Daybreak Wednesday 8/2/23

GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!

Aaaahhhh... I know, but today's pretty much a repeat of yesterday. Fog to start, mostly sunny the rest of the day, temps getting a little warmer—into the mid 70s—as high pressure slides east. Winds today from the northwest. Mostly clear to start the night, but clouds will start moving in toward morning ahead of a disturbance headed our way.A tree-climbing bear. You've gotta admire that reach, as it descends Sheldon Stansfield's cherry tree in Lyme.Faced with hiring pains, Windsor, Weathersfield, and Bellows Falls decide to share employees. Two of them, to be precise: a planning director and a zoning administrator. Halima Abuayyash just came on board in the first role, reports Liz Sauchelli in the Valley News, and Ryan Gumbart will soon take on the second. The challenge, Sauchelli writes, is that, as Weathersfield's town manager puts it, “Vermont municipalities are so small that you can’t justify a full-time position for certain positions"—but it's become near-impossible to find qualified employees willing to take on or stick with part-time jobs.A visual feast focused on Vermont. With a slice of the Upper Valley. Susan Apel was in the southwest corner of the state recently to take in "For the Love of Vermont," the exhibition at the Bennington Museum and the Southern VT Arts Center of Lyman Orton's private collection. As she writes in Artful, Orton—owner of The Vermont Country Store—has the largest collection of art about the state and by its artists in private hands, and 200 of those pieces are on display, taking in landscapes, barns, farming, and more—including a Paul Sample of Norwich and Cecil Crosley Bell's "Carnival at Royalton, Vermont".SPONSORED: Osher lecture series focuses on China. Bruce Stokes and Professor Maria Repnikova will take the stage on Friday, August 4 for "Winning Hearts and Minds: Who's Doing Better?"—a discussion of government efforts to influence public perception and related successes and failures. It’s all part of the Osher Summer Lecture Series, “China and the United States: Can Competitive Coexistence Be Maintained?” running Fridays from July 7-Aug. 11. Presented with the Dickey Center, the series is open to the public, both livestreamed and in person at LOH. Sponsored by Osher at Dartmouth."It is an extraordinary crime against art. I'm still angry about it." That was the writer Daniel Silva talking to NPR's Scott Simon a few weeks back about the 1990 theft of Vermeer's "The Concert" from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. The painting is at the center of The Collector, Silva's latest novel about art restorer and former Israeli intelligence official Gabriel Allon, and in this week's Enthusiasms, Carin Pratt says it's an ideal late-summer read, what with jewel thieves, Russian defectors, assassins, and lots of scenic locales. "Kind of like The Bourne Identity for the art set," she writes.Local skier to be honored by VT Ski & Snowboard Museum. Tara Geraghty-Moats of W. Fairlee—who's got a long record of achievement in ski jumping and biathlon, is on the US biathlon team, and would be on the Olympic Nordic Combined team if the sport's international overlords allowed women to compete in it—will get the museum's First Tracks Award at its Hall of Fame induction ceremony in October, reports Alex Nuti-de Biasi in yesterday's Journal-Opinion newsletter. The award honors a Vermonter under 35 "who is contributing to and enriching skiing or snowboarding in Vermont and/or beyond."SPONSORED: Researchers at Dartmouth Cancer Center are looking for New Hampshire and Vermont renters to take part in a research study about home radon testing. The study involves a 10-minute survey, a 90-minute discussion group on Zoom, and a final 5-minute survey. If your current home has not been tested for radon, we want to hear from you. You may receive up to $75. Hit the burgundy link or click here to learn more and to complete our interest form. Sponsored by the Dartmouth Cancer Center.12.1 inches of rain. That's how much Keene got in July—remarkably, about the same as Montpelier, but without the steep valleys that channeled water into VT's capital. Keene's total was 170 percent more than it usually sees in July; Hanover, with 10.24 inches, got 111 percent more, the Concord Monitor reports. But they're all pikers compared to Mt. Washington, which got 17 inches, the most ever recorded for July.All that water has NH urging residents to look at flood insurance. The average annual cost in NH is a bit over $1,000, writes Hadley Barndollar in NH Bulletin; an inch of water inside can cause $25,000 worth of damage, and in the wake of last month's rains, says deputy insurance commissioner DJ Bettencourt, the state has heard from homeowners "facing the prospect of having to rebuild their lives with no coverage from their insurance carrier." Barndollar looks at the differences between federal and private insurance—and writes that at a minimum, put your important documents in a safe place.Why the flooding has been such a setback for farmers in NH and VT. Beyond the obvious, that is. As NHPR's Kate Dario explains, there's a difference between ponding rainwater—which can be damaging in the moment—and floodwater from overflowing streams and rivers. "The FDA cares about these distinctions because the food safety risks differ based on the type of water that submerges crops," Dario says: Floodwater is unsafe because it can contain sewage, chemicals, contaminants, and pathogens, all affecting crop safety. Many farmers, she notes, won't have time to replant this year.NH gets closer to replacing voting machines. The state's extensive fleet of AccuVote tabulators is aging—the last new one was sold in 2008—and today, town clerks from around the state will gather in Concord to hear about possible replacements. Despite the fact that replacement parts are hard to come by, the AccuVote machines remain popular. “We love them because they’re just tabulators,” Bobbie Hitchcock, Hanover's town clerk, tells NH Bulletin's Ethan DeWitt. “They just count the ballots in the races. And they’ve been accurate.” Security and ease of use matter, she says, but accuracy is her top priority."I am in full compliance with the order and have deconstructed and removed all applicable structures from my property." That was Slate Ridge owner Daniel Banyai in an affidavit last week claiming he's torn down buildings an environmental court judge had ordered him to remove—and then ordered his arrest for not doing so. Banyai, who wants fines and the arrest warrant vacated, provided several photos of the "deconstructed" buildings, but there's been no site inspection. “He has been seen passing to and fro with material on his truck, a lot of material going in, and some things coming out,” one local tells VT Public. “But if you’re deconstructing, why do you bring material in?”Just in case you're keeping track, one word: Smuggler's. Late yesterday afternoon, VT State Police reported the third truck of the season stuck in the Notch. The driver, from Colorado, told police that he didn't read or understand English, "so he did not heed the multiple signs prior to entering the Notch." They ticketed him anyway, and Route 108 was closed as crews escorted the truck back down.Up to the minute with the Beluga whales in Hudson Bay... Every summer, writes Polar Bears International, "thousands of these whales travel to the Churchill River, which flows into Hudson Bay, to feed, molt, and give birth to their vulnerable calves in the safety of the shallow waters." And as luck would have it, they've got not one, but two Beluga cams: one underwater, one capturing the surface. So you can go hang out, too. Especially if it's hot out.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.

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A little departure for today.

Aurélien Lehmann is a French tap dancer (though really, the word in his native tongue,

claquettiste, is so much cooler, don't you think?) who took up the art when he was 15 after discovering Fred Astaire movies. He's become an evangelist in his country for what he calls "a truly American form of dance," and over the last few years has developed a show, "Tap Virtuoso," that brings tap together with classical music. Here's a taste, from Bach to Mozart and Vivaldi to Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Rimsky-Korsakov, and, finally, Gershwin. On piano: the French classical soloist

François-René Duchâble.

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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Written and published by Rob Gurwitt      Poetry editor: Michael Lipson    Associate Editor: Jonea Gurwitt   About Rob                                                 About Michael

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