GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Today, things get a little complicated. We're still looking at mostly sunny and warm—actually, hot—weather, with the high expected to hit 90 in spots. But there's a strong cold front moving in from the northwest, and though it's not due to arrive until tonight, we're likely to see showers ahead of it in the late afternoon, as well as thunderstorms that may include hail and serious wind gusts. Temps will fall in the front's wake, down into the upper 50s tonight. Oh, okay, one more balloon pic. Because they're just plain cool. This one is of a trio over Lake Fairlee, by John Pietkiewicz.Two die, one seriously injured in I-89 crash in Sharon. At about 3:20 yesterday afternoon, VT State Police responded to the crash at mile marker 15/8, after a southbound car crossed the median and struck one traveling northbound. Victor Parent, Jr., 94, of Northfield, was pronounced dead at the scene; 60-year-old Gail Parent, also of Northfield, was airlifted to DHMC, where she later died. Nicholas Tarr, 37, of S. Royalton was taken to DHMC in serious condition. The VSP release doesn't specify who was driving the southbound car. WCAX says it was Tarr; the Valley News says it was Gail Parent.Workload? Governing during the pandemic? Just a blip? Whatever, Hartford Selectboard sees 5 resignations in a year. With two members of the board, Julia Dalphin and Rachel Edens, stepping down this month, the Valley News's Anna Merriman looks into the revolving door on the board. Each member who's resigned had his or her own reasons, including health, other jobs, and Alicia Barrows' charge of "blatant bigotry" in Hartford. Town officials note a heavy workload; Edens cites the additional pressure of being Black; Joe Major believes the stresses of the pandemic are also a factor.SPONSORED: It’s Back! The Annual Pompy Tent Sale. As a Daybreak reader, you get VIP early access: 2 days before the sale officially kicks off! All Pompanoosuc Mills showrooms are open, and over 500 pieces of Vermont handcrafted furniture are available to browse and buy from ‘virtual tents’ on our web store. Every piece is up to 50% off, so there’s never been a better time to update your bedroom, living room, dining room, or home office. Most pieces are on display at our E. Thetford showroom. Proudly designed and built by your neighbors for nearly 50 years. Sponsored by Pompanoosuc Mills.Now, this will be a move to watch. You may remember that in addition to hosting balloonists, the Post Mills Airport's Brian Boland really wants to put a diner on his property. He doesn't have permits for it yet, but he's charging ahead anyway. "I purchased a flat-nosed 40-foot city transit bus," he reports in an email. "We are busy removing the middle 32 feet, and will be building a 32' long by 24' wide antique-looking barrel roof diner that will straddle the bus. The intended look will be that a bus drove through the diner." At the moment it's out in front of the museum, but if he gets the permit, will move across the road."Turns in life are not detours from the path; they are the path." Writer Molly Zapp has been hanging out at Windsor's Path of Life Garden, savoring the trip from the Tunnel of Oblivion through Birth, the Adventure maze, past Sharon sculptor and puppeteer Ria Blaas's Easter-Island-like heads in Community, gazing at the waterfalls of Respite... Terry McDonnell, who started building the garden in the late '90s with the help of friends and local artists, estimates that about 8,000 people visit each year—compared to the 150K who troop next door to Artisan's Park and, in particular, the Harpoon Brewery outpost there.Northern Stage expands school residencies. The theater company will be bringing performing artists virtually into 21 schools and two homeschool groups around the region to work with students on reading and performing Shakespeare this spring. Classes in a wide swath on both sides of the river, from Gorham and Franconia to Hanover, Hartford, Tunbridge, and Rutland, will get one educational video a week, as eight teaching artists work with smaller groups, all leading to a final video of all the schools. Time to do a little outdoor event planning for June. Especially because Seven Days' Kristen Ravin and Jordan Adams have pulled together some nearby suggestions. For instance, every Sunday, VINS will be hosting Yoga in the Canopy, up on the Forest Walk with longtime Upper Valley Yoga instructor Sharon Comeau. Tomorrow, Feast and Field kicks off at Fable Farm (across the road from its past venue) with its regular Thursday night lineup. First Fridays, of course, there's Light River Junction. And if you feel like traveling, Isham Family Farm in Williston is hosting seven concerts and theater performances.Leaving behind bioswales, tranquility in the midst of suburban bustle, and an oasis during fire season. A few weeks ago writer Jacques Leslie and his wife, Leslie (who, yes, is Leslie Leslie) left Mill Valley, CA and moved, sight unseen, to a patch of land above Woodstock. They became, as Jacques writes in an LA Times commentary, climate migrants, albeit "highly privileged ones, to be sure." Life in Marin County had become "a tightrope walk," especially as climate change turned each Northern California fire season into a hotter, longer ordeal than the one before it."If you like two hundred-plus year old stone walls, old foundations, cemeteries, ruins of old mills, and ancient witness trees..." you could take some lessons from musician and old map explorer Bob Totz. After a winter hiatus, he's back with his Old Roads, Rivers, and Rails blog, doing his best to piece together the contemporary route of "Road over the Mountain," shown on a 1795 map of VT running from Rutland to Stockbridge. It started, he figures, where Route 7 is now, and headed east just on the northern side of Rutand. From there, according to an 1869 map, you'd bear right at Mrs. Quow's....Speaking of roads, get ready for motorbikes. Bike Week is back—or will be starting June 12. Last year's was drastically scaled back—but not cancelled, because the 100th Bike Week is in 2023 and people have already made plans to attend, so it just wouldn't do to have it turn out to be the 99th. This year's is full on, though a lot of restaurants and businesses around Laconia are asking patrons to wear masks even though the state's mandate is gone. “We’re just asking people to be kind and courteous if a business asks that they wear them,” says Karmen Gifford, president of the Lakes Region Chamber of Commerce.
