SO NICE TO SEE YOU, UPPER VALLEY!
A quiet, somewhat warmer day today. There's high pressure overhead, bringing us decent sunshine and helping to moderate temps. A low that's passing well to the south will draw light winds from the north and will produce some clouds later in the day and a very slight chance of showers overnight. We're starting cold today, but highs will reach around or even above 60 by mid-afternoon, lows tonight in the mid- or upper 30s.Of course, we've got nothing to complain about. Remember the last couple weeks of April? Sunny warmth, snowstorms, and everything in between. Etna photographer Jim Block was out catching the bird life in his back yard through it all: white-throated sparrows, a dark-eyed junco, purple finches, a black-capped chickadee, mourning doves, and, for the first time in half a dozen years, a pair of evening grosbeaks....Now, what else is going on out there? Oh. Right...
NH announced 50 new positive test results yesterday, bringing its total reported cases to 2,636. Of those, 1,105 have recovered (up 86) and 92 have died (up 6), yielding a total current caseload of 1,439. Grafton County has seen one additional case and is now at 54 all told; Sullivan remains the same, at 12. Merrimack County is now at 206 (up 6). Hanover, Lebanon, and Enfield each have between 1 and 4 current cases.
VT reported 5 new cases yesterday, bringing its total to 907. Of those, 8 are hospitalized (no change), with 52 deaths (no change). Windsor and Orange counties remain at 43 and 8 reported cases, respectively. In all, the state reports 17,518 tests performed.
Lebanon to get $326,000, Hanover $272,000 for Covid-related expenses. NH has allocated the $40 million it will spend to reimburse municipalities for telework arrangements, welfare expenses, childcare costs for first responders, and other direct spending related to the pandemic. The money's being doled out based on population. Enfield nets $111,000, Canaan $94,000, Lyme $41,000. Manchester leads the list at $2.6 million, Hart's Location tails at $1,000. Full numbers at the link.Treasure Island may not open this summer. The VN reports that the Thetford selectboard decided on Monday not to open the popular recreation area on Lake Fairlee as usual, but to consider making it available for groups of up to 20 people to rent. Selectboard chair Nick Clark says the town is hoping for state guidance on parks and beaches this week.DHMC investigating use of blood plasma with Covid antibodies as treatment, looking for donors. “Reports suggest that treatment using convalescent plasma, which likely contains SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, could be a viable and safe option that may alter the course of COVID-19 in patients with severe disease and few alternatives,” said Dr. Richard Zuckerman, one of the co-principal investigators, in a hospital press release yesterday. D-H is looking for donors who have recovered from Covid-19, are over 18, and have been symptom-free for at least 28 days.This is pretty fun: Virtual crew races. Carin Reynolds, who coaches the Lebanon High crew team, has figured out a way to use Zoom and erg machines to hold races with other high schools. Using money set aside for a new shell to buy additional machines, the school now has enough to distribute so team members can race at least twice from home. Coxes start things off, but after a minute, Reynolds opens up the Zoom meeting so friends and family members can "shout encouragement, ring cowbells or do anything else motivational," the VN's Greg Fennell reports.Add Baker Library to the 7 pm bell-tolling list. "We so greatly appreciate the Dartmouth staff members who come to campus every day to perform essential duties, as well as the health care professionals on the front lines combating the virus and its effect on the Upper Valley," says Sue Mehrer, dean of libraries. Unlike the bell in the Norwich Congregational Church across the river, which must be tolled by hand, the Baker-Berry bells are programmed; that job is done by students in the Masters Program in Digital Musics.SPONSORED: Do these people ever sleep? Julian Fellowes will be Saturday's guest on the Hop’s #SmallScreenFun online chat series. He not only produced, wrote and directed the six-season Downton Abbey and its 2019 movie sequel, he’s an Oscar-winning screenwriter, novelist and writer for musical theater. Next week, join Aisha Tyler, star of Archer and Criminal Minds, and a comedian, director, author, podcaster, talk show host and, most recently, craft cocktail entrepreneur. Whew. Just writing that wears you out. Tune in to YouTube Live Saturday at 10 am for Julian Fellowes and next Thursday at 8 pm for Aisha Tyler for conversation and to post your questions in the chat. AMC closes huts for the summer. All huts in the Whites will be shuttered, though the organization still plans to open Pinkham Notch Visitor Center and the Highland Center at Crawford Notch on July 1. "It has been both heart-wrenching and heartbreaking to read the comments on social media of not only our OH (Old Hutmen) members but also those who looked forward to serving the public this summer as hut 'croo' members," director of North Country programs Chris Thayer told the Conway Sun. "But the safety of our staff, members and the public is paramount."NH fitness facilities "on the