Archive - Sep 2009
September 29th
A blog about everything from cooking food to farming it.
Fall is a whirlwind of change. The leaves change, the air gets colder and we say goodbye to summer berries and greens and welcome their more hearty cousins: sweet winter squash, potatoes, onions, apples.
For the inhabitants of Middlebury College’s Weybridge House, this fall isn’t about saying goodbye to summer’s produce: instead, the 18 residents of the cooperative environmental interest house have been figuring out how to pickle, freeze and can it all.
September 28th
In a recent commentary, Jason Gibbs, state commissioner of the Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation, wrote an upbeat piece about his department “doing everything it can to generate economic activity and create jobs.”
Not to nick-pick, but that’s a big statement — even for a politician.
But let’s come back to that in a moment.
BRANDON — The Otter Valley Union High School field hockey team shrugged off a key injury and rallied for a 3-2 overtime win over Mount Anthony on Saturday before a happy, sun-splashed crowd at OV’s homecoming game.
The win pushed the Otters’ record under first-year coach Gary Hodder to 6-1-1, while Mount Anthony dropped to 5-2; the Patriots’ only other loss, like OV’s, was by one goal to undefeated Rutland.
Senior forward Shayna McDonough, who scored the game-winner and assisted junior middie’s Kristy Pinkham’s late game-tying goal, said the big win would give the Otters a lift.
FERRISBURGH — The Ferrisburgh Zoning Board of Adjustment has issued a conditional approval of a Champlain Oil Co. plan for a gas station, convenience store and fast-food restaurant on Route 7. But the approval came without elements of the proposal that COCO officials said were critical to their business plan: diesel fuel pumps and a drive-through window for the restaurant.
The board (ZBA) took that action on Sept. 16 and publicized it last week once COCO acknowledged it had received the ruling in the mail.
MIDDLEBURY — The former Vermont State Craft Center (VSCC) building at 1 Mill St. in Middlebury will reopen this fall as an art gallery, this time under private ownership.
Cornwall resident George Dorsey last week confirmed his plan to purchase the Frog Hollow building, which for more than three decades had been owned and operated by the nonprofit VSCC as a gallery, retail store and headquarters for art and craft classes.
MIDDLEBURY — When Katherine Smith Abbott heard the news in 2005 that the Middlebury College Museum of Art was considering purchasing a 600-year-old Italian painting, she was elated. This was right up Smith Abbott’s alley.
An associate dean and a professor of art history at the college, Smith Abbott specializes in Italian Renaissance art. She knew that the college museum didn’t own any work from the Italian Renaissance, and she urged the museum’s director to consider the purchase, both because of its condition and the void it filled in the college collection.
September 25th
MIDDLEBURY — In a mid-week cross-country meet that followed Saturday’s major Burlington Invitational, the host Middlebury Union High School boys’ and girls’ teams breezed to wins on Tuesday over Mount Abraham, Vergennes and Spaulding.
In Tuesday’s meet, the Tiger girls scored 16 points, followed by Spaulding, 51, and Mount Abe, 61. VUHS fielded only one female runner. The MUHS boys totaled 26 points, followed by Spaulding, 41, Mount Abe, 73, and VUHS, 105. VUHS coach Jeff Kauffman held out most of his top runners after Saturday’s big event.
September 24th
In “Rocky 3” (for my money the most entertaining flick in the series) reporters ask Clubber Lang, played by the inimitable Mr. T, for his view of his upcoming heavyweight title fight with Rocky Balboa.
His response: “My prediction? Pain.”
It remains the most accurate forecast in the history of real or fictional sporting events.
