WELL MET, UPPER VALLEY!
Today's probably the coldest day this work week. And it will still be above normal. That low pressure lifted away overnight, and the cold front behind it has moved through, and now high pressure is starting to build in. Mostly sunny, though some clouds will filter in over the day, temps getting only into the low 40s. Back into the 20s tonight. Winds today from the northwest.Lyme voters opt to keep River Road public. The selectboard had originally placed an item on the town warrant to discontinue the section of the road — popular with bicyclists and walkers — that has been closed for years, and turn it over to abutting owners. The move drew protests from residents and outsiders who wanted it to remain open and usable. Yesterday, town meeting tabled that item, and most voters informally supported making the road a Class VI road or a public trail. (VN)Leb passes "welcoming" ordinance but school renovation bond falls short of 60 percent. Voters also re-elected all incumbent city council members. Which was the rule in Piermont, Croydon, and Dorchester as well. Meanwhile, voters also seemed inclined to pass budgets and okay new funding. The VN's town-by-town roundups are at the link. Towns want more coronavirus information from NH. As the state announced its fifth case — in Rockingham County — Hanover Town Manager Julia Griffin and Leb City Manager Shaun Mulholland tell NHPR that they've been frustrated by the state's policy of revealing only the county in which patients are located. "They can't even tell us if we have a person in our community who's in isolation or who's in quarantine status," says Mulholland, adding that he understands the federal privacy laws, but that the lack of information "makes it difficult for us to plan ahead and see what the potential impacts could be in the community.”And the VN wants to know what you want to know about COVID-19. They're dipping their toe into polling readers; this is a good thing. Some of their questions are reporting questions (Are you changing your behaviors? Are you satisfied with local/state/federal leaders' responses?) But they also want to know what questions you might have that they should be looking into.Middlebury closes campus due to coronavirus. It's sending students home early, then shifting to online classes come March 30. And it's not the only one. Harvard's told students not to come back after spring break; they'll attend classes remotely, too. Same with Princeton, Amherst, Fordham, Stanford, and no doubt others. John Cleese's "silly walk" is 6.7 times sillier than a normal human walk. Dartmouth anthropology prof Nathaniel Dominy, who leads a team studying the origins of bipedal walking, sometimes plays Monty Python's classic "Ministry of Silly Walks" sketch in class for laughs, but decided to study it to figure out what actually makes it funny. The conclusion? Cleese "is flexing and extending his knees at all the wrong times," he told New Scientist, which is paywalled, so here's the Daily Mail version. You bet this is big news in the UK."There's this idea, I think, of empathy as something that one person extends to another. I don't think that's right...It's a sort of a flickering moment of both seeing and being seen." Norwich writer and Dartmouth prof Jeff Sharlet was on VPR yesterday talking about his new book, This Brilliant Darkness. Sharlet spent a lot of time getting strangers late at night in extreme situations — a touchy Skid Row cop in LA, an angry heroin dealer, a Cossack pointing a gun at him in Russia, a seriously racist Vermonter — to open up. Sunset over Onway Lake. This is way over the other side of Manchester, but you can almost taste what's coming: open water reflecting that languid evening calm settling over the woods...Two years of tree debris down in one night. You may juuust remember Monday's item about the ice-storm experiments carried out at Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest. That two years' figure, says David Brooks on his blog, is what came down in one night after researchers sprayed trees with 3/4 of an inch of ice. "No wonder big ice storms take down so many power lines," he writes. He's got more details on the experiments, and a reminder (I'd forgotten) that Hubbard Brook is where acid rain was discovered. It's a storied place.Can the courts keep the legislature from banning firearms from its own halls? That was the question before the NH Supreme Court yesterday. Under Republican leadership, people were allowed to carry in Representatives Hall. When the Dems took over last year, they reinstated the ban. Lawmakers opposing the ban argued that the court has every right to step in; a lawyer for the state House argued this would violate the separation of powers, and that the legislature can make its own rules regarding itself.Get ready for "U-Pick" hemp. Really, it was just a matter of time. Howard Prussack's High Meadows Farm in Westminster West is the oldest certified organic farm in VT. It trucks its produce — tomatoes, strawberries, raspberries, garlic — to the Co-op stores here and Whole Foods all over MA and CT. Three years, Prussack started growing organic CBD hemp. This year, says the Eagle Times, he's going to let customers pick their own. “We’ve lost a lot of money by trusting people that are untrustworthy, and there’s a lot of them out there.” VTDigger's up with a story about the hard knocks of a year in hemp. Mold, thunder and lightning threatening the plants, hauling 9,000 pounds over Vail Pass in a snowstorm only to lose it to theft, a fire at a processor's plant that destroyed 13,000 pounds... It was a tough year, but Middlebury's Northeast Hemp Commodities survived and is refocusing. Others won't, says lawyer Tim Fair. "The last year in CBD and hemp production is going to shake out the chaff from the wheat."Vermont's solar industry chafes at restrictions, looks elsewhere. It was soaring a few years ago, with more jobs per capita than any other state. But now, says Seven Days' Kevin McCallum, "Solar developers and installers say they've been burned by new state regulations that have reduced the rates paid for solar power at the precise time when they've been socked with soaring costs." They're looking for markets outside the state, and pressing legislators to ramp up renewable energy goals. The "barrier between normalcy and the Orwellian dystopia that is becoming reality in some parts of the world is at risk of being eliminated." That's none other than the Vermont AG's office, which filed suit yesterday against Clearview AI, the no-longer-secret company (thanks, NYT!) that has scraped billions of online facial images (often against usage rules) to create a facial recognition app used by major corporations and law enforcement agencies in every state but, it seems, Vermont. The app violates VT's consumer protection statute, the AG contends.This was a strong start, people! My request yesterday for info about soft-serve/creemee stand openings drew great responses, including places that are open now (Newbury Village Store, Mac's Maple on weekends for donuts now and creemees soon); places opening soon (Frazer's Place in Windsor); and places opening not soon enough (Fore-U, Villagers). I'll keep updating this, so if you know about spots not on the list yet (here's looking at you, Dairy Twirl and Gladstone), let me know. Details and links at the link.
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Every year, Crossroads Farm's Janet Taylor gives a workshop focused on getting ready for the growing year ahead. Tonight, she'll be talking about vegetables and answering your questions. You're also welcome to bring seeds to swap. 7 pm at the Peabody Library.
A chance to hang out with other people who are working on the craft, do some group exercises to get yourself unstuck, make some measurable progress, then read what you've got and get inspired by others. At RVCC, formally 6-9 but doors open at 5 if you need company earlier.
Claremont Makerspace has a few spots left for this intro-to-silversmithing workshop. Shape and embellish a band, learn how to solder and polish, and you'll walk out with wearable evidence of your mastery. 530-8:30, sign up at the link.
It's Farmer's Night, the longstanding tradition of bringing artists from around the state to perform on Wednesday nights in the well of the House. The 40th Army Band, part of the VT National Guard, has been around in one form or another since 1907. Its musicians are doctors, lawyers, sales execs, civil servants — and Guard members who respond to floods and other disasters. 7:30 pm, VT House chambers.
And just to set a groove for the day, here's Ahmad Jamal at 83 in Paris with his combo,
Start it up, let it be your background for nine minutes, and then waft happily on to whatever you have to do. Talk about mastery.
See you tomorrow.
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