verge of bankruptcy," looking for ways to reopen. Talking to the state's re-opening task force yesterday, Michael Benton, CEO of a national chain and of three NH fitness centers, urged the panel to let gyms reopen by June 1. They've been unable to take advantage of the federal Payroll Protection Program to keep employees busy, he said. Working with other gyms in the state, he proposed a plan for facilities to open at 50 percent capacity, ask members to have their temps taken, place pieces of exercise equipment eight feet apart, and take other distancing/sanitary measures.NH state revenue losses start becoming real. Since the start of its fiscal year last July, the state has collected $76.3 million below what it has hoped for by this month, about 22 percent below projections. Much of that reduction stems from reduced business and rooms-and-meals taxes. Though many businesses are deferring filing (their deadline was extended until June 15), the extension doesn't apply to rooms-and-meals taxes, which are down almost 40 percent for this April compared to April, 2019.Meanwhile, Scott administration plans to borrow from reserve funds to plug budget hole. Vermont's General Fund is facing a nearly $195 million deficit, and finance commissioner Adam Greshin has told lawmakers the administration plans to borrow $138 million of that from the reserve fund, then pay it back next fiscal year. The rest would come from a variety of sources, Seven Days' Paul Heintz reports, including new Medicaid funding thanks to one of the federal coronavirus relief packages."The virus doesn’t give us any credit for having knocked it back." The Goodman brothers—VT-based writer David, and his Stanford epidemiologist brother Steve—had a conversation recently about the wisdom of relaxing restrictions right now. It's a local decision, Steve says, based on conditions at the moment, but the key is to have adequate testing capacity in place so that communities can respond quickly to signs of re-emergence. And thanks to no national leadership, he says, "We’re nowhere near where we need to be to have a protective radar for the community."A Little Free Library for cheese? Well, it's not quite free, but Blue Ledge Farm in Salisbury, VT—known for its goat's milk cheeses, which are usually sold through grocers—has added a tiny farmstand, and it's been selling an "astonishing amount of cheese," owner Hannah Sessions told legislators the other day. Farmstands around the state are pivoting: adding online ordering with porch-side pickup; adding products—masks, doughnuts—to their usual mix of vegetables; selling prepared foods from local producers, reports Seven Days' Jordan Barry.Need a reminder of what a Little Free Library looks like? Here's a pic of one taken yesterday on the Northern Rail Trail. "I never expected to come to the middle of the Arctic Ocean and have my daily life less restricted than it would [be] back home." That's Arctic researcher Chris Marsay, aboard the MOSAIC icebreaker, talking to WABE (Atlanta) reporter Molly Samuel about what it's like being in a place where the pandemic is just what's in the news and emails from home. "There have been plenty of conversations onboard about how strange it will be to get back and get confronted with a completely different way of life than that which we left in January," he says. "Like any good politician, he’s learned to delegate. He glares at me if he hears the sewing machine stop." You may remember Murfee, the 3-year-old spaniel who back on Super Tuesday edged out Lincoln, the Nubian goat, to become pet mayor of Fair Haven, VT. Linda Barker, Murfee's owner, has been raising money to refurbish a playground in town by sewing face masks. She put the idea up on Mayor Murfee’s FB page, and the Fair Haven Police Department ran a notice. “I got orders for 80 masks that night,” Barker says. “I woke up the next morning and thought, ‘What have I done?’”
"I guess it is no great mystery why the Cornish Art Colony was formed here." That's drone guy William Daugherty on this pic of the river above Cornish, looking along the river as it folds back on itself, farms and hills laid out below. "The primary mission was a failure but this gem was a nice consolation prize," he wrote when he posted it to FB. Link takes you to his own site. Close but not quite: VT poet laureate Mary Ruefle named Pulitzer finalist. The prizes were announced Monday, but Ruefle only checks her iPad occasionally. So it wasn't until she was making dinner that night that she learned that her poetry collection, Dunce, was one of two finalists for the prize in poetry. Her response? She told her husband when he came in from walking the dog, and texted winner Jericho Brown, who's a friend, to congratulate him. "He is absolutely wonderful, and absolutely deserving,” she says."Bumbles just keep working away. They also will work when its colder and windier compared to honeybees.” David Brooks recently discovered you could buy a box of bumblebees to pollinate your back 40, and he waxes rhapsodic on his Granite Geek blog. "There’s something about their non-threatening roundness and color scheme, plus the way they wander semi-vaguely through the air, that seems friendly and useful, like the neighborhood handyman. I imagine them muttering to themselves, 'Doggone it, where did I leave that pollen?'" he writes.
