GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Partly to mostly sunny, still warm. That southerly air flow is still in place, and it’s going to drive today’s highs up to around 40 again. We’re also going to see a lot of gusty winds ahead of the next storm system, with a low tracking through Quebec tonight, bringing a chance of rain this evening and then serious rain after midnight, along with high winds. We’ll tackle tomorrow when the time comes, but it’s going to be a wet 20 hours or so. Lows tonight around freezing.
A timeline. The National Weather Service in Burlington has a helpful little graphic laying out the rough progression of wind, rain, ice and potential river rises (no one’s alarmed), and return to snow over the next few days. Their advice: “Secure holiday decorations as needed and plan for messy Friday commutes.”
Greeting the day. Yesterday morning’s sunrise was eye-opening all over the Upper Valley. As Cheryl Lubin writes, “The sun rises every morning and some days you have to just stop what you’re doing and be in it.” Thanks to all who sent in photos. Here are three:
Bob Wagner’s glorious shot from W. Lebanon;
Sue Jukosky’s pay-attention-to-the-clouds version from Grafton, NH;
And Dave McNally’s dawn-through-the-trees photo from Norwich.
It’s time for Dear Daybreak! This week’s collection of readers’ vignettes from around the region starts with Meredith MacMartin’s sundog from Grantham the other day, then moves on to Sue Morse Jamback’s fond reminiscence of the quarter-century-long joke that Leb’s Jim Vanier, who died last week, played on her mom (and, really, the whole Morse family); Barbara Woodard’s carefully wrought solstice centerpiece, pieced together from (mostly) Upper Valley finds—including one unlikely ornament; and Kathy Smith’s metaphorically perfect moment on Squam Lake, when her youngest son and a juvenile bald eagle mirrored each other.
Daybreak’s website just got a bit better. It’s always a work in progress, of course, but as a newsletter expert I know commented yesterday, “Hey, at least it’s not embarrassing any more.” The best thing about it may be the opportunity to find a newsletter you missed, or recent Dear Daybreaks and Enthusiasms: Just go to daybreak.news/archive and filter for what you’re looking for. As time goes on, I’ll be backfilling more old content, so eventually it’ll all be in one place. As ever, the Hiking Close to Home archives and music live elswhere: Go here for links.
Revels prepares to go out “with a bang.” Its production this coming weekend will be its last, as funding cuts and other disruptions have taken their toll. But as Marion Umpleby writes in the Valley News, Celtic-themed shows have always done well, and this one in particular, “A Scottish Celebration of the Winter Solstice”, is on its way (but not there yet) to selling out. Umpleby talks to longtime performers Rich Brown and Sharon Comeau about what their years with the community troupe have meant, and to artistic director Alex Cumming, who says, “That spirit of Revels and that community is going to continue in a new, different way…which fills me so full of joy and hope.”
SPONSORED: Express Care at Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital is now open. Our Express Care team treats adults and children over the age of one for non-life-threatening conditions. And with evening and weekend hours, you get the right level of care when you need it. Get immediate care for coughs, colds, rashes, and sprains right at APD Express Care, and all without an appointment. Alice Peck Day Express Care. Part of the best health system in the region, Dartmouth Health. Sponsored by Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital.
In Peter Orner’s The Gossip Columnist’s Daughter, a satire that’s also “a family story with a nearly insurmountable ache at its center.” Two Upper Valley writers meet up in the pages of Seven Days with poet and critic Jim Schley’s review of Orner’s latest novel. As Schley writes, the book has plenty of real characters—most notably Chicago gossip columnist Irv Kupcinet and his murdered daughter, Cookie—and plenty of fictional ones. And his scenes “slide around in time like an expertly shuffled deck of cards. In tempo and texture, his storytelling style here is as talky and brash as that of Grace Paley, Jimmy Breslin or Nelson Algren,” Schley writes.
“I like interesting people. Everyone in the book has a good story.” That’s another Upper Valleyite in Seven Days this week: Tunbridge photographer Jack Rowell talking to arts writer Pamela Polston about his new collection, Jack Rowell: Photographs. It pulls together both studio portraits and scenes from the Upper Valley and central VT, and while the scenes—at cafés, lakes, farms, and, of course, the Tunbridge Fair—tell their own stories, “Like the best art,” Polston writes, “Rowell’s portraits pique the imagination and leave the viewer wanting to know more.” Especially because they capture rural VT from the ‘70s on, at a time of transformation.
SPONSORED: Help someone who needs a hand right now! Based in the Upper Valley, Hearts You Hold supports immigrants, migrants, and refugees across the US by asking them what they need. These include Haitian immigrants in Lebanon who need everything from a baby safety gate to a futon, Afghan refugees in Vermont who need basic clothing and winter wear, an Algerian asylee who needs reading glasses, and more. Everywhere, there are immigrants who need boots and jackets and help with the basics, from shampoo to clothing to school supplies. At the burgundy link or here, you'll find people who need your help. Sponsored by Hearts You Hold.
