GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Today's pretty much a repeat of yesterday, only hotter. Clear skies, calm winds, warming trend still on track for a couple more days, with temps today getting into the mid or upper 80s. Humidity remains low, but for the next few days heat stress outdoors could be an issue (ie, keep exercise moderate all you Covered Bridges runners) and the Leb Police are warning not to keep pets waiting for you in your car. Thankfully, nights are still cool: mid 50s tonight.Oh, also: if you smell smoke outside.... It's likely from wildfires in Nova Scotia, and unlike the high-flying western smoke a few weeks back, is close to the ground. It's expected to lift or dissipate by around noon, though the NH Dept. of Environmental Services yesterday issued an "elevated particle air pollution advisory" through Friday."I hit the water well before dawn, ready to make some nice images. The loons slept in." So goes the tough life of a loon documentarian, though in Newbury, VT, it gave Ian Clark a chance to catch a stunning photo of loons asleep in the mist. There was plenty of other bird life on both ponds he's been visiting, but the big news is that both pairs of loons appear to be nesting.Hankering for some freeze-dried Bit-O-Honey? I know just the place. It's Sophia's Candy Corner in West Leb, and in his first article for Daybreak, writer Matt Golec drops by for a chat with owner Sophia Lowe (former 3rd grade teacher at Leb's Hanover Street School) about how it all came about, what's cool about freeze-dried candies (we'll let her explain), and why it's been good business to ask customers what they want. Like, there's a whole "Nostalgia Nook" (think Mallo Cups), and an international aisle (think Puchao from Japan, Violet Crumble from Australia...). Matt's piece at the link.Piecemeal Pies and its owners declare bankruptcy. The Valley News's John Lippman reports that in a May 16 filing in US Bankruptcy Court, Piecemeal LLC lists liabilities of $958K vs. assets of $330K. Owners Justin Barrett and Josh Brown separately filed for personal bankruptcy. They remain silent on the cause, but faced "unique obstacles of bad luck not of [their] making," Lippman notes, including the Gates-Briggs flood and the disruptions of WRJ's S. Main Street water main project. Many investors who helped fund the company through the crowdfunding site MainVest are expected to lose their money.Want a memento of the former Dartmouth golf course? The land is taken, of course, but if you're in the market for a greens roller, reel mower, or golf cart, the college is selling off its stock. You've got a week to get your bids in. Just imagine the looks of awe and admiration as you let drop, "Oh, my lawn? Well, with my 2008 SmithCo Tournament Electra II..."SPONSORED: "We Sing Her Song": The 2023 Cantabile Spring Concert. Cantabile Women’s Chorus, under Director Kathy Sherlock-Green, will perform its spring concert on Saturday, June 3, at Norwich Congregational Church and on Sunday, June 4 at Lebanon Congregational Church, both at 4pm. "We Sing Her Song" features music based upon the lives and experiences of women, from Suffrage Movement anthems and songs out of sacred traditions, to the words of Sojourner Truth and explorations of womanhood and mothering. Tickets and information at the burgundy link or here. Sponsored by Cantabile.Geisel pathologist, Dartmouth undergrads create new "smart microscope." Aravindhan Sriharan, who works at DH and teaches at the med school, has teamed up with students at the college's Digital Applied Learning and Innovation Lab to make it easier for pathologists to work off digital images. As Harini Barath explains for Dartmouth News, a trained pathologist needs just a few seconds to make a routine diagnosis using a traditional microscope. But it can take minutes to scroll through high-res images. So the new scope mimics a conventional one, only a manipulable "dummy" slide links to digital images.DH sees first single-month positive operating margin since 2021. Although it finished the quarter ending March 31 with an overall loss of $15.1 million, reports Nora Doyle-Burr in the VN, it saw a positive margin of 1.9 percent in March—and its quarterly deficit was less than half the $36.6 million loss in the preceding quarter. In a note to bondholders, CFO Dan Jantzen cites a hiring freeze and other elements of a "performance improvement plan" for helping stem losses, and the opening of the new patient pavilion at DHMC as a key new revenue-generator.With a new home and a serious capital campaign, Revels North looks forward. The performance company (founded in these parts 50 years ago next year by, among others, Carol Langstaff, daughter of first-ever NYC Revels producer John Langstaff) is currently renting and hopes to buy space on Old Etna Road in Lebanon, writes Susan Apel in Artful. Toward that end, Revels is launching a $400K fundraising campaign to help with the purchase and renovations—which would give it rehearsal space and a costume/props shop."The best part of the day is listening to life stories." With Enfield considering joining the list of Upper Valley towns—including Lebanon, Hanover, Thetford, and Tunbridge—that now have community nurses, you might well wonder what they do. On his About Norwich blog, Demo Sofronas asked Norwich community nurse Kathy Watson what a typical day looks like. Short answer: talking to patients, talking to health care providers, making visits, lots of paperwork. Longer answer: "Those that live alone and have no family really need to tell their stories. The community nurse is a great listener."SPONSORED: If you care about climate change, clean energy and saving money on your electric bill, a community solar membership is perfect for you! This program makes it possible for renters, condo owners, and people living in shaded homes to adopt solar energy. You can invest in renewable energy and get most of your energy needs covered by solar power through net metering. This offer is available for residential and business customers in the Green Mountain Power service area. Contact us for more