News that connects you. If you like Daybreak and want to help it keep going, here's how:
#UVTogether
Staying Connected
If you're interested in China's place in the world or in US-China relations, this is one for you. Lucy Hornby started out in China teaching English in Wuhan, went on to become a Reuters correspondent and deputy bureau chief for the Financial Times in Beijing, and is now a Nieman Fellow at Harvard. At 5 pm, she'll be talking about "After the Coronavirus: China and the U.S.” in the next live "Rocky Watch."
Lucy Terry Prince was born in Africa, kidnapped by slave traders, and carried to Rhode Island. While still enslaved in 1746, she wrote “Bars Fight,” the oldest known poem in the United States written by an African American. She moved to Vermont after regaining her freedom. This evening at 6:30, the Hartland Public Library and Vermont Humanities offer a Zoomed First Wednesdays lecture and performance by Shanta Lee Gardner about Prince's advocacy for her rights in early Vermont and New England.
Or you could catch Melissa Etheridge, who's been streaming live "from my home to yours" concerts every day at 6 pm eastern. Or, tonight at 8, Zach Nugent doing a free solo acoustic livestream of Grateful Dead/Jerry Garcia tunes and more.
Or maybe you just want to spend a few minutes anytime with three sisters getting their feet (and the rest of themselves) moving with killin'-it awesomeness to James Brown's "Get On the Good Foot." You suppose if we all got green-and-white Nikes we could do this, too? Yeah, didn't think so.
Helping Out
For the last dozen years, Neighbors Unite has been providing food and emergency assistance to community members within the Rivendell school district (Orford, Fairlee, W. Fairlee, and Vershire). They depend especially on the Neighbors Unite Golf Tournament, which has been cancelled and seems unlikely for anytime this year, leaving the effort in desperate need of donations. You can do this by sending a check (no website) to "Neighbors Unite," 285 Orfordville Road, Orford, NH 03777.
Yesterday it was music. Today it's socks. Turns out the Vermont Foodbank has another benefactor: Darn Tough has made a colorful and veggie-strewn new Foodbank Farmer’s Market sock, and all of the proceeds from selling it will go to the Foodbank.
If you're a master gardener willing to help a newbie starting up a garden, you might want to know about the new Vermont Victory Gardens program, which matches up master gardeners and new gardeners from planning through harvesting. If you've got the chops to help out, they're encouraging you to email [email protected] by May 12. Seven Days has the backstory.
Reading Deeper
“There will be more, either out there already or in the making." Nature is up with a deep and wide review of the research into SARS-CoV-2, how it works, and where it comes from: It (or a very close relation) may have been "hiding in some animal for decades." It's also evolved to be especially problematic. "Although the known human coronaviruses can infect many cell types, they all mainly cause respiratory infections. The difference is that the four that cause common colds easily attack the upper respiratory tract, whereas MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV have more difficulty gaining a hold there, but are more successful at infecting cells in the lungs. SARS-CoV-2, unfortunately, can do both very efficiently."
There's a debate brewing about the NYT's blockbuster report Monday about an internal Trump administration document forecasting up to 3,000 deaths a day by the start of June. First, here's the document itself, which actually covers a broad range of projections. But then, yesterday, NPR talked to the epidemiologist who came up with those projections, Johns Hopkins' Justin Lessler. What the Times cited was unfinished work, he says, only one of many possible scenarios. "It's as if somebody looked over my shoulder when I was halfway through putting the work together and took a picture and put the results out there," he says.
Meanwhile, however, the U of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation is out with an update to its initial projections for transmission and deaths, which are considerably higher than a few weeks ago based in part on refinements to its model of deaths, and in part on "formally incorporating the effect of changes in mobility and social distancing policies into transmission dynamics" -- ie, reopening.
The Juilliard School may be closed, but a bunch of its dancers, singers, actors, and musicians (along with alums like Jon Batiste, Yo-Yo Ma, Laura Linney, Patti LuPone, Emanuel Ax, and Itzhak Perlman)
It is a feast for both eyes and ears.
(Thanks, KH and MT!)
And with that... Go enjoy this day! See you tomorrow.
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