"If there’s anything human beings need to do, it is to breathe on a very, very frequent basis." That was Democratic Rep. Peter Schmidt arguing in an NH House committee hearing against a move to bar businesses from asking about someone’s vaccine status or requiring employees to be vaccinated against Covid. Its GOP sponsor, Rep. Terry Roy, worries that “if we allow businesses to decide what people have to do to their body to be employed or to be customers," then there's nothing to keep them from, say, discriminating based on body weight. The committee split evenly on his proposal.17,250. That's the number of additional Vermonters who will have to get their first shot in order for the state to reach the 80 percent benchmark for full reopening set last Friday by Gov. Phil Scott. The latest CDC data, writes Erin Petenko in VTDigger, puts the state at 76.9 percent of eligible recipients. State data shows that about 0.5 percent of the population starts the vaccination process each day, and Scott believes VT could hit his 80 percent target as soon as Memorial Day if it has “good days,” though later in the week is more likely.Sleuthing with mom on Crime Scene Kitchen. You may remember, back in the early days of the pandemic, when Glover, VT-based pastry chef Thomas McCurdy drew national coverage for his Kingdom Direct meal delivery service. He shut it down—"I don't want to say burnt out, but pretty close," he tells Seven Days' Melissa Pasanen—and turned his attention to competing on Fox's new show (first episode airs tonight) in which teams of bakers use leftover clues to try to figure out what's just been baked in a kitchen...then recreate it. McCurdy won't tell what happened, but does say he and his mom are still talking.The "shapeliest and most charming of the utensil Big Three"? That, writes Owen Edwards in Craftsmanship Quarterly, would be the spoon. He was so enamored of one, by Italian designer Massimo Vignelli, that he, um, pocketed it at a high-end NYC restaurant before he left. "I would gladly have bought it," he explains, "but it’s rare that a restaurant will sell tableware. So theft was the only option for someone who was suddenly lovestruck by tableware design." A lovely brief discourse on an object we take for granted, with a detour into its history. At least we're not still slurping soup out of shells.
A froggery hanging out on heliconia. And they look pretty darn cool, too.
So...
Dartmouth remains at 1 student case and 1 among faculty/staff. One student and 2 faculty/staff members are in quarantine because of travel or exposure, while 1 student and 3 faculty/staff are in isolation awaiting results or because they tested positive.
NH reported 76 new cases yesterday for a cumulative total of 98,428. There were no new deaths, which remain at 1,344, while 46 people with confirmed cases are hospitalized (down 2). The current active caseload stands at 421 (up 10). The state reports 25 active cases in Grafton County (down 1), 15 in Sullivan (no change), and 33 in Merrimack (down 3). In town-by-town numbers, the state says Claremont has 8 active cases (up 1) and Rumney has 6 (down 1). Haverhill, Hanover, Lebanon, Newport, Sunapee, Newbury, and Unity have 1-4 each. New London is off the list.
VT reported 9 new cases yesterday, a number it hasn't seen since last October, bringing it to a total case count of 24,136. There were no new deaths, which remain at 255, while 10 people with confirmed cases are hospitalized (up 5). Windsor County gained 1 new case and stands at 1,467 for the pandemic, with 60 over the past 14 days, while Orange County added no new cases and remains at 814 cumulatively.
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Today at 1 pm, the Vermont Council on Rural Development kicks off a two-day, online "Summit on the Future of Vermont." It's built around "the Vermont Proposition," a draft set of initiatives for the next three years aimed at making the state successful "for the next generation." A panoply of prominent Vermonters (US Sen. Patrick Leahy, Lt. Gov. Molly Gray, Front Porch Forum founder Michael Wood-Lewis, WRJ state Rep. Becca White, Bradford's Monique Priestley, VLS's Jameson Davis, and a host of others) will address sessions on everything from expanding broadband to reducing economic disparity, tackling climate change, and promoting business creation. General admission is $30, but students or people who can't afford that can sign up at no charge.
Today at 3:30 pm, Grantham Rec hosts Keene-area magician and illusionist Jason Purdy, who uses classic magic, comedy, and grand illusions in his act. At Grantham Rec Field.
At 7 pm, Gibson's Bookstore hosts NH historian Glenn Knoblock, whose new Hidden History of Lake Winnipesaukee has just been published. He'll talk about the stuff you mostly didn't know: things like the fact that the Massachusetts border once extended to Laconia; Center Harbor was the site of the country's first college sports rivalry; and Governors Island was once at the center of a religious movement that called for the end of the world.
Also at 7, Vermont Humanities presents an online "Evening with Angie Thomas." Thomas, who's written five books, is probably best known for her debut novel, The Hate U Give, which was the book thousands of people around the state read for Vermont Reads 2020. Thomas will be talking about her work on that (and her latest, Concrete Rose, a prequel) as well as about writing, creativity, dealing with fame, and more.
Simon Phelep is a clarinetist, electronic keyboardist and composer who lives in Brittany and performs as Alizarina. He got his start paying classical music in conservatory, moved on to trance electronica at raves and underground festivals in the west of France, then took off for a year in Romania...which brought a slew of klezmer, Gypsy, and Balkan influences into his music. These days he performs with the Alizarina Quartet, who somehow bring it all together. Here they are in the woods of Brittany, with the newly released "Comètes."
See you tomorrow.
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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