info: email [email protected] or call 802.281.3213. Sponsored by Norwich Solar.Two gas stations, a food coop in Keene, and the Errol General Store. Those four spots, believe it or not, are the only places in New Hampshire approved by the Exec Council to install EV chargers with money from the VWDieselgate fund, reports David Brooks in the Monitor. "That would have been big news in 2013," he writes, "but this is 2023." But what really gets his goat? NH is the only state in New England not part of a national program (created by California) that encourages automakers to give EV preference to dealers in participating states. Which is why it's hard to find one to buy in NH.In Nashua, NH cements its place in baseball history. Late yesterday afternoon, the Black Heritage Trail of NH unveiled a new historic marker at Holman Stadium, where catcher Roy Campanella and Cy Young Award-winning pitcher Don Newcombe played in 1946 for the Nashua Dodgers, the Brooklyn Dodgers' Class B farm team—making it the first racially integrated team affiliated with the majors a year before Jackie Robinson left the Montreal Dodgers to play for Brooklyn. The AP's Michael Casey recounts how it all came about. Nashua, he writes, "proved welcoming to the two budding stars."With an eye on last year's spike in bear conflicts, VT Fish & Wildlife hopes to head them off. In a press release yesterday, Black Bear Project biologist Jaclyn Comeau noted that there were 473 bear "incidents" reported statewide last June, compared to 206 the month before. So the agency is trying to get out the message—at state parks, at transfer stations, and to homeowners—that it's a two-way street. "Anywhere there is a risk of bears learning to look for food near people, we want people to be able to see how to reduce that risk," says Comeau. Here's their list of "steps for coexisting with bears."VT Legal Aid sues to block motel evictions. It's "a last-ditch effort" to stop the eviction—due to begin tomorrow—of homeless people living in motels under a pandemic-era program, writes Kevin McCallum in Seven Days. The group's lawyers argue that the state changed program rules improperly and failed to give tenants due notice. A hearing is scheduled for tomorrow morning—when about 800 people currently in motels are due to be moved out.Gov. Phil Scott signs seven bills into law. The disparate measures, reports VTDigger's Kristen Fountain, revolve around public safety: clarifying law enforcement roles in supporting health care workers dealing with out-of-control patients (or visitors); bringing state law in line with the feds on "straw purchases" of guns and tampering with serial numbers; changing procedures for court-ordered competency evaluations; and requiring standardization of school safety plans and procedures. Fountain runs through the details.Sure, butter, cheddar, yogurt, ice cream, and creemees. But also: eggnog, gelato, powdered milk, ghee, whey powder... In fact, reading Melissa Pasanen's Seven Days piece on all the dairy products Vermont milk is being turned into these days, you wonder if there's any actual, you know, milk out there. But demand for the original form of dairy product is dropping, Pasanen writes, so it's good news for dairy farmers that demand for the other kinds is rising. In all, the state's cows produced 2.5 billion pounds of milk in 2022 (about 300 million gallons), though tracking where it all went is nigh on impossible.“My camera equipment had to deal with spores and 100 percent humidity.” Down in his basement in Germany, a photographer named Jens spent three years growing mushrooms and capturing the magic on video. In brilliant time-lapse, lion’s mane, enoki, red oysters, and ten other varieties emerge and morph into other-worldly forms. We take them for granted, those champignons, chestnut mushrooms, and chanterelles we so blithely chop and sauté, but what a wonder to see their beginnings.The Wednesday Vordle. If you're new to Daybreak, this is the Upper Valley version of Wordle, with a five-letter word chosen from an item in the previous day's Daybreak.Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it keep going by hitting the maroon button:
A
Lost Woods
mug from DB Johnson for you? Or maybe a Vordle t-shirt? Or, of course, Daybreak tees, long-sleeve tees, and mugs. Check out what's available and wear it (or drink from it) proudly! Email me ([email protected]) if you've got questions.
Starting at 4 today, the Upper Valley Land Trust holds its "annual conservation celebration" at Poverty Lane Orchards in Lebanon. Things kick off with a tour and presentation by Poverty Lane's Steve Wood, who for decades has been growing heirloom apples and turning some of them into hard ciders that are closer to wine than to the mass-produced sweeter stuff you can get out there. Then, at 6:30, writer, storyteller, and NHPBS host (Our Hometown) Rebecca Rule will talk about "The Stories That Connect Us." Free and open to anyone from either side of the river.
Today at 5 pm, the Quechee Library hosts cultural historian Jill Mudgett for a Vermont Humanities-sponsored talk, "The Hills of Home: Mountains and Identity in Vermont History." Tracing evolving ideas about the state's landscape from its early days, Mudgett asks, "Where did our pride in Vermont’s landscape come from, and why is it that we see our shared identity as rooted in the land?"
And when was the last time you got a chance to see Ferris Bueller's Day Off on a big screen? Here's your chance. This evening at 7 (with trivia at 6:45), Mascoma Bank hosts a free screening at the Lebanon Opera House.
And to start us off for the day...
We'll go with the Eagles: The Guzheng Version. The
guzheng
is a Chinese plucked zither (you'll see it in a moment) and Hong Kong-based YouTuber Moyun, who has a penchant for staying partially hidden, has made a career of using it to cover pop classics. Only, in her hands, and with the help of looping, they're both covers and launching pads.
—with notes that include some fashion explanation.
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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