GOP majority in the NH House fails to override Ayotte vetoes. “In vote after vote,” writes Ethan DeWitt in NH Bulletin, the House yesterday fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to override. “They failed to push through bills to allow separation of bathrooms by biological sex, ease the process of removing books from schools, and mandate the viewing of fetal development videos in school health classes.” Even so, DeWitt notes, several of the hot-button issues will be back in the chamber in some form next year—and will almost certainly be taken up on the stump, as legislators of both parties campaign on them. DeWitt details the votes and the debate.
NH’s school choice oversight committee issues clashing reports. Remember how the committee hasn’t met for a year? Well, it did so Tuesday, and the GOP chair, Sen. Ruth Ward, issued a report written without Democratic input declaring the EFA program “popular and successful” and showing no signs of reducing state support for local school districts—though it does recommend aggregating student assessments to better gauge academic outcomes. On the other hand, reports NH Bulletin’s DeWitt, the Democrats (with no GOP input) criticized the removal of EFA expenditures by vendor from the program’s website and its new all-comers approach regardless of income.
The committee did have one surprise up its sleeve, though. As the Monitor’s Jeremy Margolis reports (here via NHPR), the committee elected Lebanon Democratic Sen. Suzanne Prentiss as its new chair—a move that was only possible because a GOP House member on the five-member committee was absent. Prentiss says she wants to explore “the program’s effect on public education funding and how families become eligible for an additional special education stipend. She also expressed support for a public accounting of the assessment results for students in the program,” Margolis writes.
Danger, Will Robinson!!! VT most dangerous state to spend Christmas Day. Fun with statistics: Using data from the healthcare staffing platform Nursa, the science news site StudyFinds reports that VT’s ranking comes from a combination of a high annual accidental fatal injury rate, 25 structure fires on Christmas Day 2024, and a “near-certain 98.6% chance of snow on Christmas Day” (if only). On the other hand, there does seem to be a low rate of Google searches for “food poisoning” and VT recorded only one traffic fatality Christmas Day 2023. Overall, NH sits in the middle of the pack, though Granite Staters “consume more alcohol than any other state at 4.67 gallons per person annually.” Least dangerous? Mississippi.
Could a house cat have caught a Meganeura? Best not to underestimate cats, but then again, maybe the prehistoric dragonfly would have put up a good fight. In any case, house cats and the largest known insect, which went extinct about 283 million years ago and had a wingspan of up to 2.5 feet, were about the same size. The two fall toward the middle of Neal Agarwal’s new Size of Life scale on neal.fun, which starts with DNA and ends with a forest in Utah that is actually a single organism. Many of the creatures you’ve seen. But be glad you weren’t around around 292 million years ago for the Arthropleura, which was kind of like a 9-foot centipede. And velociraptors? Meh.
The Thursday crossword. It’s puzzle-maker and Dartmouth librarian Laura Braunstein’s regular Thursday “midi”—slightly longer than Tuesday’s “mini.” If you’re just catching up, you can find her earlier puzzles here.
Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak.
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HEADS UP
Wrensong holiday program at the Quechee Library. The a cappella ensemble may have a particular love for music of the Renaissance, but its “Songs of Celebration Through the Centuries” start in the 13th century and don’t end in the 16th century, what with a shape-note carol and favorites like “Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire.” 5 pm, no charge.
The Rumney Sessions at Fable Farm call it a year with Eric George. “We’re feeling huge gratitude for everyone who’s made the trek to Barnard on dark, cold nights to share in the warm, intimate magic of these shows. This barn was built for music,” they write. George is best known as the frontman for “the beloved old-school country band Ponyhustle,” and “spans genres, from Appalachian ballad singing to experimental folk and even punk rock.” Doors and food at 5:30 pm, music 6-ish. The Rumney Sessions will start up again in mid-January.
Interplay Jazz jam session at Upper Valley Music Center. At this month’s jam, writes organizer David Westphalen, “We’ll have a piano and it’ll be in tune.” Anyone is welcome as a player, singer, or listener. Format etc. at the link. 6:30-9:00 pm.
And anytime, check out JAM’s highlights this week: Parish Players’ Ten-Minute Play Festival from back in October; a one-minute video of ice in the White River (“JAM would like to encourage all to make 60-second spots capturing our sense of place,” they write); and the fictional band Tallywacker from the film Tallywacker at JAM to play songs and do a Q&A.
And for today...
Billy Strings and mandolinist Sam Bush off Billy Strings’ new Live From Apple Studios, with “Malfunction Junction”.
See you tomorrow.
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