhere to everyone else in VT and NH, but
we
know what's good! Strong Rabbit's Morgan Brophy has come up with the perfect design for "We Make Our Own Fun" t-shirts and tote bags for proud Upper Valleyites. Plus you'll find the Daybreak jigsaw puzzle, as well as sweatshirts, tees, a fleece hoodie, and, as always, the fits-every-hand-perfectly Daybreak mug. Check it all out at the link!
The founder of Circus Smirkus has a new memoir out, and at 6 pm at the Norman Williams Public Library, I'll be interviewing him about his early experiences in circuses both grand and hardscrabble, as well as about mime, Kansas the unrideable mule, his dog Rufus (an accomplished mime himself), the founding of Smirkus, and lots more. Q&A and book signing to follow.
Fairlee Arts' summer music series continues tonight at 6:30 pm with country and blue-collar rock singer-songwriter and Barre native Tim Brick.
The Kit Kat Klub, its unforgettable emcee, and Sally Bowles in 1930s Berlin, all onstage under the direction of actor, singer (
A Little Night Music
) and Broadway veteran Kevin David Thomas. Previews tonight and tomorrow, official opening Thursday, runs through Sunday.
And the Tuesday poem...
Peeling a pear,Sweet drops trickle downThe knife.
— Haiku by
(1867-1902), R. H. Blyth, trans.
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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